| User Info
| Ambrose Is Late (Again: Energy Policy) in forum [Market-Ticker]
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Dashingdwl
Posts: 9752
Incept: 2007-06-26
los angeles
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How do you get long thorium?
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When you are hard and disciplined, you can be principled. People fear you because they have no leverage against you. It's the truest form of Liberty.
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Medicdan
Posts: 8008
Incept: 2010-02-11
Scottsdale, AZ
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Damn Gen, you are on a roll today. 
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Bagbalm
Posts: 4248
Incept: 2009-03-19
Just North of Detroit
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This is a political problem not an engineering problem. You think gay rights and abortion stirs the emotions? Anyone advocating atomic energy might as well have a trefoil branded on their forehead. Most of the people have a horror of anything atomic. They would easily pass a law banning atoms if it came up. They also think an electron is something about the size of a pea that come rattling down the wire like a tube. What do you expect of a school system that doesn't teach the basic sciences and a political machine that runs on emotion and innuendo?
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Jwm_in_sb
Posts: 1036
Incept: 2009-04-16
California Desert
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Damn it, what the hell are we doing as a country and a society right now? We could solve the energy problem and reignite the job market simultaneously. Gen, maybe the candidate who goes after fraud needs to pursue this as well?
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Abn0rmal
Posts: 9261
Incept: 2009-01-10
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Bagbalm wrote..Most of the people have a horror of anything atomic. They would easily pass a law banning atoms if it came up. One summer without air conditioning or with $5/gallon gasoline would would completely reverse that sentiment even if it is even as prevalent as you say. |
Genesis
Posts: 130678
Incept: 2007-06-26
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Abn: Yep.
I lived 30 miles downwind from Fermi I as a kid.
If there's someone who should be "against" nukes based on the fact that the plant was within a few minutes of turning me into glowing radioactive waste, it's me.
I'm not. I'm strongly pro-nuclear energy, because I understand that all choices come with risks for the rewards you wish to receive.
There is no free lunch, and since energy is necessary for economic prosperity...
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I don't care if it makes sense -- only if it makes money. -- Me
Bank (n): See scam, fraud and theft. Eat a bankster -- they're low-carb.
What part of "shall not be infringed" was unclear?
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Sangell
Posts: 379
Incept: 2009-08-16
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Nuclear power is a tough sell and 'thorium' sounds sinister and as Americans tend to be scientifically illiterate getting them to embrace something that sounds dangerous is tough. Wind and sunshine are so much more comfortable to believe in than neutrons of thorium. Hell even 'hydrocarbons' have become evil
so effective has the green lobby become in shaping the debate.
One would have thought France, which is better level headed about these things
would be the go to country for developing it but, like of lot things, the French are keen on something only if they can get the Germans to pay for it!
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Genesis
Posts: 130678
Incept: 2007-06-26
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The French made an early decision to put a lot of money into reprocessing facilities for traditional uranium/plutonium fission reactors.
The Thorium cycle units would not need these - at all. Their reprocessing needs are modest and chemical (as opposed to isotopic) and as a consequence MUCH simpler and less expensive. Nearly the entirety of the investment France made in traditional reprocessing facilities would be a zero were they to move in this direction.
Thus, they didn't.
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I don't care if it makes sense -- only if it makes money. -- Me
Bank (n): See scam, fraud and theft. Eat a bankster -- they're low-carb.
What part of "shall not be infringed" was unclear?
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Jwm_in_sb
Posts: 1036
Incept: 2009-04-16
California Desert
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Gen, is it really politics and ignorance that have been preventing this? Or is there another motive involved on the part of dis-incentivized parties?
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Cheyenne
Posts: 82
Incept: 2009-01-22
Santa Cruz, Ca
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Ahhh, nuke power.
Yet another issue that's kept other liberals looking at me like I had a second head.
Trying to educate people is hard, especially when they are fighting your reason with fear.
It just always seemed like a great way to keep the environment in good shape. Now of course, I realize we still need the oil for lots of stuff...still no reason not to have cheap clean power.
Build one in my backyard! (Yeah, good luck where I live...)
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"Fear Disturbs your concentration" -- Sabine Schmitz
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Pelle031
Posts: 185
Incept: 2009-03-24
Philly burbs - PA
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dammit I hate when 'simple' solutions are non-starters due to what MUST be politics. That and NIMBYs. Though I prefer the term BANANA.....*sigh*
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Kwl88
Posts: 518
Incept: 2009-04-16
KC, MO
Banned
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Gen,
What you need to do, is what the Dems almost always do, CHANGE the MARKETING of your desired idea(s)?
Instead of terms like "Nuclear" or "Thorium" - say "SunEnergy" for "Nuclear" and say "VikingGreen" for "Thorium". Then use these new terms in the context of "GREEN ENERGY". Then create PSA's and place them all over the TV & radio.
This typical LeftWing euphimistic(sp?) propaganda ploy will work in no time amongst the general public! Hey, it got MaObama elected! Give it a shot!
Plus - its NEVER a technical problem ITS ALMOST ALWAYS a PEOPLE/POLICAL PROBLEM!
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Jal
Posts: 512
Incept: 2009-03-25
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Hummm! Let’s not hyperventilate! There are lots of sources of information. Starting Dec. 2002 http://gif.inel.gov/roadmap/ Generation IV Technology Roadmap The technology roadmap describes the required system research and development (R&D) necessary to develop each of the six selected Generation IV systems and the approximate time to completion. In addition to concept-specific R&D, the roadmap recognizes that certain R&D tasks may support the advancement of multiple systems. Therefore, crosscutting R&D in the areas of fuel cycle, fuels and materials, energy products, risk and safety, economics, and proliferation resistance and physical protection are also defined in the roadmap. The technology roadmap and its supporting documents (Table of Contents) are available through this web site. Described in the roadmap are six system concepts chosen by the forum to be researched: Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor (GFR) Very-High-Temperature Reactor (VHTR) Supercritical-Water-Cooled Reactor (SCWR) Sodium-Cooled Fast Reactor (SFR) Lead-Cooled Fast Reactor (LFR) Molten Salt Reactor (MSR) and April 2010 http://nuclear.gov/pdfFiles/NuclearEnerg.... NUCLEAR ENERGY RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT ROADMAP SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS This document presents an integrated strategy and R&D framework for the DOE Office of Nuclear Energy. In order to meet the Administration’s goals of energy security and greenhouse gas reductions, nuclear energy must play an important role in the national energy portfolio. NE’s derived missions in support of these national goals are to enable the development and deployment of fission power systems for the production of electricity and process heat. Four research and development objectives have been identified, which will guide NE’s program and strategic planning. Progress in these areas will help ensure that nuclear energy continues to be among the suite of available U.S. energy options throughout the 21st century. These objectives are: • R&D Objective 1 – Develop technology and other solutions that can improve the reliability, sustain the safety, and extend the life of current reactors. • R&D Objective 2 – Develop improvements in the affordability of new reactors to enable nuclear energy to help meet the Administration's energy security and climate change goals. • R&D Objective 3 – Develop sustainable nuclear fuel cycles. • R&D Objective 4 – Understand and minimize the risks of nuclear proliferation and terrorism. |
Anti
Posts: 4281
Incept: 2007-10-09
Online
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I found this article from May of this year: http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/sci....excerpt: Quote:"What's not to love?" asked Kirk Sorensen, a NASA rocket scientist in Huntsville, Ala., who is earning his doctorate in nuclear engineering.
Sorensen has taken up the cause of thorium reactors, an idea conceived in the 1950s and last researched in the United States in the early 1970s at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
And compared to coal?
"The amount of thorium it would take to power my whole life is the size of a marble that would fit in my hand," Sorensen said. "The amount of coal that would power my life would bury my yard to 30 or 40 feet."
The scientists who designed the first molten salt reactors at Oak Ridge were so far ahead of their time, Sorensen said, that "It's like a little moment of the 21st century was plucked out and plunked into the '50s."
So why aren't there thorium reactors all over the country?
Several nuclear scientists said the nation was simply too wedded to uranium when the Department of Energy cut funding to the Oak Ridge reactor research.
"It was demonstrated in a couple of test reactors here that it works and it works well," said Dan Ingersoll, senior program manager for nuclear technology programs at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
"It was abandoned not because it was a bad idea. It was a matter of having limited resources at the national level and choosing a single technology." the article has a picture of the inside of the reactor
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Snowman
Posts: 1797
Incept: 2009-03-09
avoiding yellow snow
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excellent ticker, glad to see you are raising the topic.
It all boils down to cost and incentives, and the economics of the nuclear energy industry.
It doesn't make any economic sense to mine thorium, presently. It isn't "clustered" in "reserves" like say uranium. It is all over the place, abundant, but scattered in very small concentrations which makes it extremely expensive to "mine". Take seawater, for instance and forget about that for now there is no known industrial working method for extracting any metals and ions from the water. But let's imagine there is. One would have to "drain" the entire Gulf of Mexico (only the clean stuff!) to extract enough uranium out of the seawater (assuming a very optimistic 50% recovery) to supply 25% of the US annual uranium market. Now think thorium which is far less frequent in sea water than Uranium (parts per trillion, ten to the minus ten) and one can imagine the difficulty to both extract sufficient quantities and the costs involved.
Canada and India have working thorium reactors but on a very small scale, primarily due to the extraction issue. If there is a way to solve this, maybe with Uncle Sam spending money on the problem instead of giving it to bankers, it is a really great idea. The real benefit, imho, is that these reactors can be built very small, almost small enough for single homes or small communities.
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Abn0rmal
Posts: 9261
Incept: 2009-01-10
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From the article linked by Anti: Quote:"We're not advocating that we build a full power plant or reactor," Why the hell not? The Chicago pile achieved criticality at December 2, 1942 3:20 p.m central time. The USS Nautilus (SSN-571) was underway on nuclear power on January 17, 1955 11:00 am eastern time. We went from the first ever sustained fission reaction to the first operational nuclear-powered warship in less than 10 years. We built a liquid fluoride thorium reactor less than 10 years after the Nautilus launched and operated it for half a decade. Why should we accept that our ability to build these things is be less than it was 50 years ago? The hard part has already been done! |
Pj
Posts: 1210
Incept: 2009-12-07
Putnam County, New York
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Quote:Several nuclear scientists said the nation was simply too wedded to uranium when the Department of Energy cut funding to the Oak Ridge reactor research. The decision to go with uranium might be forgivable if they actually BUILT enough uranium nuclear reactors to make a difference and make us more energy independent.
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When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.” Edward Gibbon
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Bighiller
Posts: 1471
Incept: 2009-05-06
Hiding from Monkeys
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Nuclear would be great here in BC if we didn't get so much from hydroelectric.
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The Earth will forget Mankind.
The play of life will go on.
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Sharon
Posts: 4352
Incept: 2008-02-10
Odessa, Missouri
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So is the problem with this the difficulty of extracting Thorium, as Snowman says?
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Semper ubi sub ubi.
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Abn0rmal
Posts: 9261
Incept: 2009-01-10
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There's a lot of thorium in the tailings left over from mining other metals. There's thorium in the ash left over from burning coal. There's also plenty of monazite which can be exploited. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MonaziteIf that's not enough NASA has already mapped concentrated deposits of thorium on the moon and mars.   |
Pj
Posts: 1210
Incept: 2009-12-07
Putnam County, New York
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Quote:If that's not enough NASA has already mapped concentrated deposits of thorium on the moon and mars. I'm sure Greenpeace and the Sierra Club have already identified endangered dust mites on those planets whose hind legs are 1 millionth of an inch longer or shorter than their other legs yada yada yada. They'll easily find some lib judge that will help tthem tie-up the whole issue in court for decades.
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When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.” Edward Gibbon
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Soylent
Posts: 129
Incept: 2009-08-27
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"So is the problem with this the difficulty of extracting Thorium, as Snowman says?"
No. It has rare-earth-like chemistry, you'll find it in fairly high concentrations wherever you find rare-earths. E.g. in the monazite sands of India, which contain 3-10% thorium, with a resource of ~300 000 tonnes of thorium.
There are fairly decent granite deposits in the US(Lemhi Pass) and fairly decent amounts of it could be co-mined with phosphate rocks(used in P-fertilizer).
The US government threw away 3200 tonnes of thorium nitrate; just burried it beneath the Nevada desert. That's 2000-3000 GW*years of electricity.
If you had to get uranium and thorium from average crust, you would need about 10 cubic metres of rock for someone who consumes 10 kWth continous(western european living standard) with a lifespan of 100 years. If you only extract and fission half of it then you need 20 cubic metres instead; big whoop.
Thorium reactors don't directly use thorium; you need about 1 tonne per GW of fissile material to start them(in the form of enriched uranium or reactor grade plutonium from spent fuel). Once you have them started, they make fissile U-233 from thorium to replace what they fission(U-235 or Pu-239, Pu-241 in first generation reactors). Depending on the design parameters you can get them to make slightly more or slightly less fissile material than they consume.
If you design them to make more than they consume you can save the surplus towards starting up more reactors.
Fast breeder reactors need about 5 to 10 tonnes of fissile material per GW to start up. They have some neat benefits; they're much better at incinerating plutonium without any left overs(in a fast spectrum you get far fewer neutron captures, which means you get less americium and curium) and they can if desired make surplus U-233 for molten salt reactors faster than molten salt reactors alone can make surplus U-233.
Molten salt reactors started up on plutonium will reduce the amount of transuranic waste, but sticking the plutonium in a fast breeder reactor will reduce the transuranic waste even further to next to nothing. I don't feel that this is necessary unless it is economically beneficial to scale thorium up REALLY REALLY fast because I'm not so worried about TRUs; partly because I believe the geological disposal method is sound and partly because I don't believe they'll ever be disposed of(really fast neutrons will fission just about anything that can be fissioned; this is what you get from a D-D or D-T fusion reactor.)
Reason: ETA
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Wb6yyz
Posts: 242
Incept: 2009-03-16
Banned
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I've always been in favor of thorium based reactors for the reasons cited. Yes, eventually the world's thorium supply will run out, but hopefully by that time, we will have mastered fusion reactions, maybe even the more difficult aneutronic reactions which will generate electricity directly.
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Steelpiston71
Posts: 4848
Incept: 2007-09-05
Michigan
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LightBridge (LTBR) is a Thorium play...
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"We have resolution authority under Frank/Dodd... How about we USE IT?" Karl Denninger, 10/07/10 on the Dylan Ratigan Show, MSNBC.
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