All very interesting, thanks for the links. I notice they say Thorium is a low value by product of uranium, or perhaps this is just one source of it. Is thorium more a poor persons uranium reactor?I doubt uranium has much of a future in Australia or in the rest of the world, thorium based reactors will dominate nuclear energy in the future, both India and china have thorium reactors in development.
http://www.powermag.com/POWERnews/A...orium-Use-in-Chinese-CANDU-Reactors_2054.html
http://www.cs-re.org.cn/en/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=16
Uranium is a dead duck IMO.
I don't know about the long long term, but the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE) say approx 64 new nuclear power plants will be bought on line in the next 6 years. China is expected to build 20 over the next 10 years. I doubt if many (if any) are thorium.I doubt uranium has much of a future in Australia or in the rest of the world, thorium based reactors will dominate nuclear energy in the future, both India and china have thorium reactors in development.
Uranium is a dead duck IMO.
While thorium can be used in common LWR's the real future of nuclear energy is in the use of MSR-Molten Salt Reactors and LFTR-liquid fluoride thorium reactors based on the thorium fuel cycle.When using thorium in modified light water reactor (LWR) problems include: the undeveloped technology for fuel fabrication; in traditional, once-through LWR designs potential problems in recycling thorium due to highly radioactive 228Th; some weapons proliferation risk due to production of 233U; and the technical problems (not yet satisfactorily solved) in reprocessing. Much development work is still required before the thorium fuel cycle can be commercialized for use in LWR, and the effort required seems unlikely while (or where) abundant uranium is available. *Thanks Wikipedia*
http://www.ga.gov.au/minerals/research/national/thorium/index.jsp
Uranium will be with us for a while yet I am afraid. Uranium-235 has a half life of about 7000 million years.![]()
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