Thorium-fuelled reactors might be the key to a safer, cleaner power supply
Credit: Justin Randall
SYDNEY: Safer, cleaner nuclear power is a step closer to reality after Norway's state-owned energy company, Statkraft, this week announced plans to investigate building a thorium-fuelled nuclear reactor.
Statkraft (which translates to "state power") announced an alliance with regional power providers Vattenfall in Sweden, and Fortum in Finland, along with Norwegian energy investment company, Scatec AS, in a bid to produce the thorium-fuelled plant.
Thorium (Th-232), has been hailed as a 'greener' alternative to traditional nuclear fuels, such as uranium and plutonium, because thorium is incapable of producing the runaway chain reaction which in a uranium-fuelled reactor can cause a catastrophic meltdown. Thorium reactors also produce only a tiny fraction of the hazardous waste created by uranium-fuelled reactors (see 'New age nuclear', Cosmos, issue 8).
Statkraft, which is already Europe's second largest producer of renewable energy - mainly thanks to Norway's abundant hydroelectric resources - has recently made thorium-fuelled nuclear power a point of serious consideration. "It would be a sin of omission not to consider it," said Bård Mikkelsen, CEO of Statkraft, in an interview with the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet.
To date, thorium has seen only limited application, such as by U.S. company, Thorium Power, which produces mixed uranium-thorium fuel for use in conventional nuclear reactors. However a reactor fuelled entirely by thorium would have significant advantages over conventional uranium or mixed-fuel reactors.
Besides their inability to go critical and their low generation of waste, thorium-fuelled reactors don't suffer from the same proliferation risks as uranium reactors. This is because the thorium by-products cannot be re-processed into weapons-grade material.
Thorium also doesn't require enrichment before use as a nuclear fuel, and thorium is an abundant natural resource, with vast deposits in Australia, the United States, India and Norway.
Another advantage of thorium-powered reactors is they can be used to 'burn' highly radioactive waste by-products from conventional uranium-fuelled power plants.
Over the past eight months, there has been a substantial rise in public support for thorium reactors in Norway. In June 2006, polls showed 80 per cent of the population were completely opposed to any form of nuclear technology. Then in February 2007, the same percentage were in favour of investigating thorium reactors as a potential energy source.
"It is an absolutely incredible surprise that it has been possible to turn around the population in a country, just by quietly campaigning and explaining the benefits of the technology," said Egil Lillestøl, a nuclear physicist at the University of Bergen, Norway.
Lillestøl is a keen supporter of the ADS (Accelerated Driven System) technology used in thorium-fuelled reactors. Because thorium is incapable of achieving a self-sustaining chain reaction – unlike uranium or plutonium – it needs energy to be injected into the reactor to keep it running. This energy comes in the form of neutrons from a particle accelerator. For this reason, a thorium-fuelled reactor is also sometimes called a sub-critical reactor.
Statkraft is the third Norwegian company to express interest in thorium reactors this year; Thor Energi and Bergen Energi, have both applied for government licenses to build plants.
The announcement by Statkraft coincides with the first meeting of the Thorium Report Committee – an initiative commissioned by Norway's Ministry of Petroleum and Energy, in association with the Norwegian Research Council, to investigate the benefits and risks of thorium reactors.
The committee will submit its report at the end of 2007. Norwegian legislation currently bans the use of nuclear power, so the report is critical for gaining Government consent to build thorium plants in Norway.
"Norway has taken the lead on this. We are an energy nation; we have large supplies of thorium – not as much as Australia of course – but we have a very advanced energy industry, and we have a responsibility to the world," said Lillestøl. "Without nuclear energy we will destroy the world, we will spend all the coal, oil and gas, and we will be left with an energy desert."
Reza Hashemi-Nezad, a nuclear scientist at the University of Sydney in Australia agrees that thorium is a promising alternative energy source. However, while the European Union, India, the US, Japan and Russia are all working on thorium technologies, Australia is lagging behind.
"Australian industry is very interested in investing in this type of clean, safe and cheap nuclear energy," says Hashemi-Nezhad. "But I am afraid that if Australian scientists and industry do not get adequate support from the government and research institutes in Australia, they may move offshore."
Well done Ms. Williams & Mr. Randall
I really like the picture from Mr. Randall. It reflects the changing opinions (and in fact reality) that nuclear technologies do offer solutions to the complex and interdependent challenges of climate change and energy security; and furthermore that such solutions are feasible without the added burdens of significant waste generation or weapons proliferation.
All of this is well detailed in the article as is the opportunity for Australia to contribute - provided we have the foresight (we surely should have the motivation as indicated here and here).
Thanks for the article.
Ed
"clean nuclear"??
Sir,
Why bother with something that is still unsafe and dangerous. Hydrogen extracting from seawater is surely safer and cheaper solution, think lateral and live dangerous materials where they belong, underground!!James
It takes lots of energy to
It takes lots of energy to pull hydrogen from water. Where does this energy comefrom? So while hydrogen is a great fuel it is only really an energy conversion material: Put energy into water to get hydrogen, get some (less) energy out when you burn hydrogen.
We will need an actual energy generator to do all this. Nuclear, hydro & solar is really all there is. Any form of bio-mass energy is just solar in disguise.
A nuclear (fission or fusion) plant that would be used to produce hydrogen might seem to be a good idea until the distribution system is considered. Today nuclear energy is distributed by electrical wires. Fairly efficient. Soon this could be done with superconductors, more efficient.
But what if the nuclear plant were to output hydrogen? Could we just use a pipeline to send hydrogen from the plant to your house? Sure, this would work. Except for a problem: Hydrogen, being such a tiny molecule, can and often does escape thru the solid steel walls of pipelines at a considerable rate. This released hydrogen would then react with other materials in the atmosphere to produce very effective greenhouse gases.
So unless some very difficult engineering problems are solved hydrogen will never be a good solution to the energy problem.
Posting Etiquette
Know your laws of thermodynamics before you post.
"Clean nuclear"??
You write : Hydrogen extracting from seawater is surely safer and cheaper solution
Please explain to me how you intend to do this ?
With kind regards,
Evan in Norway.
evan@auen.no
responce to visitor
it is only your opinion that these materials belong underground. progress can be difficult for narrow minded individuals like yourself...we either learn to embrace new ideas or in 100 years time our grandkids and great grand kids will be cursing our inability to change our ways
Nuclear Energy
Technology is soultion to most critical issue whether it is efficiency of the system or its safe operation.
We need to move forward and try to "PROVIDE SOLUTION TO ISSUES AND DEVELOP TECHNOLOGIES" for future.
Sitting ideal and criticising others does not create bight future for any one.
not even thermodynamics
Not the first time it's been suggested, like pumping water up hill then pass it through turbine to generate electricity, thus saving fuel in the generation process.
"Hydrogen is a perfectly clean fuel"
Produced either by electrolysis (requires lots of electricity) or from combining alkali metals with water (got to produce the metal first, again using lots of electricity) or from coal (basically 2C+2H2O -> 2H2+2CO2, endothermic, so even more CO2 is produced in providing heat for that reaction)
So whichever way you look at it Hydrogen is pretty "dirty"
Also - Half-lives.
The measure of time required for half the nuclei to break up. So, the shorter the half-life obviously the more intense the radiation, and the longer the half-life the less particles coming out per second.
So how come a longer half-life becomes equated with more virulence ???
The very reason there is less U235 than U238 in the world is that most of it already disappeared. So, Green-think tells us U238 is more dangerous because it has a longer half-life.
You don't believe me? Haven't you heard what they say about that awful, nasty, terrible, highly radioactive DEPLETED uranium ??
Oldgeek - I grew up
yes, clean nuclear
nuclear power has come a long way. it is safe, clean, & efficient. people tend to bring up chernobyl & three mile island but the reality is that three mile island caused no casualties & the people who had been exposed to this radioactivity received approximately the equivalent to a chest x-ray and chernobyl was a piece of shit reactor even by the standards of the 60s in soviet russia, it was a tragedy but a one time thing. these deaths don't even compare to the amount of deaths that have occurred by mining for coal. since both those situations though, reactors have become much safer.
re: "clean nuclear"??
"Sir,
Why bother with something that is still unsafe and dangerous."
Because it's the safest form of energy, bar none. More people die from coal particulates every few days than ever have or ever will die from Chernobyl. Per unit quantity of energy produced more people die from installing and maintaining wind turbines and solar panels than from nuclear power(including chernobyl; if you just count western power plant it's not even in the same league).
It's interesting how many have heard of Chernobyl but never heard of Banqiao Dam; despite the latter destroying 6 million homes and killing ~160 000 people. I don't see anyone calling for a moratorium on hydropower(except for the anti-humanists like sierra club that protest against all forms of power and any encroachment on nature, anywhere, for any purpose and by extension an end to human civilisation).
"Hydrogen extracting from seawater is surely safer and cheaper solution, think lateral and live dangerous materials where they belong, underground!!James"
Hydrogen gas is a USE of energy, not a means to PRODUCE energy. Thermodynamics is not a conspiracy invented by the oil companies to keep you down.