Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor

The revolutionary Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor (LFTR) solves all of the major problems associated with nuclear power. LFTRs transform thorium into fissionable uranium-233, which then produces heat through controlled nuclear fission. LFTRs only require input of uranium or plutonium to kick-start the initial nuclear reaction, and as the fissionable material can come from either spent fuel rods or old nuclear warheads, LFTRs will inevitably be used as janitors to clean up nuclear waste. Once started, the controlled nuclear reactions are self-perpetuating as long as the reactor is fed thorium. LFTRs are highly fuel efficient and burn up 100% of the thorium fed them. Light water reactors typically burn only about 3% of their loaded fuel, or about .7% of the fundamental raw uranium which must be enriched to become fissionable. As LFTR fuel is a molten liquid salt, it can be cleansed of impurities and refortified with thorium through elaborate plumbing even while the reactor maintains full power operation. The cost savings of using a liquid fuel is like the difference between making soup vs. baking a wedding cake. Soup is cheap, and you can change ingredients very easily. The reactor works like a Crock-Pot; you keep the fuel cooking in the pot until it is over 99% burned, so LFTRs produce less than 1% of the long-lived radioactive waste of light water reactors, making Yucca Mountain waste storage unnecessary.

LFTRs produce electric power via a waterless gas turbine system that can use helium, carbon dioxide, or nitrogen gas. The reactors are small and air cooled, so they can be installed anywhere, even in a desert. Robert Hargraves, an LFTR advocate, states that "Liquid fluoride thorium reactors operate at high temperature for 50% thermal/electrical conversion efficiency, thus they need only half of the cooling required by today's coal or nuclear plant cooling towers." LFTRs with an output capability as high as 100 megawatts can be manufactured on an assembly line, dramatically lowering costs and enabling electricity generation at a lower cost than any other new construction power source. That means lower than new construction natural gas, coal, geothermal and hydroelectric power, as well as being vastly more affordable than unreliable wind and solar projects. Multiple reactors can be installed at one location and connected to a single control room. With convenient modular design, LFTRs can be transported in pieces by truck or barge for easy assembly on site. This allows for swift construction with reliable results, avoiding delays and cost overruns. Rapid assembly line construction also allows for easy updating of the design, which will improve over time like the dramatic evolution of automobiles, airplanes, and computer chips.

A LFTR can never meltdown, because its fuel is already in a molten state by design. Any terrorists who obtained forceful entry into the reactor complex could not realistically remove any of the hot molten fissionable fuel. Coolant in LFTRs is not pressurized as in light water reactors, and the fuel arrives at the plant pre-burned with fluorine, a powerful oxidizer. This makes a reactor fire or a coolant explosion impossible. LFTRs do not require large, cavernous pressure vessels designed to contain an internal explosion of superheated steam, so LFTR enclosures are tightly fitting and compact, which makes them less expensive. The reactors will be installed underground with a thick reinforced concrete cap, making an attack by a kamikaze airplane pilot ineffective. Any overheating of a LFTR causes the molten salt fuel to naturally expand, which pushes fuel molecules so far apart that nuclear fission can no longer take place. This creates an inherent controlling negative feedback which keeps core temperatures stable. Even a total loss of operational reactor control would not cause disaster. In addition to the fuel's natural safety, any excess heat in the reactor core would automatically melt built-in freeze-plugs, causing the liquid fuel to drain via gravity into underground storage compartments where the fuel would then cool into a harmless, noncritical mass.

Thorium is more abundant than tin, and the United States alone has enough rich thorium deposits to last for many thousands of years. One pound of thorium can produce as much energy as 3 million pounds of coal. A Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor is up to 200 times more fuel efficient than a traditional Light Water Nuclear Reactor. One 3.5" diameter ball of thorium, about the size of an extra large apple, can produce an amount of electricity equivalent to the yearly consumption of one average American for about 8,000. years.

The fissile uranium-233 produced in LFTRs is unavoidably contaminated with uranium-232, which would make producing an atomic weapon with the help of a LFTR very difficult even for a major superpower. Uranium-232 emits intense gamma rays, which interfere with electronic devices needed to make atomic bombs detonate. The presence of gamma rays also makes fabricating bomb components hazardous without very complex and expensive remote controlled equipment. Uranium-232 puts out such a strong, easily detectable signal that any terrorist organization obtaining it would immediately broadcast their location to the world. Even uncontaminated uranium-233 is not a good candidate for bomb making, and any small nation wishing to joining the nuclear club would find it far easier and cheaper to make bombs using plutonium made in ordinary light water nuclear reactors.

France's Reactor Physics Group, Russia, Japan (Fuji MSR pdf), and other countries are currently conducting LFTR research. If the United States committed a relatively modest amount of money to develop LFTRs in cooperation with other nations, a fully operational TOTAL ENERGY SOLUTION could be developed quickly, because most of the basic research has already been accomplished and is well proven. Contrary to rumor, the liquid fluoride salts used in LFTRs are not unusably corrosive, even at very high temperatures. Oak Ridge National Laboratory conducted tests with a liquid salt reactor and found that the 1" thick metal alloy used in the reactor vessel corroded at a rate of just one micrometer per year, an irrelevant amount in a reactor designed to last no more than a hundred years. As the interior of the reactor vessel in a LFTR operates at normal atmospheric pressure levels, there are no unusual mechanical forces applied to its walls other than the ordinary gravitational load of the fuel. Unfortunately, LFTR research at Oak Ridge National Laboratory was ended in 1976 despite steady design progress in favor of funding the Liquid Metal Fast Breeder Reactor (LMFBR). [See Robert Hargraves fascinating Aim High LFTR proposal with slide presentation on 3.2MB PDF. See chemical engineer K.L. Johnson's brilliant slide show, Life-Sustaining Energy from Thorium and The Sustainable Chemistry and Energy of Thorium. Also see Energy From Thorium, the International Thorium Energy Organization, the Wired Magazine article on the LFTR and Too Good To Leave on the Shelf.]

We can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by creating an infrastructure based on thorium power, improved electric car battery technology, and the use of new technology called Green Freedom. The Green Freedom process can produce a whole range of liquid fuels made from atmospheric carbon dioxide and hydrogen extracted from water. These fuels include sulfur free synthetic gasoline, jet fuel, methanol as a substitute for gasoline, and dimethyl ether as a substitute for diesel fuel. [See the Green Freedom process 1.8MB PDF]

The Green Freedom synthetic liquid fuel process is cheaper than using pure hydrogen gas as fuel because it is more compatible with current vehicles and our existing energy distribution infrastructure. Green Freedom can also be used to make urea and ammonia for fertilizers. The process demands very low cost nuclear energy to work economically, and as the LFTR design can produce energy at a fraction of the cost of traditional light water nuclear reactors, we can have an endless supply of liquid fuels produced on American soil by American labor.

A less expensive fuel solution is the new Green Freedom Hybrid process, which makes synthetic gasoline out of natural gas, water, and atmospheric CO2 for a cost under $3.00 a gallon. The original carbon neutral Green Freedom process will be more expensive, but that cost could be counterbalanced by savings in military expenditures as a result of no longer needing to protect foreign supplies of oil. Burning synthetic liquid fuels in super-efficient Wave Disk engines and/or OPOC engines may eventually be a very affordable transportation solution. We can use electricity and heat from LFTR technology to produce tires and plastics from American oil shale rock, making us independent of foreign oil altogether.