/sci/ - Science & Math

I stopped it.... about half way through.... to take a piss.
100+ internets for you anon...
I like videos like this but in my opinion and as stated in the movie itself this kind of technology won't be around for about 10 - 20 years not because we took a wrong way in the 1970's but because there are greedy sons of bitches in the world who work hard on keeping us regular people paying 3.50$ per gallon of gas (nearly 6 bucks per gallon here in Europe) so that they can earn milions....

>>3906655
>Implying I haven't already invested $5.5m for 4 of my graduate student friends to work on possible Thorium solutions.

Thanks for the vid OP

Half an hour into it. Very Interesting,

What the...?
It was two hours long?
I could have sworn I only watched it for half an hour.

>>3906001
Skepticism kicking in.

What is wrong with this stuff? It sounds like the only reason we don't use it is we are retarded...I don't think that can be the case.

6:30 all of my hate

>>3907154
What's wrong with it is that it's evul nukular.

In other words, we don't use it because we're retarded.

Watched it a couple days ago.

It made me want to work for Flibe Energy.

Liked, favorited, downloaded.

> copy link
> open it
> LFTR
> close link

>>3907154

/sci/ had a thread on it yesterday, it's because the US pursued the LMFBR instead of the MSR/LFTR design, and the MSR couldn't produce fissile material like a fast breeder. Liquid Metal Fast Breeders were never developed though, apparently between design and funding problems, and a general public disinterest for anything nuclear after Three Mile Island.

>>3907154
It missed it's "opportunity window", or rather, never had one.

When it was conceived, it was rejected because Bomb material was needed and that's something a Thorium reactor couldn't do. The classic reactor could.

And when making bomb ceased to be a priority, it was in a time where the nuclear energy had bad press and no one would risk themselves in investing and trying to pass a new model.

It's not even a conspiracy, it's just that it's "too risky", from an economical and public-relation point of view.

>>3907178
It was discovered back when nuclear was not evil and was still not used. Obviously, you need a better answer.

>Pokeball on the bored with equations and shit

Wtf?

What's Ron Paul's opinion on this technology?

>>3907280

I don't think any of the current political candidates have a stance on it. The only one whose platform even mentioned Thorium was Mitt Romney, and I don't think he ever stated actually providing any amount of support for the development of a LFTR, just that he was open to the development of Thorium-based nuclear.

>>3907274
See the next line.

I count "because we want bombs instead of awesum power supply" as belonging to the Retarded-folder.

>>3907330
> Mitt Romney [...] was open to the development of Thorium-based nuclear.

Oh, how very non-committal. You got PUNKED. All those mainstream politicians don't DARE trying pushing for nuclear power in the USA. They know the public is BUTT-STUPID about nuclear power and just won't allow it to attain something like France's system.

>>3907243
It's not so retard. Except if you count the will to make bomb as retard by itself. Sadly, there was the same kind of retard on the other side.

But one system allowed to create electricity and bomb at the same time, while the other only allowed electricity. They went for the cheapest option in that regard (by that, I mean the option that allowed the providing of Both bomb AND electricity together for the less cost).

>>3907333
It's not so retard. Except if you count the will to make bomb as retard by itself. Sadly, there was the same kind of retard on the other side.

But one system allowed to create electricity and bomb at the same time, while the other only allowed electricity. They went for the cheapest option in that regard (by that, I mean the option that allowed the providing of Both bomb AND electricity together for the less cost).

Thank you for posting this OP, I'm about 12 minutes in and it's extremely interesting.

>>3907358
Obviously, that's why he said he'd be "open" to it, so he could look good while not being accused of being like every other politician when he decided he wasn't going to pursue it because it wasn't expedient. Let me expand upon
>I don't think any of the current political candidates have a stance on it
Even If they do, it's not good enough, because the MSM doesn't give a fuck. The information behind why LFTR is a better design isn't hard to grasp - there's no reason why the public shouldn't support this, despite being fucktarded as soon as someone drops the evil RAEDEEAYSHUN word

>>3907154
what's wrong is there are companies making so much money on other things than thorium that they don't want you to get close to free energy.
It's like ford: they built cars, they paid their workers relatively well. That looks costly...until those same guys buy the cars they build.

>>3907363
More cost efficient if you're absolutely intent on making bombs, maybe, but Plutonium Fast Breeders are not at all more efficient if you consider the MSR's cheaper backup systems and safety features, scalability with electricity production in addition to their ability to desalinize water or utilize LWR waste. The engineering advantages are enormous, and the official government line back when they were taken out of development was as pathetic as the DoE's reason they won't bring them back. WASH-1222 essentially stated because we don't know how much safer or how much more efficient the MSR could be, we shouldn't continue development (lol R&D), and the DoE said we don't have any alloys capable of handling the heat and radiation of LFTR for 20+ years of operation, which is a blatant lie.

>>3906777
hey uh
wanna send some of that money my way?

>>3907267
actually after further research the "rejected due to not being bomb material producing" is sort of a half-truth
what really happened is that integral fast reactors got all the attention and funding, pushing MSR into obscurity. when the fast breeders largely failed, people just shrugged and went with light water reactors as a norm, MSR fell off the fucking map basically, since it's impossible to really push "new" nuclear technology because
1) the bad PR nuclear receives means we can barely put traditional LWRs online, let alone anything experimental
2) all the focus was on fast breeders in that time period

literally the only reason it's not in place today was due to a bad call in the 60s, and public lack of education

>>3907823
>and the DoE said we don't have any alloys capable of handling the heat and radiation of LFTR for 20+ years of operation, which is a blatant lie.

someone should ship them a slab of hastelloy

i talked to a guy who uses the stuff from time to time, it actually strengthens itself at higher temperatures, like he'll put it on a cooled band saw to cut it, and if you run it too hard it'll hit that curing temperature and fucking DESTROY the band saw

it takes nuetron flux like a champ too, especially if you go heavy on the molybdenum

man i want to get some of that stuff and just hang it on my wall

Would spreading this help at all?

>>3909082
to people who understand the concepts? sure. but even remixed, the video has a somewhat high barrier of entry, it will fly over the heads of something like 80% of americans

Night time here.
Wanted to watch a little, 20 minutes in, fuck you op i need to sleep.

>>3909239
no, no sleep
only realistic energy scarcity solutions

"Your radioactivity is directly and inversely proportional to the half-life." 22:30

Directly Proportional: y = kx
Inversely Proportional: y = k/x

>>3909399
meh, he just tripped over words, i'm surprised he's talking that well with basically no visible notes or prompts. sort of reminds me of Tyson in a way

>>3909407
It's probably because he's explaining it like he's dealing with dumbasses. It's not too much to expect grown adults who still give a shit about science to at least know first year chemistry and physics.

Thanks for the vid. It's started me on a lengthy internet journey on knowing everything I can on LFTR. Thank you.

>>3909573
check this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8F0tUDJ35So
it goes into detail about materials to use and core geometries, cool shit

warning; science content

>>3908987

Nuka, the stuff was developed by ORNL specifically for Liquid/Molten Salt industrial operations, and they recently came out with a report talking about laser-welding the Hastelloy cladding. Secretary Chu was the one who made the statement for the DoE, and many people sent in rebuttals attempting to inform him. I know Robert Steinhaus, the owner of the Yottawatts from Thorium blog wrote him, but whether it was received and disregarded or completely ignored I don't know - he never responded. And now he's returned to the old line of "The US should develop Fast Breeders, herp derp"

http://www.nucleartownhall.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/NIC-FastReactors-SecChu_f.pdf

Also, you really think 80% of the country couldn't grasp the concepts behind this? Yeah, people are dumb, I get it, but it's really not that hard to explain. Kirk should go on the Daily Show or the Colbert Report, give Tyson a run for his money at the news satire game.

Relevant to the thread

http://clonemaster.homestead.com/files/coolants.htm

Watched it all, loved it.

>>3909762
>Also, you really think 80% of the country couldn't grasp the concepts behind this?
based on what i've seen at the university level? unfortunately yes
they have a much stronger propensity to ignore things they cannot comprehend and go back to playing madden

>>3909821
seconded

>LFTR in 5 minutes
>Video is 2 hours long

And you want them in charge of building Reactors

>>3909837
First five minutes sums a lot up, then it goes into more detail.

>>3909837
the video should probably be called
>shut the fuck up and watch the whole thing you asshole

>>3909586
i must reiterate that everyone in this thread watch that presentation and understand it

>>3909851
Will do after lawn-mowing.

>>3909856

Good work man, keep doing those chores.. You'll have enough for a LFTR in no time

>>3909886
Hurr hurr.

Thorium produces radium, radon, and uranium... and you faggots somehow think it is safer than mother's milk. Have you ever heard the expression "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch." ?

>>3911063

It's also dirt cheap. In a LFTR, it's not pressurized, and capable of constantly being reprocessed/refueled. The pros outweigh the cons

>>3911063
Have you heard the expression "You didn't watch the whole video and have no idea what you're talking about" ?

>>3911643

oh.. does the Video explain that Thorium IS MAGIC.. and has no unforeseen difficulties?

>>3911675
Something like that.

>light water reactor, 300 kilograms of plutonium produced per 1GW power plant
>LFTR, 100 grams of plutonium produced per 1GW power plant
>can continuously remove radioactive Xenon-135 due to it being liquid and not solid fuel, just bubbles right out
>RADON COMES OUT OF THE GROUND REGARDLESS YOU DERP, IF YOU'RE SO WORRIED ABOUT RADON GO BITCH TO GAS DRILLING PEOPLE, THEY'RE THE BIGGEST CROOKS REGARDING THAT
Please don't tell me you're one of those SOLAR AND WIND WILL FIX ERRYTHANNNG! people.

>>3911690

yeah, because using the heat energy from a huge fusion reactor a safe distance away.. why, that's just stupid, right?

>>3911725
You don't understand. I'm a solar proponent. A HUGE solar proponent. But I understand the setbacks. Weather. 12 hours of night. No superconducting power lines to transmit electricity the vast distances and simply no batteries energy dense enough to be viable for saving an entire grid-worth of electricity. The solution is geosynchronous orbit solar panels, beaming back the power using masers or some other relatively efficient way of getting the power back to Earth without interacting with water vapour/nitrogen/oxygen much. BUT. For this to be viable you need to launch HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS of dollars worth of solar panels to get any kind of meaningful power, and that simply isn't practical. And we're not quite 100% of the way to manufacturing asteroids into solar panels, that has to wait. So in the meantime, why not use a form of power generation that IS safe, that has waste that 87% of can be sold within 10 years, and 13% has to be held in containment for ~300 years instead of 10,000 for the usual LWR waste. Something that desalinates water and produces automobile fuel from ITS WASTE HEAT. Something small. Something potentially portable.Something that requires a fuel that's abundant. I'm just wondering, have you read up on LFTRs sufficiently to mount a case against why we should use them? I'm all ears.

>>3911690
>>3911690
Its still hard as shit to store if you aren't DOD though (and prototype technology that may not work
>>3909829
Conventional nuclear technology now takes less than 1% of the 1% in the military, which is a very very small number of operators. This is not easy stuff to undestand.

>>3908987
Uh, if this alloy existed, may I have some of it, it would make the refueling/replacing/repairing prototype a lot easier, because if it was perfect, we would have used it for conventional reactors (our biggest cost now is the mid life refuel cycle which is due to all of the fun fun fluxes!)

>>3911742
But we already have these reactors, our submarine reactors are small, portable, safe, and use proven conventional technology, with no development costs, a secure fuel supply, and if we even ran close to running low, we can reprocess or extract uranium from seawater until ORBITAL SOLAR POWER SYSTEMS are built.

>>3911742
But do you worship Sol?

>>3911778
I worship no one.

>>3911759
Do they have these passive safety systems like the LFTR? Switches itself off if a catastrophe occurs?

I'm fine with other forms of nuclear energy taking the stage, BUT ONLY IF LFTRs were tried and tested rigorously.

>>3911778
>>3911785

>not worshiping the machine god

>>3911785
You worship to the exception of everyone, which is pretty useless. You obessession with space is due to your inability to live within even a fraction of the density of societal differences.

>>3911797
My obsession with space is that it's the other 99.9999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
9999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
999999999999999999999999999% of the universe. Those psych 101 courses aren't doing you any good.

>>3911690

Sauce on that image?

>>3911812
Haven't a clue, saved it from here.

>>3911809
They're telling me you like to compensate for self-delusion.

Your 'factual' statements about yourself arn't doing you any good.

>>3911809
now what?
we cant use it yet. and we wont be able to use it for a very long time. deal with it.

>>3911833
So what am I supposed to say, 'Oh yes overlord I have been so narcissistic I am wrong everything you say is correct please allow me to grovel for the next three hours" ?

>>3911809
Do you get obsessed over snow because it's the 99.99999999999999999999999999999999999% of all the other snowflakes?

>>3911849
Snow usually doesn't occupy septillions of cubic kilometers.

>>3911790
did you not watch the video?
watch the video. it answers your question

>>3911871
What video, OP's video? I watched it. Your point?

>>3911852
But it's real...and yuou can touch it...and..well, you don't have to imagine about it and be deluded to the point of never actually contributing to reality.


I know it's difficult, in that your beliefs about it might be contradicted, where as imaginary things can rarely ever be contradicted.

But keep on keeping on.

>>3911875
then you're kind of an idiot to ask a question that was answered in the OP's video

>>3909239
That pic; all of my feel.

>>3911878
1) Don't need to imagine it. Can observe it, then eventually touch it.
2) Define 'contributing to reality.' Choose your words carefully.

I'm already sensing you're one of those 'BUT IF IT DOESN'T BENEFIT ME NOW WHY IS THIS SCIENCE BEING DONE AT ALL' types. Correct me if I'm mistaken.

>>3911880
It's 5AM and I watched the video once, which was quite technical and had lots of information crammed in. I'm not likely to memorize every single stinking part of the damn thing, so why don't you quit flapping your fingers and get to the point already?

This is the first time that I have bothered to pay attention to a link in a Thorium thread. I have watched 35 minutes so far of the video. It looks interesting and I think it is going to take me a while to get my head around it. I have already had to rewind several parts but so far it has been worth the time. Thanks.

interesting video. only thing i disagree with is that they're shitting on wind & solar because a) requires too much area to put up enough turbines/panels b) on cloudy/windless days, you have to rely on batteries, and that's impractical.

he makes it sound like we're hacking down virgin rainforest to put up PVs.. why not just put them in the middle of the desert? there's hardly anything out there, you don't have to cut shit down, there's more than enough room to power the world, and it's sunny all the goddamned time. and i'm sure you could find similar spots for turbines.

>>3911894
if you have questions during the video you should have been paying attention

your question is answered at 2:00

>>3911887
Nah, it's just the realization that your technological problems are focused on, when the majority of that technology is hocus pocus when it comes to the real challenges of ever leaving this rock.

The place to start if you really want your vision is not in space.

Sorry guy, you're deluded.

>>3911905
I was asking about other reactor types that have passive safety features, not the LFTR. I've known about the drain tank shit for months. Sooooooo, miscommunication.

>>3911909
oops
<3

>>3911908
>when the majority of that technology is hocus pocus
Start listing them.
>the real challenges of ever leaving this rock.
Start listing them.

>>3911903 .. why not just put them in the middle of the desert?

And make power for.... who? Sure, nobody's there to complain about the panels, but there's nobody there to provide power to.

>>3911903
Deserts are huge environments with their own ecosystems, we can't just pave over them, because it turns out you may destroy nature!

>>3911925
The feasibility of all isolated technology is the sum of all technologies, which is why these technology threads are always filled with derp.

take the mohave, for example. could easily power most of the USA. few thousand species of flora/fauna (i'm guessing), 95% of which is probably located either around oases or rock formations, which we'd leave alone.. i still see potential.

>>3911915
Well for one, human psychology.

Two, population density.

Three, gravity well

Four, efficient propulsion

Five, environmental biomes

Six, your stupidity and sloth.

Seven, your desire tto fantasize and not actualize.

Eight, reality.

>>3911956
>human psychology.
WHOA TOTALLY NOT A VAGUE REFERENCE
>Two, population density.
Elaborate.
>Three, gravity well
Apollo 11. These things aren't intractable, just currently expensive. And in the past few years leaps and strides have been made to lower the cost further for a kilogram to LEO.
>Four, efficient propulsion
Current chemical rockets aren't that bad, but yeah I'd like to go FAST.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_salt-water_rocket
>Five, environmental biomes
http://www.edenproject.com/
>Six, your stupidity and sloth.
Thanks darling, love your hair.
>Seven, your desire tto fantasize and not actualize.
You've got to concede these last two 'points' are really just snide comments.
>Eight, reality.
And then you had to pick the broadest topic of all.

>>3911978
You are such a stellar and insular knowledge buff.

I'm sure on your titantic intelligence, man can roam the stars.

I bravo to you every day, tripfag.

>>3911994

>>3911063
those are pretty mildly radioactive, and small levels of those are all over the damn place anyway.

>>3911747
>Uh, if this alloy existed, may I have some of it, it would make the refueling/replacing/repairing prototype a lot easier, because if it was perfect, we would have used it for conventional reactors

it's pretty damn pricey for what it does, and its only real advantage is being able to tale hellish corrosion, heat, and neutron flux environments. anything short of that and it's not really necessary.
if there was a significant demand for it, the price would probably go down as multiple manufacturers got into the business of making it quick and making it cheap

>>3911894
the video wasn't quite that technical, this one was
>>3909586

>>3911909
actually, most light water reactors tend to have safety systems which turn the control rods into passive mechanical stabilizers, as the fuel gains heat, the control rods lower, as it cools, they rise.

however i'm not entirely sure how many reactors use something like that, or how vulnerable it is to mechanical failures

>>3911952
got a checkbook to pay for the super corrosion and temperature shift resistant power lines, and the extra cost of installation and maintenance in an environment that has a respectable chance of killing you workers?

pay up guy

>>3911809
So according to this, earth measures in at around 1E-201 km diameter?
Dipshit

>>3906001
ty OP, I had only a vague idea of what lftr was until I watched that vid +100 internetz for you

>>3906777
You have $5.5M ??

Shit I thought rich people didn't go to 4chan

>>3912482
they usually do not
which is why i asked if that guy could throw some money my way

Fuck you /sci/, i was all dark and edgy, thinking the world was awful and it will be so much worse in the future, and now i can't stop smiling and giggling when i think of the glorious utopian future that is awaiting us.

Fuck you /sci/.

>>3911903

Covering a desert still ruins a biome. Is it less overtly full of life? Sure. But it's still got life in it.

How are they going to deal with the Iodine-131?

>>3912648
it comes off in the vacuum distillation process, and decays pretty damn fast

>>3912655
oh... wait, I got the wrong one, I read somewhere it had iodine-129 with a half life of 16 someodd million years?
Is that false then and it's iodine-131?

>>3912727
a 16 million year half life puts it beyond thorium in terms of trace radioactivity, and thorium's pretty damn harmless in trace quantities

Great, now I can't go to sleep. Thanks OP.

Everyone should see OP's video!

>>3914394
>sage.