/sci/ - Science & Math

[Anonymous No.4573688]

>Searching /sci/ for threads that contain Thorium...
>0 results found.

You disgust me /sci/
Thorium and LFTR awareness thread

[Anonymous No.4573691]

I brought up liquid fuel reactors in a nuclear energy session at an American Physical Society meeting (huge conference, the March one). The presenter said that tritium contamination was a huge issue (nearly impossible to contain), and that he'd rather focus on solid fuel reactor designs.

The undercurrent I picked up is that you simply aren't going to get liquid reactor designs approved in the current political climate.

[Anonymous No.4573694]

If the nazi's had won, we would have them.

[Anonymous No.4573696]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9M__yYbsZ4

>Kirk
>my nigga

[Anonymous No.4573708]

>>4573691
This. This. 1000x this.

Every single Thorium thread I come across, I have to remind people that single loop, high temperature gas reactors running on fast spectrum fission from U-238 have less engineering hurdles to getting them operational. And it has half the advantages listed here.

>>4573696
Brayton cycles, ftw.

[Anonymous No.4573747]

>>4573708
You wouldn't happen to be talking about a Pebble Bed reactor would you?

[Anonymous No.4573763]

>>4573747

You could use pebble beds, but there are several alternative designs too (i.e. solid elements). And once through Braytons > two-loop gas-water.

[Anonymous No.4573902]

>>4573763
And what would be the advantages of a Gas cooled Reactor versus a Heavy or Light water reactor?

[Anonymous No.4573916]

>>4573763

More abundant fuel, Brayton cycle efficiencies, you can run natural uranium (like you can with heavy water reactors), don't have to mess with high temperature salts (or high temp metals).

[Anonymous No.4573958]

>>4573916
I'd much rather use a molten salt than anything under high pressure.
Also, the pebble fuel is not more abundant than thorium. If I didn't know about the LFTRs, I'd be for pebble bed reactors, because they ARE better than what we have now. But LFTRs are so elegant and streamlined and passively useful and safe that even though there are other better things out there, like pebble bed, I gotta go with what looks best, not just better.

[Anonymous No.4573983]

>>4573958

Are you kidding me? Pebble bed fuel is Uranium. Thorium may be more abundant by sheer mass in the Earth's crust, but unlike uranium, it's much more diffuse and not as concentrated in the natural deposits discovered so far. Also, it would be much easier to convert the existing uranium mining industry to a new use rather than creating a whole new mining industry based around Thorium.

High pressure being a problem? Please, PWRs are pressurized up to around 2200/2300 psia. Liquid thorium would have to be pressurized too (how else do you get a fluid to flow in a conduit?). And as I've said before in every other Thorium thread, molten salts are going to be a corrosive problem with or without the irradiation. Let's not forget that half those fission products are water soluble. Last time I checked, it wasn't a good idea to be mixing corrosive fuel with water soluble fission products that could leak into ground water.

Additionally, creating an entire reactor out of Hastalloy or Zircalloy would become prohibitively expensive compared to more traditional materials that would be needed in HTGRs.

It seems that you're judging the decision to implement Thorium based on looks alone, rather than the cost effectiveness of the programs (or any other rational decision-making basis).

[Anonymous No.4574592]

This is a link for this guys
>>4573696
video at the coolest scene.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9M__yYbsZ4&feature=player_detailpage#t=2862s

[NavalAnon !!jz5JQZ1dN2Q No.4574605]

>>4573691
Of course not, as long as the NRC is smart.

Also Thorium does not directly fission, you have to breed it, which involves lots of high energy gammas, which is a pain to work on.

Also, every reactor has poisons to be extracted, and conventional nuclear plants can scale down in use, though why would you want to, the efficiencies make no sense below some sizes unless its a training unit.

[Anonymous No.4574606]

>>4574592

>guy getting impaled to the ceiling with a control rod

holy fucking shit

[NavalAnon !!jz5JQZ1dN2Q No.4574609]

>>4573983
Hell, I work(ed) with PWRs for most of my adult life now, we have got them down to such a science we can use them for warships.

also

>>4573958
>looks over proven safe performance.

You are an idiot, at best, I mean you literally are needing of a massive upgrade.

PWRs are the proven ideal design, until we can prove that pebble bed designs work, and are safe.

[Anonymous No.4574610]

>>4573983

The corrosion was experimentally detemined to be very minor in the MSRE experiment. It can be further reduced by keeping the salt slightly reducing and adding a bit of niobium to the alloy.

Hydorgen is not a problem if you use Li-7 salts.

Fission products are kept in because they are fluorinated, as opposed to oxides in traditional fuel rods. This is LFTRs first level of containment, expecially good at containing the biologically active water soluble species.

[NavalAnon !!jz5JQZ1dN2Q No.4574616]

>>4574610
>not having various ion exchangers before dumping highly radioactive products
>2012
...do you even know the first thing about the actual operation, not just 101 and 201 level classes and internet diagrams of nuclear power plants?

[Anonymous No.4574617]

>>4574609

What if the pebbles become stuck?

[NavalAnon !!jz5JQZ1dN2Q No.4574619]

>>4574610

then you undergo a shutdown evolution and scream for a bit while the robots fix things. (also it starts loosing power, it is a graphite design which is actively safe, which is appealing, yayyy)

[Anonymous No.4574622]

>>4574616

We are talking about disasters. Your ion exchangers are destroyed, fuel is exposed and meltdown is in progress. How are oxides (or pure species in case of transmutated products in fuel rods) better than ionic fluoride salts of fission products in such case?

- Fluorine combines ionically with almost any transmutation product to form stable fluorides. This is an MSFR's first level of containment. Fluoride is especially good at holding biologically active "salt loving" wastes such as cesium-137.
- If there is an accident beyond the design basis for the multiple levels of containment, fluorides do not easily enter the biome. The salts do not burn, explode, or chemically degrade in air or water. The fluoride salts of radioactive actinides and fission products are generally not soluble in water or air.

[Anonymous No.4574625]

LFTR propaganda time?
LFTR propaganda time.

[Anonymous No.4574626]

[Anonymous No.4574628]

[Anonymous No.4574631]

[Anonymous No.4574633]

[NavalAnon !!jz5JQZ1dN2Q No.4574647]

>>4574622
If a meltdown has occured, you fucked up. I mean I have seen some shit occur, but our operators and reactor designs prevent NUCLEAR DISASTERS.

Also, contaiment tanks for overflow, natural circulation to remove decay heat LONG before meltdown should occur.

you literally have shit knowledge about how nuclear operations occur, and think HURR WE SHOULD BUILD REACTORS SO THEY SHOULD EXPLODE HURR.

no, you build them so that.. there are multiple layers of safeguards so even if all power is lost to the core, and there is no emergency diesel generation system, the reactor will cool through basic physical principals.

[Anonymous No.4574648]

>>4574633
why does everyone use that image?ITS NOT THORIUM YOU RETARDS, ITS STAINLESS STEEL. at least get a fucking accurate picture.

[Anonymous No.4574658]

>>4574633

Some kind of visual representation of what 600 train cars, 440 million cubic feet of gas and 300 kg of fuel rods looks like in this image would be nice.

And an actual 6kg block of thorium, not steel as a previous poster pointed out.

[Anonymous No.4574670]

>>4574647

If we assume the reactor wont be destroyed, then your original point I replied to, about fluoride salts leaking into the environment is also moot. You cant have it both ways. LFTRs are also passively safe.

I agree that modern PWRs are a great technology to use now, but if we want to think long-term, we need breeders and high temperature reactors.
Why do you think pebble beds are a better route than MSRs? MSRs seem to have more advantages and less downsides than pebble bed reactors.

[NavalAnon !!jz5JQZ1dN2Q No.4574677]

>>4574648

Because the engineering for Graphite based reactors has been more completely done ( than an entirely new chemistry which was rejected and now exists only on paper, which.. I don't trust purely paper designs anymore.

Also, we can have dedicated reprocessing plants if anything, and keep the majority of plants on PWR based designs until ITER stops shitting itself and gives us fusion technology.

Fuel even without reprocessing is.. we won't run out of it anytime within the feasible lifetime of america.