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Pitch

Different nuclear that can solve the world's energy needs without pollution that is safe: Molten Salt Reactors running on thorium ARE safe.


Description

Summary

Robert Hargraves, PhD, wrote a proposal in the form of a book called Thorium energy cheaper than coal. He wants us to pick up where Alvin Weinberg and his team left off with the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment at Oak Ridge National Labs in the 1960s and engineer totally different kind of nuclear reactors than what we use now.

He wants us to take about 10 years to get them in production and build 100 mega-watt reactors at the rate of one per day at a cost of about $200 million dollars each. He wants them all over the world. At the rate of building them at one per day, we could replace all the coal electrical plants in the world over 30 years and stop all the pollution from burning coal. Boeing built passenger aircraft at $200 million dollars each, at one per day, which shows that it can be done. We could have SAFE nuclear power using thorium which is plentiful throughout the world. Thorium is about five hundred times as available as the uranium-235 that we use now in our nuclear reactors.

A YouTube presentation from Robert Hargraves that summarizes his book, Thorium cheaper than coal is at this web site.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayIyiVua8cY


Category of the action

Reducing emissions from electric power sector.


What actions do you propose?

I propose that Robert Hargraves be the winner of the CoLabs contest for the best proposal to decarbonize our energy supply and that CoLabs fully endorse his proposal.  

In addition, I propose the CoLabs work with Robert Hargraves and the Thorium Energy Alliance to get the word out about Molten Salt Reactors that run on thorium so that most citizens throughout the world demand them. 

See ThoriumEnergyAlliance.com. 

People can't demand what they  don't know about.   If most people knew the facts about Molten Salt Reactors that run on thorium, then there is no question that we would be on track to get them into production through out the world.

CoLabs would make Robert Hargraves a winner of their contest for reducing carbon in the air.

Any money I get from recommending Robert Hargraves would be donated to the Thorium Energy Alliance.

CoLabs would endorse and promote Robert Hargraves' proposal with vigor and get the word out.

CoLabs would set up brainstorming sessions with graduating University Students, Corporation leaders, Thorium Energy Alliance members, Nuclear Physicists, Engineers, Investors Politicians, and Philanthropists to improve on plans than I suggested here.

I am a rookie student of LFTRs and not a good promoter.  We need people to promote this who are much better at it than I am.

 

 

 

 

 

 


Who will take these actions?

CoLabs

Members of the Thorium Energy Alliance

Graduating University Students

Corporation leaders

Nuclear Physicists

Engineers

Investors

Politicians

Philanthropists

Promoters

LFTR enthusiasts

 

 


Where will these actions be taken?

Starting in the USA and then through out the world.


How much will emissions be reduced or sequestered vs. business as usual levels?

Nearly all emissions from producing electricity would be eliminated. Naturally there is some emissions created by making the materials for building LFTRs, manufacture of the LFTRs, transportation of the materials and things like that.  The emissions would be miniscule in comparison to the emissions related to using coal to make electricity.


What are other key benefits?

LFTRs run hot enough for a process to make fuels out of CO2 and water that can be used in automobiles and diesels. LFTRs run at about 700 degrees C. This gives us liquid fuels without the need for petroleum.  Existing reactors run at only 350 degrees C.

LFTRs run hot enough for a process to desolate water.

A specially designed LFTR called a DLFTR can use up our nuclear "waste" as fuel, which would eliminate the need to store the stuff for tens of thousands of years. This stuff is not really waste.

There is virtually no nuclear waste from a LFTR because all the fertile and fissionable material stays in the liquid salt solution to produce electricity until then are all nearlyfission-ed.

LFTRs produce medical isotopes molybdenum-99 & bismuth-213 for cancer cures.

LFTRs produce Plutonium-238, essential for NASA's deep space missions. This is not the Plutonium 239 that is used in nuclear bombs.

LFTRs are walk away safe, which means that they can be unattended.


What are the proposal’s costs?

It is impossible for me to determine the total cost, but I can quote from Robert Hargraves book. He expects the cost of the development to be about a billion dollars. He feels that we can produce 100 Megawatt LFTRs at the cost of about $200 million dollars each after the research and engineering is done. The fact is that even if the actual costs were many times his estimates, these costs are peanuts as compared to the cost of electricity from coal, especially when were to add in the costs for the health care of everyone harmed by coal in any way at all.

Coal is causing Coal Minors to get black lung disease. They and others get asthma and lots of respiratory diseases too. It is causing pollution and coal is the worst contributor to global warming. If you search the Internet, you will find estimates that coal kills over 100,000 people per year in China and about 13,000 per year in the United States. What about India and the rest of the world? I just don't know. I can't vouch for these numbers but I do know that coal kills a hell of a lot of people every year. We don't have to know the actual numbers to know that we MUST DO SOMETHING significant to stop burning coal for electricity or it will kill off so many people that there won't be enough left to run coal burning electrical plants or to do anything to make pollution worse for centuries

Also, CO2 is dissolving into the oceans which makes the oceans more acidic. If this gets bad enough, it will kill off anything there with a shell and kill off the reefs too. Who knows what else will happen there?


Time line

If we started the researh and engineering now, we could start building LFTRs in 10 years.  Then it would take 30 years to replace all the coal electric generating plants in the world.   We have to get going.


Related proposals


References

ThoriumEnergyAlliance.com

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayIyiVua8cY

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_fluoride_thorium_reactor

http://www.wimp.com/lftrminutes

http://energyfromthorium.com/lftr-safety

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwGcefHYyIM