Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Gold/Mining/Energy : Big Dog's Boom Boom Room -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter van Steennis who wrote (157214)	9/18/2011 2:56:40 PM
From: Dennis Roth	5 Recommendations Respond to of 206176

>> I cannot understand why this molten salt reactor is not the standard for producing atomic energy.<< It's lack of usefulness to development of a domestic nuclear weapon industry is the main impediment to the development of Thorium for power generation. No Government wants to support an atomic power industry that doesn't act as an adjunct to their nuclear weapons industry. Those nations without nuclear weapons don't want to develop nuclear facilities that can't be readily adapted to aid the production of weapons should the need arise, no matter how piously they proclaim that they will never want to produce a bomb.

To: Peter van Steennis who wrote (157214)	9/18/2011 9:13:03 PM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 206176

<molten salt reactor that appears to be much safer> If you want to test out a fancy new solar power technology, you can do it quickly and cheaply. You can buy enough solar panels for the roof of one house. There are a long list of companies, making solar panels using gee-whiz technologies that might transform the global energy industry. Or not. Solyndra, for instance, has several warehouses full of panels they'll sell you (very cheaply, with no warranty). From decision-time to generating electricity, about 18 months. With nuclear, the time and money hurdles are much, much higher. From the time a new technology is designed, to producing megawatts: at least 10 years. That's if everything goes right. In the real world, it'll probably take 20 years, or more. And, you'll probably have to spend 5 billion dollars, at least, for your first commercial reactor. You can't start small, try several different technologies, and scale up once you've found a winner. Plus, you have to worry about protesters laying down in front of the bulldozers, the day you break ground on the construction site. More delays. So, most new nuclear technologies never go beyond the concept stage. It just takes too much money and time. Nuclear energy development is like a chemical reaction, with a very high activation energy, impossible to overcome in real-world conditions. en.wikipedia.org This is unfortunate, but true.

To: Peter van Steennis who wrote (157214)	2/22/2012 2:59:06 PM
From: Triffin	3 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 206176

LFTRs ( Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor ) Revisited .. This topic gets discussed on this thread from time to time .. Today's Drumbeat over at TheOilDrum.com has an article on this topic .. The following excerpt is from the comments section of the referenced article .. There are three compelling ( to me ) characteristics of this technology .. 1) Reactor core cannot experience a "melt down" 2) Ability to burn existing fission fleet's spent fuel assemblies 3) Doesn't require any cooling water I'm sure there are some difficult engineering considerations to be addressed/solved with the LFTR approach to power generation prior to deployment .. I may not be the sharpest pencil in the box, but I do know that whoever successfully deploys this technology first .. will OWN the future .. It better be US .. ===== Nuclear power isn’t the problem. The problem is with the reactors the world has been using to make it. If the reactors at Fukushima had been Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTRs) they wouldn’t have a mess on their hands. Liquid-fuel reactor technology was developed at Oak Ridge National Labs in the 1960s. Although the test reactor worked flawlessly, the project was shelved, a victim of political considerations and Cold War strategy. But LFTRs have been gathering a lot of new attention since the events in Japan. A LFTR is a completely different kind of reactor, as different as an electric motor from a gasoline engine. It can’t melt down, and it automatically adjusts its heat generation to meet changing workload demands. It requires no active cooling system and can be installed anywhere on earth, even an underground vault. A tsunami or a tornado would roll right over it, like a truck over a manhole cover. LFTRs use liquid fuel - nuclear material dissolved in molten fluoride salt. Solid-fuel reactors are atomic pressure cookers, with the constant danger of high-pressure ruptures, meltdowns, and the forceful ejection of radioactive material into the environment. LFTRs don’t use any water or steam, and they always operate at ambient pressure. If disaster strikes and a LFTR springs a leak, the spill cools to an inert lump of rock, chemically locking all the nuclear material inside. The fuel can all be recovered and used again. The spill would be measured in square meters, not square kilometers. LFTRs can deliver 750ºC heat for industrial processes, or spin a high-temperature gas turbine to generate power. They run on Thorium, a mildly radioactive material more common than tin and found all over the world. America has already mined enough Thorium to power the entire country for 400 years. It’s found by the ton in the tailings of our abandoned Rare Earth Element mines. LFTRs are highly resistant to proliferation. Thorium is bred into 233-Uranium inside the reactor, but only enough is made to keep the LFTR running, so no stockpiling occurs. While 233U is an excellent fuel, its harsh radiation makes it nearly impossible to steal, and extremely difficult to use in a weapon. Liquid fuel can be continuously cleaned of the contaminants that spoil solid fuel. This unique feature enables LFTRs to consume their fuel so thoroughly that they can even use the spent fuel from other reactors, cleaning up our legacy of nuclear waste while producing a minuscule amount of waste themselves. A 1-gigawatt LFTR, big enough to power a city of one million, will run on one ton of Thorium per year, or about 2 teaspoons per hour. The LFTR’s yearly long-term waste will be the size of a basketball. Compared to the long-term waste profile of a conventional solid-fuel reactor, a LFTR’s waste would be substantially harmless in just 300 years. Not 300 centuries -- 300 years. washingtonpost.com ===== Triff@Why-Aren't-We-Doing-This.com