One neutron converts them into a fissile form and the other neutron actually causes the fission. Most of the uranium and all of the thorium is fertile, meaning that it can be converted into fissile fuel inside a nuclear reactor.īoth thorium and uranium-238 require two neutrons to release their energies.
Only a small fraction of natural uranium is fissile. By using the nuclear fuel in fluoride form we not only simplify the fuel cycle but we make recycling of the fuel far more straightforward.Īlthough liquid-fluoride reactor technology can enable us to use uranium fuel with greater efficiency than we do today, we believe that the long-term viability of nuclear energy will come about when we are able to use nuclear fuels with far greater efficiency than we can today. The uranium hexafluoride can be reduced to uranium tetrafluoride as it is loaded into the reactor and used in that form to produce electrical energy. Because the reactor uses fuel in the fluoride form, there is no need to convert uranium hexafluoride back to oxide and to form it into pellets, rods, and assemblies. It is these assemblies that are loaded into the reactor, irradiated to produce electricity, and then removed and disposed.Ī liquid-fluoride reactor has the potential to dramatically simplify several of the steps in the nuclear fuel chain. Then the oxide powder is sintered into pellets which are loaded into rods which are formed into assemblies. The reason for this is so that the uranium can be enriched.īut at the end of the process the uranium fluoride salt must be converted back to an oxide form and this is chemically unfavorable. Flibe Energy Overview of the Florium Fuel Cycleįor a technical discussion about the differences between using uranium versus thorium for nuclear fuel, we turn to Flibe Energy and their detailed overview of the florium fuel cycle, in its entirety.Īccording to Flibe Energy, “in today’s approach to generating nuclear energy, we mine uranium oxide ore out of the ground and chemically convert it to a fluoride salt-first uranium tetrafluoride and then uranium hexafluoride. While all of US nuclear plants run on uranium, countries including India and Japan are beginning to adopt thorium as the fuel of choice for nuclear power plants of the future due to their efficiency and safety. Sorensen, who coined the term “liquid fluoride thorium reactor”, believes the nuclear industry is thwarting the development of this technology to protect its turf while at the same time conceding its advantages.įollowing is a video of Sorensen talking about thorium reactors: In “Thorium Energy Cheaper than Coal”, author Robert Hargraves compares coal, solar, wind, biofuels and other energy resources to “Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors.” New Nuclear Technology Safer Than Fossil Fuels?Īccording to Kirk Sorensen, a former NASA engineer and president of Flibe Energy of Huntsville, Alabama, US utilities preparing to replace more than 30 nuclear reactors should consider the “liquid fluoride thorium reactor” (LFTR) or “lifter”, which is considered to be more efficient and safer. The recent boom in fracking, not without its own environmental issues, has put a temporary damper on the use of coal in the United States but this is not the case in other parts of the world where coal is being used In large amounts, causing millions of deaths a year. The only way to leave fossil fuels in the ground, estimated at today’s market rates as having a value of over $40 trillion, is to find a source or sources of fuel that will undercut fossil fuel prices, making them uneconomical. Thorium was safer, cleaner and more abundant than uranium, but because nuclear weapons could not be built from it, it was relegated to a footnote in atomic energy journals for the past half century. The reason uranium won out over thorium at the dawn of the Atomic Age was its ability to undergo fission and provide material for atomic weapons. Not only that, thorium just might underlie the future of a plentiful and widespread prosperity on earth, make wars over scarce fossil fuels obsolete, eliminate the release of choking and poisonous pollutants into the atmosphere and make the debate over global warming and climate change a moot point. Thorium, discovered in 1828, is abundant in the earth and has been used since in industrial processes.
A Clean Source of Energy That Will Be Available Forever
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