Are thorium reactors the way forward?

[asthmatic camel]

Interesting article in today's Daily Torygraph.

There is no certain bet in nuclear physics but work by Nobel laureate Carlo Rubbia at CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) on the use of thorium as a cheap, clean and safe alternative to uranium in reactors may be the magic bullet we have all been hoping for, though we have barely begun to crack the potential of solar power.

Dr Rubbia says a tonne of the silvery metal – named after the Norse god of thunder, who also gave us Thor’s day or Thursday - produces as much energy as 200 tonnes of uranium, or 3,500,000 tonnes of coal. A mere fistful would light London for a week.

Thorium eats its own hazardous waste. It can even scavenge the plutonium left by uranium reactors, acting as an eco-cleaner. "It’s the Big One," said Kirk Sorensen, a former NASA rocket engineer and now chief nuclear technologist at Teledyne Brown Engineering.

"Once you start looking more closely, it blows your mind away. You can run civilisation on thorium for hundreds of thousands of years, and it’s essentially free. You don’t have to deal with uranium cartels," he said.

Sounds too good to be true, but is it? I have no idea.

[Croydon Bob]

I have no idea.

And neither does anyone else here...


It is being seriously looked at in several countries. I doubt it will prove to be a miracle power provider; it might be an improvement on uranium. Or might not.

[brianp]

It is being seriously looked at in several countries. I doubt it will prove to be a miracle power provider; it might be an improvement on uranium. Or might not.

In theory it sounds great - but so did uranium reactors back in the 1950s. They were the miracle answer to the nation's power needs - soon electricity would be so cheap they would be giving it away. It didn't quite work out like that.