Many nuclear experts believe that the future of safe, effective, nuclear power lies in deploying thorium fuel rather than uranium, the firewood of choice that has prevailed ever since the world first starting splitting atoms to feed the grid in 1956.
Thorium proponents point out that the metallic element is more plentiful than uranium, leaves far less long lived waste, can effectively help burn existing waste, reduces the prospects of making weapons from waste, and that it can avoid meltdowns.
But who’s making it work? Which countries are taking the lead? China? India? Norway? Do you simply put it into conventional reactors? Or should you build alternative reactors that optimize its advantages? Should you run it in liquid or solid form? How do you overcome some of the engineering and materials challenges for proposed alternative reactors like molten salt machines? And, as thorium itself is not fissile, what’s the best way to excite it into a state of chain reactions? Is industry even interested in it?
Some of the world’s brightest minds in thorium and nuclear science will offer their answers to these questions next week, as they gather at CERN, the internationally famous physics lab in Geneva, for the fifth annual Thorium Energy Conference.
“Thorium offers a route to safe, clean nuclear energy,” said Jean-Pierre Revol, a CERN physicist and president of the international Thorium Energy Committee (iThEC). “The number of renowned scientists coming to ThEC13 gives a clear signal that a truly international cooperation is forming to herald a new era in nuclear energy, with clear benefits for the world.”
To read more, click here.