I normally hate and skip all sponsor, but total props for having a sponsor for this video that has a direct application to the content within. The video was also very good, but just had to call out what a rare pleasure that was to see.
As someone who works at a nuclear plant I would love to say Thank you for all the work you’ve done and still do to dispel the negative and false information about nuclear power.
Actually one of the so-called waste products is cesium. Which is useful for ion drives for satellites and etc. In fact some of the research we did for US DOE in the 1980's proved that almost all of the byproducts of fission have some useful purposes, when handled properly. These are just a few of the things we were told not to disclose for a period of time by NDA's. Well, that time has past. Thank you to you and others that are finally letting the public know the truths about nuclear energy.
^^^^^^^^^^^^ Plus the insanely useful uses for medicine, aaaand! crafts: small amounts uranium(the not explody kinds) mixed into all kinds of pigments, makes it dead useful for glow in- the dark pigments. I thought I saw a very dated video showing that some isotopes(the rad af elements kind) were used for a minute on roads for night time safety markings. Probably fell out of favor easier to find night time glow in the dark stuff.
@@aldeybrutus4109 Not only that clearly people been going there off this it seems. Searching Sam o Nella brings his thorium video as one of the top results
I also thought the molten salt had the viscosity of lava. That was an incredible demonstration with the salt in this video. I was hoping there would be a segment on how corrosive molten salt is though. I wasn't able to find an answer while searching online, but I was always under the impression that one of the main complications was how corrosive the molten salt would be and that the "red hot plumbing" part of the reactor would have a significantly shorter lifespan than typical plumbing. Which is then complicated further by the fact that the plumbing would also be radioactive and harder to service. Not saying these are insurmountable challenges, I was just hoping the see this mentioned in the video since I'm wondering *how* these challenges will be surmounted.
"Advanced ceramic materials such as silicon carbide and its composites have both the temperature tolerance and corrosion resistance to function in MSRs at the desired level of performance and safety. These materials are also radiation tolerant and, thus, can be used for structural components in the MSR." -The American Ceramic Society
It does have a significantly lower viscosity than lava, but even that's not a fair comparison. Most images of slow, creeping lava are near its freezing point. It flows many orders of magnitude more easily at higher temperatures, such as within an insulated lava tube.
A classic saying from my thermodynamics lectures i will never forget: "If you want efficiency, run it hot!" Basically saying the hotter you run a thermodynamic engine, the better its efficiency of converting heat energy to electrical energy.
The SSR draught from Moltex runs at a _very_ high temperature. Which allows them to: 1) use a gas turbine instead of a steam turbine 2) Use the heat directly in process, such as efficient water desalination. 3) Can heat it's energy storage salt tanks to very high temperature, preserving that efficiency even when output is idling.
You missed the best part, completely passive safety. By keeping a plug of the salt frozen below the reactor core, if that refrigeration stops or loses power, the plug melts and all the fuel goes into dump tanks where it solidifies almost immediately into something hard as rock There's basically no way for this to have any kind of meltdown or dangerous event ever, if the fuel every escapes it just solidifies super fast and is easy to clean up
i feel like the biggest reason thorium reactors weren’t really focused on over uranium-235 (outside of the increased complexity of a molten salt reactor) is precisely because of what you mentioned at the end there where it doesn’t really have weaponizable byproducts. To us now this is a huge benefit but to the governments funding the early research into nuclear power, that would actually have been a massive downside, they would’ve wanted those byproducts to bolster and develop their nuclear arsenals.
I came here to say this. Most of the nuclear research into reactor types that was done in the USA, was done with military funding and with military applications in mind. Applications like atomic bombs, or nuclear-powered propulsion for bombers that drop atomic bombs. The peaceful uses were only barely considered, and not usually funded. Google "molten salt reactor experiment oak ridge" for an example of one of the few times it happened. (I'm sure Kyle is going to cover more of this in part 2...)
Hit the nail on the head. Early reactors were military programs specifically meant to either power military systems or create nuclear weapons. By the time MSRs became the subject of interest in the nuclear community the military wasn't really interested and the cultural zeitgeist had shifted from atomic mania to fear. Combine that with the difficulty explaining the technology to investors and technological limitations and it was basically inevitable for the technology to be quietly sidelined for pre-existing systems.
just no? you can go to the Wikipedia page for U233 and there's a link to the Lawrence Livermore memo saying that U233 is exactly as good as Pu239 for making nuclear weapons and a breeder reactor is a breeder reactor no matter if it's breeding Th232 into U233 or U238 into Pu239, and breeder reactors are extremely rare for power generation in the west. The light water reactors that are used in almost all western nuclear power plants were developed originally as naval reactors for stuff like nuclear-powered submarines. If you're on a ship where even small molten salt or sodium metal leaks would be rather catastrophic, light water reactors are much safer, and that design makes a rather terrible breeder reactor. The naval reactors use weapons-grade material so that they can go for 20+ years without refueling. Given that that's the design that was built and tested by the US Navy and it works with very cheap per MWh low-enriched uranium if you refuel it regularly, why bother developing anything new for civilian power generation?
@@thamiordragonheart8682 "U-233 has been shown to be highly satisfactory as a weapons material; however, it has substantial technical advantage over plutonium only in certain environments, and the probability of such environments being encountered is quite low." Lawrence Livermore Memo you are referring to; however it does also say: "The statement was made that if today's weapons were based upon U-233, LRL would have no interest in switching to plutonium?" While the first guy isn't right, you absolutely aren't either in saying U233 is exactly as good as Pu239.
America had a molten salt reactor at Oak Ridge in the 60's. I'm sure someone in the comments will know more than me but I believe the U.S. chose not to pursue this method of nuclear power, favouring instead Uranium breeder reactors due to the need to produce material for nuclear weapons.
That's what I remember as well from when I read about the Oak Ridge reactor years ago. The research reactor was in need of repairs and maintenance, and America was really gung-ho about building bombs at that time and they figured that they had learned enough about thorium and fixing the reactor or building another reactor seemed unnecessary to the powers that be. I also remember reading about the DOE having a huge stockpile (I think it was in the thousands of tons) that they had accumulated and buried somewhere in containers. So if the technical challenges of thorium fluoride reactors are overcome, there's enough fuel already amassed to last generations.
Everyone likes to claim it was because the US was "Bomb happy" But reality is what he only very briefly touched on (and has said in other comments that the lifespan of the system in part 2) is that the reactor needs to be rebuild within 5 years because the corrosive nature of the salts to metals. Not much has changed in 60 years, metals are still reactive to salts, specially when heated to molten temperatures unlike the standard nuclear reactors which have lifetimes of decades.
LFTRs are THE solution, but there's a huge r&d hump to get them feasible. The liquid is literally hell in a bottle. Wildly reactive, super hot, crazy high neutron flux. This puts huge material science constraints on design. The incredible passive safety ALONE should be enough to dump crazy money into researching this
Have a look at Moltex energy's solution to this: Don't pump the fuel salt. Create fuel _tubes_ that contain static fuel salts and a sacrificial zirconium layer. No corrosion, the fuel salts sit in the tube not moving Gaseous fission products exhaust from a vent, where they decay inside the SCV before being exhausted. You pump hot coolant salt around these fuel tubes and use that to make power. But you use two different salts in the tube and coolant loop, choosing the right one to specialise in just that one task (cooling, being pumped, sitting not being corrosive in the core. It's a fantastic design.
Any LFTRs built will be vanity projects soon mothballed: no one will (without coercion) pay for their output what they cost to operate. That is the case already, even for cheaper tech, and moreso every day as the cost of solar, wind, and storage halves and halves again, relentlessly. No reactor begun today, LFTR or otherwise, would even be completed; last I checked none were even under construction, just "planned". It costs less to build a new solar farm and switch to it than to continue operating an already paid-for nuke plant. Terawatts of new solar come on line each year. The growth industry around nukes is in _decommissioning_ them, which will eat up many $billions. Solar and wind projects _all_ have passive safety, produce usefully within a year of breaking ground, and deliver power from small farms as cheaply as from big ones. Vertical, bifacial solar fencerows running north-south between rows in cropland offer farmers predictable year-round revenue in still-producing farmland, meanwhile increasing crop yield by reducing heat stress.
I'm a retired Nuclear worker and I have two questions. First the expensive nature of a molten salt reactor. Liquid salt is very corrosive, therefore the only pipe material that could be safe to use would be inconnel. Inconnel pipe is about ten times more costly than stainless steel pipe. So build cost would be very high. Also because of the corrosive side of liquid salt it will require replacement very often in the life cycle of the reactor. Second, your video basically shows a boiling water reactor style of system. These systems put " HOT" piping outside the reactor building. With a BWR system radioactive steam spins the turbine. Therefore many more contaminated systems that will someday need decon, and more exposure to risk of HOT leaks. The HOT salt designs have been around for years, but I would much prefer a PWR with boronated water as a medium. But thanks for the video.
you are right is the same if you try to make brint you corros the ,etal cobber or Titanum last longst he also say the life time on pipe is 5 years the otehr way roound even with distallet water added the propbem do not go away thats what they need to fix an as he says if the reactor last 5 years an are cheap to build it will be = profit becosue they are very small on the size of a mini van max.
"Advanced ceramic materials such as silicon carbide and its composites have both the temperature tolerance and corrosion resistance to function in MSRs at the desired level of performance and safety. These materials are also radiation tolerant and, thus, can be used for structural components in the MSR." -The American Ceramic Society
because of the high purity in the salt, which they are making themselves, SS 316 can be used which is way cheaper than iconel. Still, I believe they are planning on replacing the steel components every 5 years.
Wow, this whole time I've heard about Molten Salt reactors for years, I always thought the salt was viscous like, as you say, lava! This is mind blowing, I finally understand how it could feasibly be piped around in a reactor!
I've been preaching the benefits of Thorium reactors since I heard about them back in college five years ago. Great to see them getting more direct coverage.
I studied LFTR’s in my first year of high school for a project (over ten years ago now) and that is what started me down the nuclear power rabbit hole, led me to this channel and changed my entire view on nuclear energy. I’ve been eagerly waiting for you to do this one for a while
I'm quietly waiting for TH-cam documentary makers to discover Moltex Energy and their SSR reactor design. You should go look, the elegance of their solutions to problems listed in this video is breathtaking. And the British firm are building one in Canada. The -W configuration that is fueled with nuclear waste! 😂
Something that stood out to me when it was mentioned was that the metal components of the reactor only have an operational life of 5 years. Which I believe answers a thought I had at the start of the video wondering how well the components of the reactor will stand up to molten salt.
Have a look at how they solved the corrosion problem in Moltex's SSR design. Long story short, don't pump the fuel, put it in static fuel tubes with a sacrificial zirconium coating, problem solved through creative chemistry
Takes time and advocacy to change an established technology. If existing reactors did not have the issues they do, from waste, to safety, to public perception, then there would never be enough pressure to push forward with the research and development that they need to make molten salt reactors a feasible option
In SoCal? They need to build like 30 small modular thorium reactors all the way up the coast, far enough away from the fault lines to be safe, but near enough to make massive ocean desalination facilities a thing. Have the desal water from each reactor associated pump/plant stored in huge reservoirs in the hills that act as batteries. When the water is returned for use, electricity is generated, making the system less expensive. This way, the water tables can be restored, massive reserves of water will be available for fires, farming, urban use, and the surrounding ecosystems can be restored to thriving desert forests. Existing solar can be tied into the pumps, leveraging the reservoirs for energy storage when there's a surplus. Oh, and energy will become so cheap as to be nearly free for all but business consumption.
A few problems with that, namely the brine you'll be pumping back into the ocean will form lethal brine pools, and you're ignoring the obvious solution, evacuate that desolate hellhole. California isn't mean to sustain millions of people and farming.
There are additional problems with desalination than energy. It is bad for the environment, as it Increases the salinity of the coastal habitat and disrupts the waters. Still has real benefits, but you can't just massively scale it up without concern.
Large scale desalination like this does sound great, but you also can't just dump that much salt right back into the ocean without harming the entire local ecosystem. It's got some challenges as well, but for sure is going to be something we adopt wide-scale
alvin weinberg and cohorts at oak ridge had shown success with their molten salt reactor experiment, which went critical in 1965 and operated without incident until 1969. there were plans to scale the design for commercial power production but (as i understand it) alvin's own notes cited one flaw regarding build-up of residues in the plumbing over time (but with plans to resolve them in the next experiment's design). in light of this, hyman rickover (who had pres. nixon's attention resulting from success of his 'nuclear navy') and his westinghouse cronies, pushed hard to standardize their pressurized water reactor design instead, and mothballed MRSE. having said that, i have long hoped for others to resume and improve alvin's innovative efforts. many thorium reactor startups have come and gone, but i've rooted for all of them. wild historical sidenote: we got here as a result of the aircraft nuclear propulsion project. the goal of ANP? a nuclear-powered flying superfortress.
so, I used to work with molten salt as an engineer manufacturing parts for military aircraft, you would have to make sure 100% that no water gets into the system. As the salt melts the sodium becomes more reactive as it gains energy and the bonds between it and the chlorine become looser, as it was explained with our salt vats, a small cup full of water could blow the whole room and cause significant damage to the workshop. Molten salt that has a bunch of uranium dissolved in it makes me nervous if it's not properly built... That's a lot of excess energy that can go boom. The safety measures on that reactor would have to be top notch.
From my understanding the only reason we didn't go with this design decades ago, was that it is more complicated to setup but also it does not create weapons grade materials , and since we were building a nuclear arsenal the traditional water reactor won out, not a 100% sure tho.
It's great to see this work being done again. Especially after all, the work that was destroyed at oak ridge national laboratories with their molten salt reactor experiments, which were in my opinion, wildly successful and should've been the widely adopted technology used for nuclear energy.
Wow. This is amazing info and my US Army Mechanic is happy to see an engine in the works. Hopefully there is more to come about this new engine and the Maintenance behind it in a coming soon. Thank you Kyle.
Another aspect to these reactors that wasn't discussed is that they'd also be safer, too! The big fear with standard nuclear reactors is the dreaded nuclear meltdown, when the nuclear fuel reaches critical melting point temperatures and escapes containment, producing corium. However, with these reactors? The fuel's already melted... BY DESIGN. And because of that, the reactor is already purpose-built to handle the fuel in its liquid state, dramatically reducing the risks of it escaping containment like in solid uranium fuel reactors.
All you really need for it to be foolproof is a mechanism to make it dump the fuel into a recoverable but non-critical storage unit if power is lost. Something like a train's break system, where an air-pump holds the valve closed and it springs open the moment the air pressure is lost... or a refrigerated plug that'll drop out if power is lost.
Science class current affairs, @1972-73. Thorium reactors was the article, and I remember my Science Teacher saying: "Never happen, you cannot make bombs with a thorium reactor. It will die a clean death." That stuck. I've always waited for energy pressures to get serious enough to cause exactly this.
Oak ridge had MSRE online decades ago. This isn't "new" technology as Copenhagen Atomics claims. The only reason this wasn't implemented large scale back in the 50s was lobbying from Westinghouse and General Electric for water cooled reactor technology.
SO glad you got Copenhagen Atomics on - they are doing the hard work of developing the nuts and bolts of the fabled LFTR and have made so much progress already: the highly purified salt which dramatically reduces corrosion, and the high temperature pumps. A thing to be optimistic about.
Something I genuinely appreciate about this sponsor bit is that you actually showed the price of the item. So many sponsors intentionally don't disclose what the thing will actually cost until they got you to click their link. I'm unfortunately currently not in the market for a device this cool, but I'll absolutely make a bookmark for an irresponsible spending decision later down the line.
That cliffhanger was SUPERB!!! I always thought the salt was solid in Thorium reactors. I'm glad you're an Award-winning Science Educator because this stuff normally goes over my head 😂
One of the huge benefits of this technology is it can run on the brayton cycle without water. Right now places like france that see heat waves and use a lot of nuclear have to shut down if river temps get too high. The waste heat from the reactor can be used for desalination another extra benefit.
Cool to see you in Denmark, hope you enjoyed your stay. It's a great place, with great people, I just wish my fellow countrymen would see through the anti-nuclear propaganda and accept nuclear as the obvious choice it is.
I have two concerns 1) corrosion - this reactor seems to have two closed saltwater systems that flow into each other… heat, water and salt are all corrosive. What protections are in place to protect against corrosion on both sides of the plumbing to prevent radiation leak after the extra neutron is inserted and the material is fissile? 2) what prevents the reactor operator from producing an overabundance of fissile material that can later be refined further into weapons grade uranium (which is why governments chose uranium over thorium in the first place)?
To your second concern: Nothing prevents you fundamentally from using this technology to create nuclear bombs. Indeed, because reprocessing is such a central part, it becomes much easier to create bombs because all the steps you would have take to create bomb material you're already doing. With new fissile material ( = bomb material) constantly being created its that much easier to siphon of small amounts to create a nuclear bomb over time if that's what you wanted. In normal nuclear technology, fuel reprocessing is such a "no-no" for exactly this reason. (It also helps that new fuel is cheaper than reprocessing)
U-233 has a strong gamma that's very easily detectable and hard to shield against. Keep in mind that nothing stops someone from using a conventional U-235 reactor to breed plutonium or even inserting thorium for U-233.
Salt itself is not an electrolyte. I'm not sure if molten salt is, probably not since it's used to isolate electrons from rods. Galvanic corrosion should not be a problem but when dealing with high flow, stainless steel can be a victim of Flow-Accelerated Corrosion (FAC)
The thing I'd be worried about - and the thing I would maybe like to see discussed in a future video - is that having the fuel mixed into this salt and moving around sounds like it would be exposed to more points in the machinery that could fail or leak. I am very open to being convinced otherwise, but it sounds like the added complexity adds new possible failure points. Otherwise, the idea of fuel making itself more efficient sounds awesome, as does their pitch of a newly assembled reactor each day.
You're exactly right. By mixing the fuel with the coolant, the entire inner coolant loop out to the first heat-exchanger has to be shielded from radiation, instead of just the core. Most of the radioactive elements are very short lived so they'll decay before the fluid leaves the core but some elements remain emitting radiation as it flows around the loop.
This is one of the big issues with the design, as every part inside the primary loop is exposed to neutron radiation, leading to neutron embrittlement. This coupled with the salt corroding metal still hasnt been fully solved. Considering you need NPPs capable of running 80-100 years without major overhauls to be competitive on the current energy market, I dont have high hopes for molten salt reactors.
Well i think the box itself is alreay leakproof and a sort of containment building. and arround that the requirements will probaly require another containment building.
Ever since I discovered thorium salt reactors as a teen, I've always been sold on their use. It just felt like such a no-brainer. It's been exciting seeing the old technology finally gaining in popularity. It's seriously about time!
I guess I will find out in part 2 but I believe I am right in saying that Thorium is often a by-product in the mining of rare earth metals which would explain why China has an abundance of it.
I was lucky enough to be part of a team that got to brief both the Obama and McCain campaigns about this tech back in 2008. We calculated that about an oil barrel's volume worth of thorium would run a typical nuclear sub's reactor for about 50 years. To bad the US never took the lead on this. Turns out we (along with India and Australia) have some of a largest thorium deposits. There are technical challenges such as corrosion due to the salt, spinning up thorium mining and processing, and safely making the salt (lithium beryllium fluoride salts are actually ideal for these reactors, though the only working MSR made in the 50s/60s used sodium salts), etc. These are engineering and material science challenges. The physics is solid. One other nice feature is that you can "reburn" your waste products by keeping them in the fluid. This removes most of the nasty actors and what you are left with (mostly strontium) you need to isolate for about 200 yrs vs. 10,000+ years with current waste products. The making of weapons is always a consideration. Turns out almost every nation who has developed nukes tried U233 but abandoned it. The processing requirements and the potential nasty gamma emitters from the decay of U233 in weapons grade densities halted this. (The gammas are at lethal energies from weapons grade U233 and are easily detectable from space). The energy density from these reactors is also amazing. We are talking TW-hr/metric ton of fuel (using LiBeF salts) or a few hundred GW-hr/metric ton of fuel using sodium salts. This makes things like desalination of sea water economical, as well as any other power hungry technologies.
@@eugene4950 The choice was made to go with light water reactors because they can be duel used to make weapons grade material. You can't do that with MSRs. That is why the US stopped development.
The US leads the world in thorium research already. Oak Ridge has an ongoing research project since the 60's and there are several others of various types. Many of the projects outside the USA are US funded, like the Indonesian one.
Dammit...just as the resounding chorus of "...so what's the catch?" in my head swelled to a cacophony, I get slapped with a To Be Continued! Well played, sir
You make some bold claims here 14:52 while showing in fine print that Copenhagen Atomics disputes the facts of the article. That really needs to be explained, or at least a link provided with an explanation if we're expected to trust you.
Hopefully we get a good answer from Kyle, but my guess would be that it has to do with the amount of thorium or estimated run time rather than the mechanics of it. More political than technical I'd say
Well how else do you think you get power from radioactive elements? How it works is you a) make heat b) boil water c) spin a turbine and make electricity
Or on the flip side geothermal is just a convoluted way to use nuclear power. Same with solar and wind now that I'm thinking lol. Even Fossil fuels technically, because the energy that created those bonds came from the sun.
The key phrase is "negative thermal coefficient." I wish I'd had heard that in the video. This is what makes liquid reactors passively safe: as they heat up, the reaction becomes _less_ efficient (because the fuel becomes less dense) and the reaction rate slows down, so the reactors cool off and then eventually spin up again, making them self-regulating.
Thorium reactors have been in the R&D phase for some six decades! Thorium was put on low priority in research and funding. Partly due to traditional U-235 fission reactors being so popular and large scale at usually at least 600MW output and more while not needing sodium nor the complex daily operations as Thorium nor Thorium's more complex fuel processing (11:24). Molten salts are corrosive especially at high temperatures which they'll be used 24x7x365 in a Thorium reactor. I agree at 9:15 that is a plumbing puzzle, but the costs and maintenance to build piping, pumps, heat exchangers, valves, seals, etc will be so expensive that any cost reduction with Thorium will be blown away by construction and maintenance costs. That's just one cost. Another big cost is the much more complex daily operations just to keep the small Thorium reactor running. The abundance of Thorium over Uranium isn't much of a benefit as there's more than enough Uranium for current and future traditional U-235 reactors. That said, the much bigger threat to Thorium is renewables powered by that cosmically large fusion reactor in the sky. So by the time that China plans bring online a small 373MWth Thorium reactor in 2030 (TBD), the world would be even deeper into renewables and grid-scale storage -- renewables will be even more abundant and cheaper than it is now and they're already at historic low costs of generation. Currently, the LCOE + LCOS costs of renewables already cheaper than nuclear LCOE alone. So, again, Thorium will be put on low priority if it's even ever brought back. Global renewable generation is growing at exponential rates now and increasing while costs are decreasing. Renewables will dominate the terrestrial grids by 2035.
Don't under estimate the value of having a heavy output power source that can be relied on in an emergency. While renewables are the future, we could do with a strategic backup of thorium reactors.
@ Yes, the grid-scale storage is needed, and this will usher in dispatchable "firm renewables" which will mop the floor every other form of electricity production on Earth, since it will remove the one weakness of renewables, intermittency. Already the LCOE of renewables *plus* LCOS storage cost is _cheaper_ than LCOE cost of new construction commercial utility-scale nuclear. Furthermore, both renewables LCOE and grid-scale storage LCOS are heading _downwards_ too. Moreover, they can both be deployed an order of magnitude faster than nuclear which is key as climate change is breathing own our collective necks. This is why the field of grid-scale storage is white hot right now with subsidies, investments, R&D, and scientific interest. It's not all about battery storage either. There are other forms of storage that are more adapted to grid-scale like: liquid-metal flow batteries, compressed air/CO₂, ceramic/sand thermal storage, hydrogen, gravity, pumped storage hydro. These alternatives use much more conventional construction methods and materials. They are not as energy dense as batteries, but they don't need to since they are stationary.
Something about being that close to the world's deadliest salt bath made me shiver. I've been a fan of Thorium reactors since the Gordon McDowell's Thorium Remix videos over a decade ago, and it's nice that not only is the research going but we're getting closer to more small modular reactors starting to power communities around the world. The downside is that it's the electrical power needed for the servers training AI and search engines and all other internet based corporations that's pushing for this type of power. But hey, it still gets developed and hopefully humanity benefits positively in the long run.
@@patfre She herself requested for her polish roots not to be forgotten. She got famous in france and her husband was french. Even academia tried to dismiss her work and just claimed it's all the work of Curie. (Woman were discriminated at the time in academia remember)., but her husband was such a chad and he refused to acknowledge anything until they aknowledge Maria Skłodowska-Curie as one of the contributors. This was basicaly french erasure historicaly.
spoilers for part two: precisely because it could not be weaponized. U was chosen for its ability to breed plutonium and other weapons-grade materials.
Thorium can breed plutonium too, just nowhere near as much as uranium can. It was not that thorium could not be weaponized, just that it could not produce enough weapons-grade materials fast enough to justify maintaining them as breeders, unlike uranium. Given enough time, thorium can produce enough for a proper weapon and not just something dirty, though it still takes too long for it to produce enough for something dirty. So while thorium, theoretically speaking, can be weaponized, the practicality for it is pretty much nonexistent.
I was curious because one of the fissile products that builds up in current design Uranium reactors is Plutonium and if that was the case here. Apparently not!
Why is it that the HUGE proliferation issue that is brought with Thorium always over looked when talking about Thorium? It literally works off of generating the second best nuclear bomb material, a process that the United States used to stockpile U233 during the cold war for the arms race. It is a single step chemical process to dissolve U233 from a molten salt fuel making basically pure U233 by just running the reactor. I do hope this glaring issue is brought up in part 2 because it is almost never mentioned outside of the Nuclear Engineering/Chemistry community.
Maybe because the consensus is that Thorium reactors are worse at producing nuclear weapon isotopes than Uranium. From Wikipedia: "It is difficult to make a practical nuclear bomb from a thorium reactor's by-products" "a thorium reactor's plutonium production rate would be less than 2 percent of that of a standard reactor, and the plutonium's isotopic content would make it unsuitable for a nuclear detonation. Several uranium-233 bombs have been tested, but the presence of uranium-232 tended to "poison" the uranium-233"
Because it's pure hopium. They never want to talk about the downsides. Same reason whenever conventional nuclear power is brought up, they always say there's enough uranium on Earth to fuel civilization for thousands of years, conveniently leaving out that most of it is in the ocean and would require a negative EROI just to extract. Hell, *all* discussion of fission or fusion power tends to conveniently ignore any power costs, up to the moment the fuel is in the fully constructed reactor and ready to undergo a reaction.
the thorium reactors could eat nuclear grade material too . decreasing weapon stock too. there are plenty of reasons due to how hard is it to get at the fuel. how it decays and spikes making it easily detectable. thorium is the win
In theory pure U233 would make a reasonable good bomb. The usual argument is that the U233 (especially produced from solid fuel) is contaminated with U232 that makes it less or not suitable for a bomb. Though not really tested so far and a bit more complicated the moten salt reactor could allow to seprate very pure U233. The 2nd and possibly bigger concern is that the same technique needed for the thorium breeder could also be used to produce plutonium with relatively little modification. There are enough other difficulties that prevent a molten salt thorium breader from happening. It's a very dead horse and was abandoned in the early 1970s for good reasons.
if i'm not mistaken, some of the issues/challenges with molten salt reactors are 1) the molten salt is very corrosive, be it because of its composition, as well as the high temperature, thus it could be quite difficult to build a reactor that lasts long enough (i suppose at least a few decades would be ideal) 2) extracting the spent fuel byproducts and/or adding more fuel without having to shut down the reactor
Hey Kyle, please take a look/tour of Moltex's SSR-W reactor being designed and built in Canada by a British nuclear firm. Solves a lot of the problems with current MSR designs such as: Online gas product extraction from where gas is created inside the fuel salts Burns MOX with a VERY high burnup rate Solves the problem of pumping hot, corrosive fuel salts around the corner Solves the meltdown problem All without needing to create and have certified New Nuclear Steels (suffice to say this is not cheap or quick prices, nor should it be)
It will certainly not be completed. It will _probably_ not be started. No one will pay what power from it would cost, with abundant, radically cheaper alternatives.
I'd love to see you cover the credibility of the new planned commercial fusion reactor in Massachusetts. From what I hear, they need about 3-4 times the current output for commercial viability, but still planning to start building the commercial plant basically while testing begins on their smaller test plant, which they have only just started building. They're at around 70% of the net energy in coming out. They need about 200-300 percent to be commercially viable. That's a long way off.
“I’ve come up with a new type of nuclear reactor” “Is it just a fancy way to make steam turn a turbine?” “It’s a fancy way to make steam turn a turbine…” I jest, this shit’s DOPE, but it’s still funny to know the basics of power generation are entirely unchanged, the only change is How we heat the water
9:15 these are high pressure sanitary lines. With the welds not brushed, which is big no no at work. We could do these, easy as we do it daily. Thats so cool that nuclear power production really is just spicy plumbing. 😂. Kyle nailed it there.
I hope you touch on the possibility of molten salt fast reactors that can potentially breed Thorium232 or Uranium238 into a fissile form, or on Molten Salt Burner reactors which just use standard enriched uranium.
There is already a running molten salt thorium reactor right now: The 2MW "TMSR-LF1" ("thorium molten salt reactor liquid fuel number 1") was completed in 2021 and reached criticality (self-sustaining reaction) in Oct. 2023, and has been running to this day (Jan. 2025). I am not 100% sure, but I believe it wasn't called the first Thorium Molten Salt Nuclear Power Plant, because (1) It is experimental and running in batch mode for now, and (2) It does not yet have the equipment to generate electricity to be sent to the grid.
There is also the planned 10 MW "TMSR-SF1" ("thorium molten salt reactor solid fuel number 1"), also a pebble bed reactor. Wikipedia says it's 100 MW and supposed to be ready by 2024, but that conflicts with other papers I've read so further fact-checking is needed.
A 2016 paper (DOI: 10.7693/wl20160904) already outlined the roadmap of the Chinese "TMSR" series of reactors. The short-term goal was to have both a solid fuel and a liquid fuel experimental reactors running by 2030. Now we know the liquid fuel one is the operating "TMSR-LF1" and the solid one is "TMSR-SF2". The medium-term goals are to (1) Generate hydrogen directly from the reactors, and (2) Develop water-free cooling methods. There's no deadline given in the paper. Using thorium to generate electricity for the market is actually considered "long-term goal" by the paper, with commercialization by 2050, so it would actually take quite a while for that to happen even if all goes to plan.
The molten salt reactor road map from the 2016 paper (DOI: 10.7693/wl20160904) was: Solid fuel: 10 MW "TMSR-SF1" for research (already superseded by a simulator "TMSR-SF0") -> 100 MW "TMSR-SF2" for practical demonstration (such as hydrogen generation) planned by 2025-> GW "TMSR-SF3*" for commercialization by 2050. Liquid fuel: 2 MW "TMSR-LF1" for research (already operational) -> 10 MW "TMSR-LF2" also for research (the one mentioned in the video, I guess now they also added power generation) planned by 2025 -> 100 MW "TMSR-LF3*" for practical demonstration (such as electricity generation, but it appears now it has been pushed ahead to be part of its predecessor) -> GW "TMSR-SF4*" for commercialization. * speculated names
I normally hate and skip all sponsor, but total props for having a sponsor for this video that has a direct application to the content within. The video was also very good, but just had to call out what a rare pleasure that was to see.
a sponsor related to the content finally :P
You skipped over the part where the sponsor is a Russian company, operating out of Cyprus, sponsoring the war in Ukraine.
We love Radiacode here
i almost always skip them too but i actually watched this one as well.
Topped off with a radioactive dad joke.
Perfect.
THE TRANSFORMATION IS COMPLETE. HE ACTUALLY BECAME THOR....
Bitten by a radioactive hammer.
...ium
...IUM
I like how he just completely dodged that association when introducing thorium.
Trans-THOR-mation!
Glad to see you visit us in Denmark
Hopefully he got to go for a cycle around and feel how nice life can be if streets are not only for cars.
@@Orphiouxto most Americans it is,cars are a deeply important part of our culture.Nascar for a example it’s not just out of necessity (for some it is)
royal dansk cookies can GOATED
As someone who works at a nuclear plant I would love to say
Thank you for all the work you’ve done and still do to dispel the negative and false information about nuclear power.
We need more nuclear power! Not just that we want it, we need it.
Actually one of the so-called waste products is cesium. Which is useful for ion drives for satellites and etc. In fact some of the research we did for US DOE in the 1980's proved that almost all of the byproducts of fission have some useful purposes, when handled properly. These are just a few of the things we were told not to disclose for a period of time by NDA's. Well, that time has past. Thank you to you and others that are finally letting the public know the truths about nuclear energy.
^^^^^^^^^^^^ Plus the insanely useful uses for medicine, aaaand! crafts: small amounts uranium(the not explody kinds) mixed into all kinds of pigments, makes it dead useful for glow in- the dark pigments. I thought I saw a very dated video showing that some isotopes(the rad af elements kind) were used for a minute on roads for night time safety markings. Probably fell out of favor easier to find night time glow in the dark stuff.
“He’s chill.”
- Sam O’nella discussing Thorium.
Happy to see another Samonella fan
nice
@@aldeybrutus4109 Not only that clearly people been going there off this it seems. Searching Sam o Nella brings his thorium video as one of the top results
First thought, "He's like a cripple"
Yup
I also thought the molten salt had the viscosity of lava. That was an incredible demonstration with the salt in this video.
I was hoping there would be a segment on how corrosive molten salt is though. I wasn't able to find an answer while searching online, but I was always under the impression that one of the main complications was how corrosive the molten salt would be and that the "red hot plumbing" part of the reactor would have a significantly shorter lifespan than typical plumbing. Which is then complicated further by the fact that the plumbing would also be radioactive and harder to service.
Not saying these are insurmountable challenges, I was just hoping the see this mentioned in the video since I'm wondering *how* these challenges will be surmounted.
They *briefly* and _tangentially_ address this at 13:49 when he says "...our metal components only last for five years."
@@brentogarayeahsn that's quite the sneak 😂
"Advanced ceramic materials such as silicon carbide and its composites have both the temperature tolerance and corrosion resistance to function in MSRs at the desired level of performance and safety. These materials are also radiation tolerant and, thus, can be used for structural components in the MSR." -The American Ceramic Society
"Corrosion" will probably be in Part 2.🤔
It does have a significantly lower viscosity than lava, but even that's not a fair comparison. Most images of slow, creeping lava are near its freezing point. It flows many orders of magnitude more easily at higher temperatures, such as within an insulated lava tube.
A classic saying from my thermodynamics lectures i will never forget: "If you want efficiency, run it hot!" Basically saying the hotter you run a thermodynamic engine, the better its efficiency of converting heat energy to electrical energy.
The most basic principle of the Carnot cycle
meanwhile all the electrical engineers are screaming right now
fusion bomb explosions are pretty hot i think 🤔
@@badabing3391yeah but you're not going to harvest that energy and turn it into electricity, would be a bit of a challenge lol.
The SSR draught from Moltex runs at a _very_ high temperature.
Which allows them to:
1) use a gas turbine instead of a steam turbine
2) Use the heat directly in process, such as efficient water desalination.
3) Can heat it's energy storage salt tanks to very high temperature, preserving that efficiency even when output is idling.
We alumni of the prestigious Sam O'Nella academy are glad to see Thorium reactors get their recognition.
Here here
Glad they finally listen to Sam O'Nella
Here here!
Here here
You missed the best part, completely passive safety.
By keeping a plug of the salt frozen below the reactor core, if that refrigeration stops or loses power, the plug melts and all the fuel goes into dump tanks where it solidifies almost immediately into something hard as rock
There's basically no way for this to have any kind of meltdown or dangerous event ever, if the fuel every escapes it just solidifies super fast and is easy to clean up
Super hard and easy to clean up as the Elephant's Foot?
@@toolbaggersit won't be as radioactive as the foot
@@toolbaggersso it's actually easier.
@@toolbaggers you cant heat up the elephants foot and liquify it. you can with this. how about you think a little my friend
@@toolbaggers Problem with the Elphants foot is that it doesn't have a dedicated chamber used to clean it up and dispose of it properly
i feel like the biggest reason thorium reactors weren’t really focused on over uranium-235 (outside of the increased complexity of a molten salt reactor) is precisely because of what you mentioned at the end there where it doesn’t really have weaponizable byproducts. To us now this is a huge benefit but to the governments funding the early research into nuclear power, that would actually have been a massive downside, they would’ve wanted those byproducts to bolster and develop their nuclear arsenals.
I came here to say this. Most of the nuclear research into reactor types that was done in the USA, was done with military funding and with military applications in mind. Applications like atomic bombs, or nuclear-powered propulsion for bombers that drop atomic bombs. The peaceful uses were only barely considered, and not usually funded. Google "molten salt reactor experiment oak ridge" for an example of one of the few times it happened. (I'm sure Kyle is going to cover more of this in part 2...)
Hit the nail on the head. Early reactors were military programs specifically meant to either power military systems or create nuclear weapons. By the time MSRs became the subject of interest in the nuclear community the military wasn't really interested and the cultural zeitgeist had shifted from atomic mania to fear. Combine that with the difficulty explaining the technology to investors and technological limitations and it was basically inevitable for the technology to be quietly sidelined for pre-existing systems.
just no?
you can go to the Wikipedia page for U233 and there's a link to the Lawrence Livermore memo saying that U233 is exactly as good as Pu239 for making nuclear weapons and a breeder reactor is a breeder reactor no matter if it's breeding Th232 into U233 or U238 into Pu239, and breeder reactors are extremely rare for power generation in the west.
The light water reactors that are used in almost all western nuclear power plants were developed originally as naval reactors for stuff like nuclear-powered submarines. If you're on a ship where even small molten salt or sodium metal leaks would be rather catastrophic, light water reactors are much safer, and that design makes a rather terrible breeder reactor. The naval reactors use weapons-grade material so that they can go for 20+ years without refueling. Given that that's the design that was built and tested by the US Navy and it works with very cheap per MWh low-enriched uranium if you refuel it regularly, why bother developing anything new for civilian power generation?
@@thamiordragonheart8682 "U-233 has been shown to be highly satisfactory as a weapons material; however,
it has substantial technical advantage over plutonium only in certain environments,
and the probability of such environments being encountered is quite low." Lawrence Livermore Memo you are referring to; however it does also say: "The statement was made that if today's weapons were based upon U-233, LRL would have no interest in switching to plutonium?" While the first guy isn't right, you absolutely aren't either in saying U233 is exactly as good as Pu239.
I live right outside Copenhagen and can confirm I see his hair blowing in the wind on the horizon.
It's beautiful.
America had a molten salt reactor at Oak Ridge in the 60's.
I'm sure someone in the comments will know more than me but I believe the U.S. chose not to pursue this method of nuclear power, favouring instead Uranium breeder reactors due to the need to produce material for nuclear weapons.
That's what I remember as well from when I read about the Oak Ridge reactor years ago. The research reactor was in need of repairs and maintenance, and America was really gung-ho about building bombs at that time and they figured that they had learned enough about thorium and fixing the reactor or building another reactor seemed unnecessary to the powers that be.
I also remember reading about the DOE having a huge stockpile (I think it was in the thousands of tons) that they had accumulated and buried somewhere in containers. So if the technical challenges of thorium fluoride reactors are overcome, there's enough fuel already amassed to last generations.
Everyone likes to claim it was because the US was "Bomb happy" But reality is what he only very briefly touched on (and has said in other comments that the lifespan of the system in part 2) is that the reactor needs to be rebuild within 5 years because the corrosive nature of the salts to metals. Not much has changed in 60 years, metals are still reactive to salts, specially when heated to molten temperatures unlike the standard nuclear reactors which have lifetimes of decades.
@@SilvaDreams With advanced materials, maybe China figured it out the corrosion problem.
@ China can't even get basic metallurgy going, how do you expect them to make advanced metallurgic advancements?
It would have to be you talking about THORium.
I was thinking the same!
Well he is Science Thor
Dollar store thorium is kylesium?
This isn't clever. It's literally the thumbnail.
You know the Thor was already from Thor, right? Highlighting it isn't a pun
LFTRs are THE solution, but there's a huge r&d hump to get them feasible.
The liquid is literally hell in a bottle. Wildly reactive, super hot, crazy high neutron flux. This puts huge material science constraints on design.
The incredible passive safety ALONE should be enough to dump crazy money into researching this
You literally used the word literally wrong.
@@toolbaggers at some point peoples like you will have to accept the use of "literally" for emphasis, language changes and you can't stop it
Have a look at Moltex energy's solution to this:
Don't pump the fuel salt.
Create fuel _tubes_ that contain static fuel salts and a sacrificial zirconium layer.
No corrosion, the fuel salts sit in the tube not moving
Gaseous fission products exhaust from a vent, where they decay inside the SCV before being exhausted.
You pump hot coolant salt around these fuel tubes and use that to make power.
But you use two different salts in the tube and coolant loop, choosing the right one to specialise in just that one task (cooling, being pumped, sitting not being corrosive in the core.
It's a fantastic design.
Any LFTRs built will be vanity projects soon mothballed: no one will (without coercion) pay for their output what they cost to operate. That is the case already, even for cheaper tech, and moreso every day as the cost of solar, wind, and storage halves and halves again, relentlessly. No reactor begun today, LFTR or otherwise, would even be completed; last I checked none were even under construction, just "planned". It costs less to build a new solar farm and switch to it than to continue operating an already paid-for nuke plant. Terawatts of new solar come on line each year. The growth industry around nukes is in _decommissioning_ them, which will eat up many $billions.
Solar and wind projects _all_ have passive safety, produce usefully within a year of breaking ground, and deliver power from small farms as cheaply as from big ones. Vertical, bifacial solar fencerows running north-south between rows in cropland offer farmers predictable year-round revenue in still-producing farmland, meanwhile increasing crop yield by reducing heat stress.
@Akio-fy7ep Solar farms are MUCH more environmentally devastating and unsustainable than nuclear. Especially as a way to phase out coal.
I'm a retired Nuclear worker and I have two questions. First the expensive nature of a molten salt reactor. Liquid salt is very corrosive, therefore the only pipe material that could be safe to use would be inconnel. Inconnel pipe is about ten times more costly than stainless steel pipe. So build cost would be very high. Also because of the corrosive side of liquid salt it will require replacement very often in the life cycle of the reactor. Second, your video basically shows a boiling water reactor style of system. These systems put " HOT" piping outside the reactor building. With a BWR system radioactive steam spins the turbine. Therefore many more contaminated systems that will someday need decon, and more exposure to risk of HOT leaks. The HOT salt designs have been around for years, but I would much prefer a PWR with boronated water as a medium. But thanks for the video.
also anti-proliferation flies out of the window
you are right is the same if you try to make brint you corros the ,etal cobber or Titanum last longst he also say the life time on pipe is 5 years the otehr way roound even with distallet water added the propbem do not go away thats what they need to fix an as he says if the reactor last 5 years an are cheap to build it will be = profit becosue they are very small on the size of a mini van max.
"Advanced ceramic materials such as silicon carbide and its composites have both the temperature tolerance and corrosion resistance to function in MSRs at the desired level of performance and safety. These materials are also radiation tolerant and, thus, can be used for structural components in the MSR." -The American Ceramic Society
ORNL's test reactor they set up in the '60s used an alloy they developed for this exact purpose called Hastelloy-N.
because of the high purity in the salt, which they are making themselves, SS 316 can be used which is way cheaper than iconel. Still, I believe they are planning on replacing the steel components every 5 years.
Cant wait for part 2. This video has been in the making for a WHILE and im happy to finally see it.
Great job as always!
Wow, this whole time I've heard about Molten Salt reactors for years, I always thought the salt was viscous like, as you say, lava! This is mind blowing, I finally understand how it could feasibly be piped around in a reactor!
6:47 Forbidden Kool-aid
I've been preaching the benefits of Thorium reactors since I heard about them back in college five years ago. Great to see them getting more direct coverage.
I studied LFTR’s in my first year of high school for a project (over ten years ago now) and that is what started me down the nuclear power rabbit hole, led me to this channel and changed my entire view on nuclear energy. I’ve been eagerly waiting for you to do this one for a while
I'm quietly waiting for TH-cam documentary makers to discover Moltex Energy and their SSR reactor design.
You should go look, the elegance of their solutions to problems listed in this video is breathtaking.
And the British firm are building one in Canada.
The -W configuration that is fueled with nuclear waste! 😂
As was foretold by the wise Sam O'Nella Academy..
What did he say?
@@Andreassoegaard thorium is cool
Something that stood out to me when it was mentioned was that the metal components of the reactor only have an operational life of 5 years. Which I believe answers a thought I had at the start of the video wondering how well the components of the reactor will stand up to molten salt.
Have a look at how they solved the corrosion problem in Moltex's SSR design.
Long story short, don't pump the fuel, put it in static fuel tubes with a sacrificial zirconium coating, problem solved through creative chemistry
Dollar store Thor advocating for Thorium.... mmmm, close enough, welcome back Chris Hemsworth!
Kylesium
@02:36 Nuke Hemsworth
Chris Lessworth
"To be continued..."
How dare you. What is this, Back to the Future?
DAMN! worst part about catching these videos so early is we ain’t got no part 2 yet :(
Sam O’ Nella already told everyone Thorium was the answer years ago lol
Takes time and advocacy to change an established technology. If existing reactors did not have the issues they do, from waste, to safety, to public perception, then there would never be enough pressure to push forward with the research and development that they need to make molten salt reactors a feasible option
In SoCal? They need to build like 30 small modular thorium reactors all the way up the coast, far enough away from the fault lines to be safe, but near enough to make massive ocean desalination facilities a thing. Have the desal water from each reactor associated pump/plant stored in huge reservoirs in the hills that act as batteries. When the water is returned for use, electricity is generated, making the system less expensive. This way, the water tables can be restored, massive reserves of water will be available for fires, farming, urban use, and the surrounding ecosystems can be restored to thriving desert forests. Existing solar can be tied into the pumps, leveraging the reservoirs for energy storage when there's a surplus.
Oh, and energy will become so cheap as to be nearly free for all but business consumption.
A few problems with that, namely the brine you'll be pumping back into the ocean will form lethal brine pools, and you're ignoring the obvious solution, evacuate that desolate hellhole. California isn't mean to sustain millions of people and farming.
There are additional problems with desalination than energy. It is bad for the environment, as it Increases the salinity of the coastal habitat and disrupts the waters. Still has real benefits, but you can't just massively scale it up without concern.
Large scale desalination like this does sound great, but you also can't just dump that much salt right back into the ocean without harming the entire local ecosystem. It's got some challenges as well, but for sure is going to be something we adopt wide-scale
@@Sam_on_TH-camcould you not just avoid pumping the salt back into the ocean? like, evaporate it down to crystals and store it somewhere on land?
@@ayybe7894lets just use some of the salt then, cuts down on salt mining
Interesting how they named an element after Kyle
alvin weinberg and cohorts at oak ridge had shown success with their molten salt reactor experiment, which went critical in 1965 and operated without incident until 1969. there were plans to scale the design for commercial power production but (as i understand it) alvin's own notes cited one flaw regarding build-up of residues in the plumbing over time (but with plans to resolve them in the next experiment's design). in light of this, hyman rickover (who had pres. nixon's attention resulting from success of his 'nuclear navy') and his westinghouse cronies, pushed hard to standardize their pressurized water reactor design instead, and mothballed MRSE.
having said that, i have long hoped for others to resume and improve alvin's innovative efforts. many thorium reactor startups have come and gone, but i've rooted for all of them.
wild historical sidenote: we got here as a result of the aircraft nuclear propulsion project. the goal of ANP? a nuclear-powered flying superfortress.
so, I used to work with molten salt as an engineer manufacturing parts for military aircraft, you would have to make sure 100% that no water gets into the system. As the salt melts the sodium becomes more reactive as it gains energy and the bonds between it and the chlorine become looser, as it was explained with our salt vats, a small cup full of water could blow the whole room and cause significant damage to the workshop.
Molten salt that has a bunch of uranium dissolved in it makes me nervous if it's not properly built... That's a lot of excess energy that can go boom. The safety measures on that reactor would have to be top notch.
the uranium is not dissolved in the salt it is the salt Uranium hexafluoride
From my understanding the only reason we didn't go with this design decades ago, was that it is more complicated to setup but also it does not create weapons grade materials , and since we were building a nuclear arsenal the traditional water reactor won out, not a 100% sure tho.
Thanks for visiting Denmark, Kyle. It's an honour ❤Love from... Denmark!!
I have been listening to Kirk Sorensen for years about LTFR and IMSR, glad to see it getting more attention.
Thorium - "Transmissive and Breedable"
BRUH
It's great to see this work being done again. Especially after all, the work that was destroyed at oak ridge national laboratories with their molten salt reactor experiments, which were in my opinion, wildly successful and should've been the widely adopted technology used for nuclear energy.
Wow. This is amazing info and my US Army Mechanic is happy to see an engine in the works. Hopefully there is more to come about this new engine and the Maintenance behind it in a coming soon. Thank you Kyle.
1:18 Christmas tree powered reactor?
If it works for Santa, it'll work for me
We always did a "weapons first" approach to development. You can't use Thorium for typical weapons, so we didn't do anything with it.
Another aspect to these reactors that wasn't discussed is that they'd also be safer, too!
The big fear with standard nuclear reactors is the dreaded nuclear meltdown, when the nuclear fuel reaches critical melting point temperatures and escapes containment, producing corium.
However, with these reactors? The fuel's already melted... BY DESIGN. And because of that, the reactor is already purpose-built to handle the fuel in its liquid state, dramatically reducing the risks of it escaping containment like in solid uranium fuel reactors.
All you really need for it to be foolproof is a mechanism to make it dump the fuel into a recoverable but non-critical storage unit if power is lost.
Something like a train's break system, where an air-pump holds the valve closed and it springs open the moment the air pressure is lost... or a refrigerated plug that'll drop out if power is lost.
Science class current affairs, @1972-73. Thorium reactors was the article, and I remember my Science Teacher saying: "Never happen, you cannot make bombs with a thorium reactor. It will die a clean death." That stuck. I've always waited for energy pressures to get serious enough to cause exactly this.
Oak ridge had MSRE online decades ago. This isn't "new" technology as Copenhagen Atomics claims. The only reason this wasn't implemented large scale back in the 50s was lobbying from Westinghouse and General Electric for water cooled reactor technology.
SO glad you got Copenhagen Atomics on - they are doing the hard work of developing the nuts and bolts of the fabled LFTR and have made so much progress already: the highly purified salt which dramatically reduces corrosion, and the high temperature pumps. A thing to be optimistic about.
Nurmal nuclear reactor: spicy rock make steam.
Moltan salt reactor: spicy rock make liquid rock make steam
Something I genuinely appreciate about this sponsor bit is that you actually showed the price of the item. So many sponsors intentionally don't disclose what the thing will actually cost until they got you to click their link.
I'm unfortunately currently not in the market for a device this cool, but I'll absolutely make a bookmark for an irresponsible spending decision later down the line.
Great video, much love from Denmark
I love Copenhagen. Can't wait to explore more of your beautiful country.
I am glad that you educate us in the proper understanding of nuclear energy, radiation and so on. Thank you!
Love your videos mate. I'm a science teacher and I'll show this video in class tomorrow.
Greetings from Copenhagen, Denmark 🙂
Yo that’s dope. I hope your class likes it. Tell us how it goes.
That cliffhanger was SUPERB!!!
I always thought the salt was solid in Thorium reactors. I'm glad you're an Award-winning Science Educator because this stuff normally goes over my head 😂
9:47 why are we not allowed to look at thorium
It's the banned texture
Finally… the Hill of Thorium is crossed… while all of us following Nuclear have been following for decades, very glad to see this.
"Until next time." WHAT? Are you killing me?
One of the huge benefits of this technology is it can run on the brayton cycle without water. Right now places like france that see heat waves and use a lot of nuclear have to shut down if river temps get too high. The waste heat from the reactor can be used for desalination another extra benefit.
Spread the good word! Too many people really underestimate, how much progress in safety we have made with nuclear power.
Cool to see you in Denmark, hope you enjoyed your stay. It's a great place, with great people, I just wish my fellow countrymen would see through the anti-nuclear propaganda and accept nuclear as the obvious choice it is.
Atomkraft - Ja tak! :D
@@JaxiPaxified Præcis;)
same for the germans, they are so anti-nuclear its crazy. Compared to france who love it
Nuke Hemsworth was one if the best jokes i've heard you make 😂😂
Oh my God! I’ve been waiting so long for this!
I have two concerns
1) corrosion - this reactor seems to have two closed saltwater systems that flow into each other… heat, water and salt are all corrosive. What protections are in place to protect against corrosion on both sides of the plumbing to prevent radiation leak after the extra neutron is inserted and the material is fissile?
2) what prevents the reactor operator from producing an overabundance of fissile material that can later be refined further into weapons grade uranium (which is why governments chose uranium over thorium in the first place)?
Corrosion was my first concern as well as soon as I saw salt was being used.
To your second concern: Nothing prevents you fundamentally from using this technology to create nuclear bombs. Indeed, because reprocessing is such a central part, it becomes much easier to create bombs because all the steps you would have take to create bomb material you're already doing. With new fissile material ( = bomb material) constantly being created its that much easier to siphon of small amounts to create a nuclear bomb over time if that's what you wanted.
In normal nuclear technology, fuel reprocessing is such a "no-no" for exactly this reason. (It also helps that new fuel is cheaper than reprocessing)
@@TroyBrinson salt is not corrosive
U-233 has a strong gamma that's very easily detectable and hard to shield against. Keep in mind that nothing stops someone from using a conventional U-235 reactor to breed plutonium or even inserting thorium for U-233.
Salt itself is not an electrolyte. I'm not sure if molten salt is, probably not since it's used to isolate electrons from rods.
Galvanic corrosion should not be a problem but when dealing with high flow, stainless steel can be a victim of Flow-Accelerated Corrosion (FAC)
welcome to denmark, hope you have a great time here and remember to get a hotdog here we make great ones :)
The thing I'd be worried about - and the thing I would maybe like to see discussed in a future video - is that having the fuel mixed into this salt and moving around sounds like it would be exposed to more points in the machinery that could fail or leak. I am very open to being convinced otherwise, but it sounds like the added complexity adds new possible failure points.
Otherwise, the idea of fuel making itself more efficient sounds awesome, as does their pitch of a newly assembled reactor each day.
You're exactly right. By mixing the fuel with the coolant, the entire inner coolant loop out to the first heat-exchanger has to be shielded from radiation, instead of just the core. Most of the radioactive elements are very short lived so they'll decay before the fluid leaves the core but some elements remain emitting radiation as it flows around the loop.
This is one of the big issues with the design, as every part inside the primary loop is exposed to neutron radiation, leading to neutron embrittlement. This coupled with the salt corroding metal still hasnt been fully solved. Considering you need NPPs capable of running 80-100 years without major overhauls to be competitive on the current energy market, I dont have high hopes for molten salt reactors.
Well i think the box itself is alreay leakproof and a sort of containment building. and arround that the requirements will probaly require another containment building.
@@xXYannuschXxThe guy himself said the metal lasts only 5 years while the fuel lasts for 100
@@minecraftfirefighter Nothing is truly "leakproof". Leak-resistant sure. But, the right unexpected earthquake comes along and .. yeah.
Ever since I discovered thorium salt reactors as a teen, I've always been sold on their use. It just felt like such a no-brainer. It's been exciting seeing the old technology finally gaining in popularity. It's seriously about time!
Damn it Kyle, ending on a cliffhanger like that!
i know right lol
^_^
I guess I will find out in part 2 but I believe I am right in saying that Thorium is often a by-product in the mining of rare earth metals which would explain why China has an abundance of it.
I was lucky enough to be part of a team that got to brief both the Obama and McCain campaigns about this tech back in 2008. We calculated that about an oil barrel's volume worth of thorium would run a typical nuclear sub's reactor for about 50 years. To bad the US never took the lead on this. Turns out we (along with India and Australia) have some of a largest thorium deposits. There are technical challenges such as corrosion due to the salt, spinning up thorium mining and processing, and safely making the salt (lithium beryllium fluoride salts are actually ideal for these reactors, though the only working MSR made in the 50s/60s used sodium salts), etc. These are engineering and material science challenges. The physics is solid.
One other nice feature is that you can "reburn" your waste products by keeping them in the fluid. This removes most of the nasty actors and what you are left with (mostly strontium) you need to isolate for about 200 yrs vs. 10,000+ years with current waste products.
The making of weapons is always a consideration. Turns out almost every nation who has developed nukes tried U233 but abandoned it. The processing requirements and the potential nasty gamma emitters from the decay of U233 in weapons grade densities halted this. (The gammas are at lethal energies from weapons grade U233 and are easily detectable from space).
The energy density from these reactors is also amazing. We are talking TW-hr/metric ton of fuel (using LiBeF salts) or a few hundred GW-hr/metric ton of fuel using sodium salts. This makes things like desalination of sea water economical, as well as any other power hungry technologies.
because US already tried it in the 60ties and it didn't go anywhere
@@eugene4950 The choice was made to go with light water reactors because they can be duel used to make weapons grade material. You can't do that with MSRs. That is why the US stopped development.
The US leads the world in thorium research already. Oak Ridge has an ongoing research project since the 60's and there are several others of various types. Many of the projects outside the USA are US funded, like the Indonesian one.
Dammit...just as the resounding chorus of "...so what's the catch?" in my head swelled to a cacophony, I get slapped with a To Be Continued! Well played, sir
You make some bold claims here 14:52 while showing in fine print that Copenhagen Atomics disputes the facts of the article. That really needs to be explained, or at least a link provided with an explanation if we're expected to trust you.
Hopefully we get a good answer from Kyle, but my guess would be that it has to do with the amount of thorium or estimated run time rather than the mechanics of it. More political than technical I'd say
Currently online fuel reprocessing of liquid fuel tech is not good enough. One day, quite a long time in the future
11:44 does this mean thorium reactors are just a really convoluted form of geothermal power?
Well how else do you think you get power from radioactive elements? How it works is you a) make heat b) boil water c) spin a turbine and make electricity
Or on the flip side geothermal is just a convoluted way to use nuclear power. Same with solar and wind now that I'm thinking lol. Even Fossil fuels technically, because the energy that created those bonds came from the sun.
The key phrase is "negative thermal coefficient." I wish I'd had heard that in the video. This is what makes liquid reactors passively safe: as they heat up, the reaction becomes _less_ efficient (because the fuel becomes less dense) and the reaction rate slows down, so the reactors cool off and then eventually spin up again, making them self-regulating.
Thorium reactors have been in the R&D phase for some six decades! Thorium was put on low priority in research and funding. Partly due to traditional U-235 fission reactors being so popular and large scale at usually at least 600MW output and more while not needing sodium nor the complex daily operations as Thorium nor Thorium's more complex fuel processing (11:24).
Molten salts are corrosive especially at high temperatures which they'll be used 24x7x365 in a Thorium reactor. I agree at 9:15 that is a plumbing puzzle, but the costs and maintenance to build piping, pumps, heat exchangers, valves, seals, etc will be so expensive that any cost reduction with Thorium will be blown away by construction and maintenance costs. That's just one cost. Another big cost is the much more complex daily operations just to keep the small Thorium reactor running.
The abundance of Thorium over Uranium isn't much of a benefit as there's more than enough Uranium for current and future traditional U-235 reactors.
That said, the much bigger threat to Thorium is renewables powered by that cosmically large fusion reactor in the sky. So by the time that China plans bring online a small 373MWth Thorium reactor in 2030 (TBD), the world would be even deeper into renewables and grid-scale storage -- renewables will be even more abundant and cheaper than it is now and they're already at historic low costs of generation. Currently, the LCOE + LCOS costs of renewables already cheaper than nuclear LCOE alone. So, again, Thorium will be put on low priority if it's even ever brought back. Global renewable generation is growing at exponential rates now and increasing while costs are decreasing. Renewables will dominate the terrestrial grids by 2035.
Don't under estimate the value of having a heavy output power source that can be relied on in an emergency.
While renewables are the future, we could do with a strategic backup of thorium reactors.
@@GrowlsWho's gonna pay for that?
@ Hopefully sensible economics that takes extreme weather into account.
@ Yes, the grid-scale storage is needed, and this will usher in dispatchable "firm renewables" which will mop the floor every other form of electricity production on Earth, since it will remove the one weakness of renewables, intermittency.
Already the LCOE of renewables *plus* LCOS storage cost is _cheaper_ than LCOE cost of new construction commercial utility-scale nuclear. Furthermore, both renewables LCOE and grid-scale storage LCOS are heading _downwards_ too. Moreover, they can both be deployed an order of magnitude faster than nuclear which is key as climate change is breathing own our collective necks.
This is why the field of grid-scale storage is white hot right now with subsidies, investments, R&D, and scientific interest. It's not all about battery storage either. There are other forms of storage that are more adapted to grid-scale like: liquid-metal flow batteries, compressed air/CO₂, ceramic/sand thermal storage, hydrogen, gravity, pumped storage hydro. These alternatives use much more conventional construction methods and materials. They are not as energy dense as batteries, but they don't need to since they are stationary.
Something about being that close to the world's deadliest salt bath made me shiver. I've been a fan of Thorium reactors since the Gordon McDowell's Thorium Remix videos over a decade ago, and it's nice that not only is the research going but we're getting closer to more small modular reactors starting to power communities around the world. The downside is that it's the electrical power needed for the servers training AI and search engines and all other internet based corporations that's pushing for this type of power. But hey, it still gets developed and hopefully humanity benefits positively in the long run.
Please remember to say the whole name of Marie Curie Skłodowskiej, it was incredibly important for her and Poland and it keeps getting forgotten
If it matters that much then why aren’t people tought the full name in school? I sure never did
@@patfre That is precisely the problem, it might be cause it's a hard name or cause it's her maiden name.
@@patfre She herself requested for her polish roots not to be forgotten. She got famous in france and her husband was french. Even academia tried to dismiss her work and just claimed it's all the work of Curie. (Woman were discriminated at the time in academia remember)., but her husband was such a chad and he refused to acknowledge anything until they aknowledge Maria Skłodowska-Curie as one of the contributors. This was basicaly french erasure historicaly.
Love the video Kyle!!! Keep up the great work 👍
spoilers for part two: precisely because it could not be weaponized. U was chosen for its ability to breed plutonium and other weapons-grade materials.
Thorium can breed plutonium too, just nowhere near as much as uranium can. It was not that thorium could not be weaponized, just that it could not produce enough weapons-grade materials fast enough to justify maintaining them as breeders, unlike uranium. Given enough time, thorium can produce enough for a proper weapon and not just something dirty, though it still takes too long for it to produce enough for something dirty. So while thorium, theoretically speaking, can be weaponized, the practicality for it is pretty much nonexistent.
I was curious because one of the fissile products that builds up in current design Uranium reactors is Plutonium and if that was the case here. Apparently not!
@ thank you for the nuance and clarification.
This is awesome! Such cool information.
The amount of credit that Sam O'Nella deserves for the education on this topic that he has provided is incalculable.
My god i'm suprised to see you in Denmark, hope you enjoy your stay here:)
Why is it that the HUGE proliferation issue that is brought with Thorium always over looked when talking about Thorium? It literally works off of generating the second best nuclear bomb material, a process that the United States used to stockpile U233 during the cold war for the arms race. It is a single step chemical process to dissolve U233 from a molten salt fuel making basically pure U233 by just running the reactor. I do hope this glaring issue is brought up in part 2 because it is almost never mentioned outside of the Nuclear Engineering/Chemistry community.
Maybe because the consensus is that Thorium reactors are worse at producing nuclear weapon isotopes than Uranium. From Wikipedia: "It is difficult to make a practical nuclear bomb from a thorium reactor's by-products" "a thorium reactor's plutonium production rate would be less than 2 percent of that of a standard reactor, and the plutonium's isotopic content would make it unsuitable for a nuclear detonation. Several uranium-233 bombs have been tested, but the presence of uranium-232 tended to "poison" the uranium-233"
You realise the alternative is either collecting U235 or making Pu239, right? Like this is not a problem unique to Thorium.
Because it's pure hopium. They never want to talk about the downsides. Same reason whenever conventional nuclear power is brought up, they always say there's enough uranium on Earth to fuel civilization for thousands of years, conveniently leaving out that most of it is in the ocean and would require a negative EROI just to extract. Hell, *all* discussion of fission or fusion power tends to conveniently ignore any power costs, up to the moment the fuel is in the fully constructed reactor and ready to undergo a reaction.
the thorium reactors could eat nuclear grade material too . decreasing weapon stock too. there are plenty of reasons due to how hard is it to get at the fuel. how it decays and spikes making it easily detectable. thorium is the win
In theory pure U233 would make a reasonable good bomb. The usual argument is that the U233 (especially produced from solid fuel) is contaminated with U232 that makes it less or not suitable for a bomb. Though not really tested so far and a bit more complicated the moten salt reactor could allow to seprate very pure U233. The 2nd and possibly bigger concern is that the same technique needed for the thorium breeder could also be used to produce plutonium with relatively little modification.
There are enough other difficulties that prevent a molten salt thorium breader from happening. It's a very dead horse and was abandoned in the early 1970s for good reasons.
if i'm not mistaken, some of the issues/challenges with molten salt reactors are 1) the molten salt is very corrosive, be it because of its composition, as well as the high temperature, thus it could be quite difficult to build a reactor that lasts long enough (i suppose at least a few decades would be ideal) 2) extracting the spent fuel byproducts and/or adding more fuel without having to shut down the reactor
Sam O’Nella was right
Hey Kyle, please take a look/tour of Moltex's SSR-W reactor being designed and built in Canada by a British nuclear firm.
Solves a lot of the problems with current MSR designs such as:
Online gas product extraction from where gas is created inside the fuel salts
Burns MOX with a VERY high burnup rate
Solves the problem of pumping hot, corrosive fuel salts around the corner
Solves the meltdown problem
All without needing to create and have certified New Nuclear Steels (suffice to say this is not cheap or quick prices, nor should it be)
It will certainly not be completed. It will _probably_ not be started. No one will pay what power from it would cost, with abundant, radically cheaper alternatives.
Sam O'Nella gang
I'd love to see you cover the credibility of the new planned commercial fusion reactor in Massachusetts. From what I hear, they need about 3-4 times the current output for commercial viability, but still planning to start building the commercial plant basically while testing begins on their smaller test plant, which they have only just started building. They're at around 70% of the net energy in coming out. They need about 200-300 percent to be commercially viable. That's a long way off.
i sense a future tyler folse video
“I’ve come up with a new type of nuclear reactor”
“Is it just a fancy way to make steam turn a turbine?”
“It’s a fancy way to make steam turn a turbine…”
I jest, this shit’s DOPE, but it’s still funny to know the basics of power generation are entirely unchanged, the only change is How we heat the water
If china is able to power the whole country with thorium their power grid and development is gonna be crazy reliable
And if they replace the coal, their pollution will go down by an insane number.
@@zerberus_ms Yes exactly, i cant believe china has a good chance of becoming more enviromentally friendly than the west
I hate cliffhangers. How am I now gonna fall asleep now. Oh well, I"ll make up my own part2 with blackjack and...
9:15 these are high pressure sanitary lines. With the welds not brushed, which is big no no at work. We could do these, easy as we do it daily. Thats so cool that nuclear power production really is just spicy plumbing. 😂. Kyle nailed it there.
one of the most painful to be continued's in a while! this was so cool! cant wait for part 2!
I BEEN WAITING FOR THIS ONE, TURN IT UP
thank you Kyle, very cool!
This is so interesting. Enjoyed heaps
Hands down, the coolest demo I've seen, and I worked on a video in the 80's with a bomb squad.
9:00 "most of it was figured out in the 50's (and we're just using the same design with new materials)
story of everywhere i've worked
I'm all in for Nuclear energy, be it the classic uranium or molten salt thorium.
They are for the future.
Ohhhh! “A question for part two.” I was so excited to learn more right now haha.
RadiThor is back!!!!!!
THX Kyle for this
I hope you touch on the possibility of molten salt fast reactors that can potentially breed Thorium232 or Uranium238 into a fissile form, or on Molten Salt Burner reactors which just use standard enriched uranium.
There is already a running molten salt thorium reactor right now: The 2MW "TMSR-LF1" ("thorium molten salt reactor liquid fuel number 1") was completed in 2021 and reached criticality (self-sustaining reaction) in Oct. 2023, and has been running to this day (Jan. 2025).
I am not 100% sure, but I believe it wasn't called the first Thorium Molten Salt Nuclear Power Plant, because (1) It is experimental and running in batch mode for now, and (2) It does not yet have the equipment to generate electricity to be sent to the grid.
There is also the planned 10 MW "TMSR-SF1" ("thorium molten salt reactor solid fuel number 1"), also a pebble bed reactor.
Wikipedia says it's 100 MW and supposed to be ready by 2024, but that conflicts with other papers I've read so further fact-checking is needed.
A 2016 paper (DOI: 10.7693/wl20160904) already outlined the roadmap of the Chinese "TMSR" series of reactors.
The short-term goal was to have both a solid fuel and a liquid fuel experimental reactors running by 2030. Now we know the liquid fuel one is the operating "TMSR-LF1" and the solid one is "TMSR-SF2".
The medium-term goals are to (1) Generate hydrogen directly from the reactors, and (2) Develop water-free cooling methods. There's no deadline given in the paper.
Using thorium to generate electricity for the market is actually considered "long-term goal" by the paper, with commercialization by 2050, so it would actually take quite a while for that to happen even if all goes to plan.
The molten salt reactor road map from the 2016 paper (DOI: 10.7693/wl20160904) was:
Solid fuel: 10 MW "TMSR-SF1" for research (already superseded by a simulator "TMSR-SF0") -> 100 MW "TMSR-SF2" for practical demonstration (such as hydrogen generation) planned by 2025-> GW "TMSR-SF3*" for commercialization by 2050.
Liquid fuel: 2 MW "TMSR-LF1" for research (already operational) -> 10 MW "TMSR-LF2" also for research (the one mentioned in the video, I guess now they also added power generation) planned by 2025 -> 100 MW "TMSR-LF3*" for practical demonstration (such as electricity generation, but it appears now it has been pushed ahead to be part of its predecessor) -> GW "TMSR-SF4*" for commercialization.
* speculated names