Thorium Power

Dr House

Dr House

Dr House

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Sounds like it could change the world one day.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium-based_nuclear_power


Thorium is four times as abundant as uranium and as common as lead. The Thorium Energy Alliance (TEA) estimates "there is enough thorium in the United States alone to power the country at its current energy level for over 1,000 years

Chinese scientists claim that hazardous waste will be a thousand times less than with uranium

It is estimated that one ton of thorium can produce as much energy as 200 tons of uranium, or 3,500,000 tons of coal
 
pitchfork said:
With land as abundant as the states I don't see why they don't just go full solar/ wind.

In the long run, problem solved.
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Because you'd practically have to cover the entire countryside with wind and solar farms? (and run into major issues at times of peak demand, it might be lovely and sunny outside when it snows, but your panels get covered...).

Also it's very hard to protect solar and wind farms due to their size from things like tornado's and hurricanes, both of which are fairly common in much of the US.
 
orderoftheflame said:
Figured out why a lot of the big countries aren't interested.
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While it is true that Uranium fission/fuel cycle was primarily developed for the weapons program

(EG MAGNOX is a direct development of plutonium production piles, as was the Soviet RMBK)

There was quite a lot of work done with Thorium in the past as well. It is not a new idea. NS Savannah ran Thorium trials during her operational life
 
orderoftheflame said:
Figured out why a lot of the big countries aren't interested.
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pretty much exactly it, although now its being rolled out as a way of making the word 'nuclear' much more passable with the masses.

tbh im not fussed whats inside it, nuclear power is the way to go, even though its generally only a large scale operation it can get smaller and it has less of a carbon impact than even some of the 'green' tehnologies.

I recall reading an article on this a couple of years back and they were considering using mini automated power stations, kind of like what youd find in a nuclear sub, for a more localised form of power station. waste is an issue but thorium produces less (i think the article said its byproduct was actually lead, although my memory may be wrong on this). plus ofc its not like there arent places where nuclear dumping is viable, chernobyl for example and they could fill in all those craters in nevada etc they made during the nuclear testing programmes
 
Small thorium reactors have a lot of potential.

I like the idea of having them running deep underground, and if there is a problem, you can just bury the whole thing.


Research is accelerating - mainly from China - definately something to keep an eye on in the future.
 
IIRc theyve just started a small throium reactor trial in scandanavia which is partly funded by the UK...
 
There was some idea of using a small Thorium power unit for a new build site. You'd get everyone who bought a new house (say one of a few hundred on a new build plot) to pay a few hundred pounds more. You'd put a sealed thorium unit underground, and it would give free electricity for those hundreds of houses for a decade or so, and then you'd pull it up and replace it. It would be like a giant version of a thorium battery.
 
Thorium deep underground.. Sounds good but protesters and greenpeace etc will pick a flaw somewere. Unfortunately we can't just keep putting up wind turbines hoping our problem will go away as we will always need peaking units sat on standby right now/coming up the grids output is dropping due to SSE taking around 6000MW offline totally until it picks up again in the gas sector and its shut its old coals down which didn't have blue-flu or carbon capture. We need some long term ideas either more nukes (yeah dangerous if they go wrong but its good power outputs for what they do) or research and development into thorium
 
Nuclear is the only way to go. There's just no other way to get enough power if you want to supply electricity to everyone who wants it. Ultimately, we want fusion, but until that happens, thorium would be relatively cheap and clean. It's sad that we don't have it because everyone wants to make nukes.
 
Steampunk said:
Nuclear is the only way to go. There's just no other way to get enough power if you want to supply electricity to everyone who wants it. Ultimately, we want fusion, but until that happens, thorium would be relatively cheap and clean. It's sad that we don't have it because everyone wants to make nukes.
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Well one day when the UN decides to limit stockpiles of nukes to a really low number (e.g 10) (Wonder if they would ever do that) we will have lots of spare to build nuke power :)
 
Steampunk said:
There was some idea of using a small Thorium power unit for a new build site. You'd get everyone who bought a new house (say one of a few hundred on a new build plot) to pay a few hundred pounds more. You'd put a sealed thorium unit underground, and it would give free electricity for those hundreds of houses for a decade or so, and then you'd pull it up and replace it. It would be like a giant version of a thorium battery.
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Are you talking about the Toshiba 4s micro reactor. 30years and provides 10MW. It still expensive at an estimated $25million. All though its not thorium.

Trouble with thorium is the price per kWh, but as gas and other sources increase pretty much year on year and research hopefully lowering the price.
 
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I don't understand why tidal power is never really considered. Good reliable source that can be predicted years in advance.
 
Thorium power has been known since the trials were abandoned around 1964.
The reason we don't have it, or any of the other options, in abundance is because too many people are still making far more money from fossil fuel.

FREE energy?
You must be joking, lad... now run along and fill yer car up for a moderately extortionate fee.
 
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