Ecologically-friendly nuclear

[Lamplighter]

...experimental assessment pending...

details ... details

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by Lamplighter

details ... details

Well, the big new diff in this study reactor up in Norway is that the first method considered for Th-fuel fission was "we need a neutron source" to bombard the thorium, making it U233 -- a short half life and lots and lots of hot, consuming the thorium, decaying readily itself, and turning the steam turbines. Now they're trying the same but using alpha particles, this being what plutonium mostly spits, and plutonium is alloyed in the thorium fuel rods for the purpose. They may be making specific use of Pu240's high rate of spontaneous fission here. Pu240 seems a nuisance in bomb making; Pu239 is much more cooperative for waiting around in an arsenal, but 240 is more immediately useful generating power.

Part of the "experimental results pending" is that after running the fuel rods for a goodish while, a few years if memory serves, they're going to pull the rods and analyze them -- to see if they're ending up with what they expect, I gather. And what all that will mean to the business of nuclear power -- what if anything they might need to do differently from the use or reprocessing of enriched-uranium rods.

[xoxoxoBruce]

It's not the alpha from the plutonium that will make the Thorium viable. Alpha's only good for making Helium.