Video Outlines Possible Design for Small Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor

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Wed, Jan 4 2012 6:24 AM

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With its waste-management and non-proliferation benefits, liquid thorium fuel has been a much-discussed alternative to low-enriched uranium for powering future nuclear plant designs. Once exposed to “ignition” neutrons from a small amount of fissile material, like uranium-235, the fertile thorium-232 breeds uranium-233. It then fissions, creating heat and producing more fissile material.

At the 3rd Thorium Energy Alliance Conference last year, Thorenco founder Charles S. “Rusty” Holden offered a look at how a small reactor using a thorium fuel might be designed, with an eye toward the requirements of U.S. regulators. The 40 megawatt reactor would feature a roughly five-foot by five-foot core, traditional control rods to reduce or stop the reaction, a system to capture reactor poisons and passive safety features.

Thorium, small modular reactor, breeder reactor, Charles S. Holden, Thorenco

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Video Outlines Possible Design for Small Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor

Nuclear Power Industry News

Nuclear Power Industry News

Video Outlines Possible Design for Small Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor