nuclear-news

Can thorium solve the nuclear problem? That’s doubtful.

San, Peter Zeihan, Geopolitical Strategist, 27 Nov 23

Many countries consider thorium a viable and attractive option for generating power and meeting their growing energy needs. Thorium is more abundant in nature than uranium and China has already completed its first experimental thorium-based nuclear reactor. But a substantial number of global nuclear reactors rely on uranium, and transitioning to thorium would require considerable research and development investment.

Straight Arrow News contributor Peter Zeihan explains how uranium-based nuclear power works and sheds light on why thorium, despite being championed by many nations, may not be the ideal substitute.

Excerpted from Peter’s Nov. 27 “Zeihan on Geopolitics” newsletter:

Thorium is a potential substitute for uranium-based nuclear power, but will it solve our nuclear problems? If thorium could help with the proliferation of plutonium and make it harder to create weapons on the backend, adoption of more nuclear power might be easier….but thorium isn’t our knight in shining armor.

Here’s the grossly over-simplified uranium nuclear process: you take the usable uranium and separate it from the other isotopes, then convert it into something like a fuel rod, then it’s placed in a reactor which generates heat which spins a turbine. (Like I said, grossly over-simplified) Once that’s done, one of the waste materials is called plutonium.

The process with thorium is a bit more involved and requires different infrastructure, but you still end up with plutonium. Sure, it’s marginally less of the bomb-making stuff and in a bit more complex compound mix, but there’s STILL plutonium.

While this is an interesting tech that should be explored by countries with a bunch of thorium (like India), this doesn’t solve our proliferation issue. Plus, there’s still an entire set of other problems that need to be considered, such as disposal and storage.

Barring the development of fundamentally new tech, nuclear power might be losing its place in the U.S. energy mix. https://san.com/commentary/can-thorium-solve-the-nuclear-problem/

November 29, 2023 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | thorium