That's a critical time period, because that's when Milton Shaw was appointed head of the Division of Reactor Development and the liquid metal fast breeder reactor (LMFBR) project started taking over the show at the AEC. If he instead took the seat, and kept it for long enough (by no means guaranteed), that gives the MSR a powerful patron in Washington during the mid to late 60s. IOTL, Weinberg turned the position down, preferring to remain as head of ORNL. Weinberg was the head of Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), the laboratory that developed the MSR, and he was the project's main backer within the AEC bureaucracy. My recommendation for a PoD: Alvin Weinberg was offered a seat on the Atomic Energy Commission by John McCone in the late 50s/early 60s. And the LFTR is just a type of Molten Salt Reactor (MSR) most of the attractive features of the LFTR, other than proliferation resistance, are actually features of the MSR, which can be run on other fuel cycles as well.Īssuming you mean the MSR, it depends on how you get it accomplished. People usually mean the Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor (LFTR) when they say "thorium reactor", but thorium can be used as a fuel in a wide variety of reactor types, including the existing fleet of LWRs.
India should invest in developing clean coal technology reduce oil imports and promote alternative solutions such as electric vehicles and tap ocean thermal energy and uranium, he said.It depends on what kind of thorium reactor you're talking about. This is a huge project and nations should join hands in this, he said. It gets continuously replenished and is as endless as solar and wind, he pointed out. Nearly 4 billion tonnes of uranium in seawater could fuel 1000 of 1,000 MW nuclear plants for 100,000 years, Pillai said. On getting energy from oceans, Pillai said uranium seawater extraction makes nuclear power completely renewable.
It is possible to generate nearly 5,000 mw of power through the 900 plants across India, he added. The pollution in Delhi, for instance, can be curbed by turning the waste into power. This is already being done in Salem, and can be replicated elsewhere. Pillai also suggested generation of power through municipal solid waste. However, it is ‘fertile’ and upon absorbing a neutron will transmute to uranium, which is an excellent fissile fuel material, the association said. Thorium is not itself fissile and so is not directly usable in a thermal neutron reactor. Thorium is very insoluble, which is why it is plentiful in sands but not in seawater, in contrast to uranium. Thorium is found in small quantities in most rocks and soils, where it is about three times more abundant than uranium. Other major countries that have thorium resources include the US, Egypt, Turkey, Venezuela, Canada, Russia, South Africa and China, the association’s website said. With availability of abundant thorium, India can take the lead in thorium-based reactors, he added.Īccording to the World Nuclear Association, out of the 63,55,000 tonnes of thorium resources available globally, India has 8.46 lakh tonnes, followed by Brazil with 6.32 lakh tonnes and Australia with 5.95 lakh tonnes. This is equivalent to 230 train cars (25,000 tonnes) of bituminous coal or 600 train cars (66,000 tonnes) of brown coal, he said. For instance, 6 kg of thorium metal in a liquid-fluoride reactor has the energy equivalent of 66,000 MW hr. Thorium has high thermal conductivity and higher melting point. Nearly 25 per cent of the world's thorium ore is available in India, especially in Kerala and Tamil Nadu. Its exploitation requires a proper sequencing of reactor-fuel cycle technologies in the overall programme, he said at the 9th edition of TANENERGY Summit 2019 organised by FICCI and the Tamil Nadu State Council on the theme: Emerging Energy Scenario in the Current Economic Trend. India’s reserves of thorium are at least three times larger than its uranium reserves. Thorium is a weakly radioactive metallic chemical element. India should start developing thorium-based nuclear reactors as an alternative source of energy, said A Sivathanu Pillai, President, Project Management Associates, and former CEO & MD of BrahMoS Aerospace.
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