Global Studies Blog: Unit 3:Thorium as an Alternative Fuel Source

Most of the world wold like to believe that nuclear energy is the future. It has been sold to the public as the energy of the future even if many people are still skeptical, and who can blame them. With the memories of famous accidents such as Chernobyl and Fukushima hovering over every nuclear plant in the world it's a little daunting. But these accidents happened for a reason. Every nuclear reactor has a measure of safety nets installed into it in the event of unforeseen consequences. But all of these safety nets require some fort of activated response, they're not automatic. This is why accidents happen. In Fukushima there were a number of safeguards but the tsunami that hit the reactor knocked out every single one of those. In Chernobyl people weren't even thinking about safety or what could go wrong. These downfalls are based on the standard thermal reactor found across the globe. This variety of reactor is fundamentally flawed by its inadequate safety measures. I believe that the liquid fluoride thorium reactor is a much safer and more reliable alternative.

A liquid flouride thorium reactor (LFTR) is much safer than a standard thermal reactor because of its use of liquid fissile material. Now thorium itself is not fissile, but when mixed with uranium-233 it creates a fissile material which is able to run the reactor. The reason this type of reactor is much safe is because the safety net is build directly into the architecture of the system. The freeze plug requires electricity to remain plugged so in the case of a power outage it would shut off and any irradiated materials would be flooded into the emergency dump tanks. The video below really emphasizes the availability and effectiveness of an LFTR compared to a thermal reactor.

The map below shows the density of thorium deposits across the United States and in some parts of Canada.

Another great advantage of thorium as a power source is the supply and efficiency. The worlds supply of thorium separated by country is shown on the chart below.

Country	Tonnes	% of total
India	846,000	16
Turkey	744,000	14
Brazil	606,000	11
Australia	521,000	10
USA	434,000	8
Egypt	380,000	7
Norway	320,000	6
Venezuela	300,000	6
Canada	172,000	3
Russia	155,000	3
South Africa	148,000	3
China	100,000	2
Greenland	86,000	2
Finland	60,000	1
Sweden	50,000	1
Kazakhstan	50,000	1
Other countries	413,000	8
World total	5,385,000

In 2002, the worlds net energy consumption was around 14 trillion kilowatt hours. Using an LFTR at 50% efficiency it would be able to produce approximately 11 billion kilowatt hours per metric ton of thorium. To power the world with thorium it would take at a minimum 1500 metric tonnes of thorium which because of its density would only be around 130 cubic meters of volume. And comparing that figure to the supply in the chart above, even countries such as Kazakhstan and Sweden have enough thorium to power the world.

The image below is of the 3216 metric tonnes thorium that the United States Government deemed worthless and buried at the Nevada Test Site.