MSR/LFTR development and Chinese Economic Growth.

Note: This is the third part of an three part essay on the the the future non proliferation policies of India and China with respect to the thorium related technologies. The second part of this essay discussed the role of Thorium in India's nuclear development program, and Indian past, present and possible future attitudes towards nonproliferation.

Despite the current extremely robust growth of the Chinese economy during the last decade, some economists, looking ahead see clouds on the horizon. Michael Pettis is a professor at Peking University's Guanghua School of Management, and author of the well received book, The Volatility Machine: Emerging Economics and the Threat of Financial Collapse. Pettis is a pessimist about the stability of the international finance order, and sees international boom and bust monitary cycles effecting the economies of developing countries even more than the econmies of developed countries. In a recent article in China Financial Markets, Professor Pettis argues that

we are at the end of one of the six or so major globalization cycles that have occurred in the past two centuries. If I am right, this means that there still is a pretty significant set of major adjustments globally that have to take place before we will have reversed the most important of the many global debt and payments imbalances that have been created during the last two decades. These will be driven overall by a contraction in global liquidity, a sharply rising risk premium, substantial deleveraging, and a sharp contraction in international trade and capital imbalances.

Professor Pettis predicts:

* BRICS and other developing countries have not decoupled in any meaningful sense, and once the current liquidity-driven investment boom subsides the developing world will be hit hard by the global crisis.
* Over the next two years Chinese household consumption will continue declining as a share of GDP.
* Chinese debt levels will continue to rise quickly over the rest of this year and next.
* Chinese growth will begin to slow sharply by 2013-14 and will hit an average of 3% well before the end of the decade.
* Any decline in GDP growth will disproportionately affect investment and so the demand for non-food commodities.
* If the PBoC resists interest rate cuts as inflation declines, China may even begin slowing in 2012.
* Much slower growth in China will not lead to social unrest if China meaningfully rebalances.
* Within three years Beijing will be seriously examining large-scale privatization as part of its adjustment policy.
* European politics will continue to deteriorate rapidly and the major political parties will either become increasingly radicalized or marginalized.
* Spain and several countries, perhaps even Italy (but probably not France) will be forced to leave the euro and restructure their debt with significant debt forgiveness.
* Germany will stubbornly (and foolishly) refuse to bear its share of the burden of the European adjustment, and the subsequent retaliation by the deficit countries will cause German growth to drop to zero or negative for many years.
* Trade protection sentiment in the US will rise inexorably and unemployment stays high for a few more years.

The rest of Professor Pettis's article fleshes out his predictions about the course likely followed by the Chinese economy for the rest of the decade, and the implications of that course for Chines society, and political system. (Hat tip to Brian Wang for his recent post on Professor Pettis's economic forecast.)

It is my view that even if this socio-economic and political crisis strikes China, Global awareness of the grave implications of continued reliance of carbon based energy sources will rise rise rapidly. Thus at the same time China may faces an economic crisis. Even if more conventional estimates of the developmental course of turn out to be correct, China will be faced with the problem of shifting its energy system to post-carbon energy technologies.

Thus what ever the course of the Chinese economy, the need to replace energy from fossil fuel sources, with energy from post carbon sources will start to become acute within the next ten years. Thus what ever its economic situation, China will require rapidly scalable energy technologies that can replace coal and other fossil fuels. At the moment, China appears committed to developing LFTR technology. On February 2, in the wake of the Chinese LFTR announcement I stated on Nuclear Green, I stated:

The potential promise of thorium and the LFTR technology can rapidly be brought into the effort to prevent further global climate change. China, perhaps more than any other country has realized the importance of energy in increasing the wealth of its citizens, and making life for its people better. At the same time, the Chinese have paid an enormous price for their reliance on fossil fuel technology. As many as 500,000 people die every year from fossil fuel related causes. Global Warming represents another large threat to the well-being of the Chinese people, and although China has made a large commitment to renewable energy sources, the Chinese leadership is aware that renewables cannot produce anything like the amount of energy that the Chinese people need to bring their standard of living to that enjoyed by people living in advanced Industrialized and post-industrial societies. At the same time, the Chinese leadership is far more technologically oriented than the leadership of the United States or Europe.

Thus, the leadership of China is far more open to promising new technology. In addition China has a large thorium supply that comes from its rare earth mines, and so far has not found any use for thorium. The LFTR allows China to kill two birds with a single thorium stone. First it offers a potential source of vast amounts of environmentally clean and safe energy at a low cost, and secondly it allows China to take advantage of an unused resource, which can easily replace coal. LFTR technology has the potential of providing China with abundant energy at a very low cost, and might solidify Chinese economic, cultural and political dominance of the world for a long time to come.

What will appeal to Chinese leadership about MSR/LFTR technology during the next decade is its potential for rapid production in large numbers and at a low cost. Uranium fueled MSRs offer a technology that is almost ready for mas production today.

The MSR core is very simple, requires few materials, and can be built with a tiny fraction of the labor required by conventional reactor cores, Other optional parts of the MSR may be more complex, but this is in no small measure because radioactive fission products can be continuously cleaned from the MSR core. The added cost of fuel salt cleaning can be balanced by a diminished cost of other safety features. Both fuel cleaning and reprocessing can be included in the MSR package. Thus the MSR can eliminate the necessity for building a separate large and complex fuel reprocessing facility. Molten Salt Reactor researchers world wide have repeatedly touted their safety. Low cost underground placement would further enhance their safety.

One the other hand the low cost of MSRs, their scalability and the sustainability of of LFTR technology would make LFTR technology an extremely valuable source of post-carbon energy, and quite possibly the dominate energy technology on earth asa soon as 2050. The paths to LFTR development were charted at Oak Ridge National Laboratory during the 1970's and are well understood. In terms of the potential cost savings that could be achieved through the adoption of LFTR technology the cost of its development would be extremely small, and indeed a number of large American companies could afford to finance LFTR development without government assistance, if they chose to do so.

Nor would MSR/LFTR development take long, if a business as usual approach were abandoned in favor if a more intensive approach. My estimate that if MSR/LFTR development were commenced in China this year, MSRs could be ready to start rolling off production lines by 2020. With factory based mass production, the replacement of carbon based electrical generation could be accomplished in a short time. In addition, to use in electrical generation, LFTRs and be used as an industrial process heat source. They can be used to produce hydrogen, and carbon based liquid fuels from atmospheric CO2 and water. They can also be used to power ships.

The principle obstacle to MSR/LFTR development is ignorance and human incredulity. Until recently Molten Salt Reactor technology was not even be mentioned is the training of reactor physicists and nuclear engineers. Past statements about Molten Salt Reactor technology form the Department of Energy are filled with misinformation While Secretary of Energy Chu recently made statements about the LFTR that suggest he had been given the same misinformation. Even when informed about the potential some people are incredulous, or insist that it would take to long to develop to be a practical solution, or that it is too technologically challenging. The Chinese have a significant advantage, because its technologically sophisticated national leadership is aware of the potential that the LFTR offers.

The LFTR approach to world energy issues amounts to a paradigm shift. What will be required for the success of a LFTR based approach is the spread of knowledge about the LFTR and of a vision of LFTR potential. Knowledge and vision cannot simply be spread by policy, and indeed in the United States policy has been an impediment to its spread, until the policy makers themselves are educated, and catch a little of the vision. Once that knowledge and the vision are discovered by enough people, as appears to be the case in China, a tsunami of change will follow that will rapidly sweep us forward into the post carbon age.

Thus by continuing its commitment to develop LFTR technology, Chinese leadership, either Communist or democratic, will almost certainly assure continued Chinese economic development, whatever short run national economic problems emerge in China.

No accurate estimate of China's Thorium reserve is available, but thorium is a common mineral in rare earth mining tilings, and China's rare earth mining industry is by far the largest in the world. My guess is that China holds enough thorium above ground now, to power the entire Chinese economy for hundreds if not thousands of years. The energy potential of this internal, low cost energy source is attractive to China, which like India is dependent on foreign uranium sources for a uranium powered economy, would prefer to have total control of its energy resources.

Historically China has been economically self contained, and although Chinese economic development has focused on international trade, Professor Pettis offers the view that future Chinese economic development will focuse on the growth of internal markets. In addition the Chinese government is under great though largely hidden pressures to clean up environmental problems. Shifting from coal to Thorium would solve serveral environmental problems at the same time. A shife from trade to internal economic grown and increasingf environmental concerns thus point to a rational for thorium energy use as a matter of national policy.

The historic foreign policy of China has usually been to exercise hegemony over its neighbors but to not incorporate them into its empire. In addition, the Chines state has usually defended its territory rather than sought expansion. The present Communist government has acted to insure that traditional Chinese imperial territory remain part of China. The 1949 invasion of Tibet, and the continued Chinese insistence that Taiwan is part of China are evidence of that poi icy, The Chinese Government is also concerned about border defenses, and the 1962 war between China and India was motivated by Chinese desires to obtain defensible southern borders.

Finally China has cooperated with American Nonproliferation policies only when it is in Chinese interests to do so. China has in the past been willing to transfer of nuclear weapons technology and even weapons grade nuclear materials, when the development of nuclear weapons by other states furthered what Chinese leaders viewed as China's national interest. China has viewed India as a potential enemy, and thus its allied itself with another enemy of India Pakistan. China reportedly provided both nuclear weapons design and U-235.

Thus China appears wholly unwilling to adopt nonproliferation goals, that run contrary to its national interests, or the national interests of Allies that it might wish to see possessing nuclear weapons. Furthermore China is unlikely to prefer nonproliferation over national economic or energy policies. To the extent that American policy toward the thorium cycle as a proliferation issue runs contrary to Chinese trade or energy goals, China will be unwilling to give preference to American goals over its own.

Thus if American thorium related nonproliferation policies are contrary to Chinese interest, China can be expected to oppose and even undermine them. China may well regard its own internally developed LFTR as a legitimate trade item, even without proliferation controls preferred by the United States. The United States will have no choice except to adapt its nonproliferation policy to the sort of nonproliferation order that China is willing to accept. China, like India will most likely be willing to support a nonproliferation agreement that embraces thorium, but that order may be quite contrary to current US nonproliferation policy.

Thus both India and China have in the past been notably independent from American nonproliferation policies and goals, and can be expected to maintain that independence. There growing economic power will make that opposition increasingly difficult for the United States to impose its nonproliferation goals on the international community. Both India and China have interests in developing a Thorium cycle nuclear power technology, and it is very likely that any future nonproliferation order will conform to Chinese and Indian policy goals with respect to thorium fuel cycle technology.

Reverse Engineering the Future of Energy: A future nuclear option?

Reverse engineering is usually thought of as a software development practice, but it can be used to produce the design of all sorts of products. One of the best known cases was the design of Intel instruction set microprocessors by Advanced Micro Devices (AMD). Inte. originally licensed AMD to produce copies of its 8086 and 8088 micro-processors for IBM. But AMD'sIntel clones proved too popular with computer manufacturers, so Intel interpreted its license with AMD to not include its new Microprocessors. For AMD this meant the loss of its principle business, and this involved a future that it found unacceptable. AMD had a choice, sue Intel for violating its agreement, or develop an alternative, competing product. Eventually it chose to do both.

AMD's business depended on delivering microprocessors that used the Intel instruction set and matched Intel performance. Under its license AMD simply received Intel Microprocessor designed and reproduced them. Faced with the withdrawel of its right to do that, AMD chose to reproduce the Intel instruction set and match its performance by reverse engineering. In that case reverse engineering meant designing a microprocessors without borrowing from Intel's designs. The new AMD Microprocessors had to at least match Intel instruction sets, and performance. while being competitive with Intel prices. Thus AMD designers began with a list of instructions, and performance and cost targets, and they had to engineer CPU designs that could produce all of the goals.

The process of discovering designs that would realize all of the AMD microprocessor goals is called reverse engineering. AMD wanted a microprocessor that would deliver better performance at a lower price than the targeted Intel product. If AMD could offer its customers - computer manufacturers - better than Intel performance at a lower than Intel price, the customers would buy enough from AMD to keep AMD, if not always profitable, at least in business. Thus the ultimate object of AMD's reverse engineering was to give AMD customers a better deal than Intel did. The AMD business model has been successful for over 20 years.

Reverse engineering is typically applied to technological developments, but it can be applied to all sorts of things. It is my argument that reverse engineering can be applied to future energy plans. The object of future energy business is to give the customers what they want, and what the customers wants is energy at the lowest possible price, and a reliable energy supply. Thus any viable future energy plan must address the issues of customer costs, and reliable supply.

Yet, for the most part, plans for post carbon energy systems fail to adequately address future energy costs, and they fail to to insure the reliability of the post carbon energy sources they advocate, or that future market demands for energy will be meet. Furthermore, most future energy plans fail to offer sufficient carbon lowering, and either overtly or tacitly relies on the continued use of fossil fuel energy sources, to bridge gaps between likely energy demand and the likely maximum energy output of favored energy technologies.

In addition to their continued reliance on fossil fuels, many future energy plan place unrealistic expectations on efficiency to bridge gaps between likely maximum energy output from featured post carbon energy technology, and plausible energy demand. Arguments for the substitution of efficiency for energy generation capacity, often ignore the long term conclusions about efficiency by economists. Economists, since the 19th century economist William Stanley Jevons studied the effect of increased efficiency on coal consumption, have argued that efficiency leads to greater energy use on a macro-economic scale. While it might be argued that there is not strong direct empirical evidence for Jevons hypothesis. Research on the effects of efficiency on energy consumption tends to rely on indirect evidence, because Jevons hypothesis is a macro-economics theory. not a micro economics theory. Efficiency advocates argue, rather weakly, that the reliance on indirect evidence weakens the case for Jevon's paradox. It should be noted, however, that this is also a problem for the efficiency advocates as well. The evidence problem has to do with formulating a reasonable test, but if a test can't be formulated for their null-hypothesis, then the efficiency position may not be falsifiable, and thus arguments the energy benefits of efficiency do not qualify as scientific arguments.

Thus references to reliance on energy efficiency as a substitute for energy production, are speculative in nature. Reasonable people can doubt such arguments, and thus a prudent energy plan should if possible include a fall back position, in case anticipated developments do not occur.

Plan costs are a further issue. In a recent paper titled, Wind and Energy Markets: A Case Study of Texas, Ross Baldick argued that a 30% wind penetration into the ERCOT (Texas)' grid would cost Texas consumers about $4.5 Billion a year, . Baldick estimates that Texas wind costs would run in the neighborhood of $105 to $110 per MWh. But this is current costs and future costs will probably be higher, as evidenced by the steady inflation of wind facility costs between 2003 and 2010. Recent wind cost estimates are influenced by current low interest rates, and the effects on current market risk perceptions of high wind power subsidies from both federal and state governments. In contrast Bendick's wind cost estimate, levelized cost estimates for the B&W mPower reactor would run under $60 per MWh given a 5% interest rate. At a 10% interest rate, the levelized cost of the mPower would be a little over $80, a cost which would still be highly competitive with the Baldick's Texas Wind estimate. It is doubtless the case that the market would find the mPower reactors far less risky than reactors that are 10 times their size, and thus there would be few problems with its finances. There is little doubt then that utilities would find mPower Reactors an extremely attractive alternative to wind generators, especially if the wind generators no longer received a large subsidy. Future energy plans cannot assume that the market will prefer a higher cost, less reliable option over the lower cost, high reliability option.

Thus any plan calling for the use of the high cost, poorly preforming wind option in preference to the lower cost, better performing nuclear option needs to rationally justify its choice. Rational justification would not include the usual Greenpeace or Natural Resources Defense Council anti-nuclear scree. One Greenpeace energy plan proclaims,

the dangers of nuclear waste and proliferation pose similar existential threats to humanity as global warming itself . . . .

Of course, Greenpeace does not offer an evidence based account of these supposed dangers to the future existence of humanity. Anti-nuclear renewable planner, Mark Z. Jacobson does provide us with one such account,

the ability of states to produce nuclear weapons today follows directly from their ability to produce nuclear power. In fact, producing material for a weapon requires merely operating a civilian nuclear power plant together with a sophisticated plutonium separation facility. . . .

Then he demonstrates some remarkable excirsions from logic in support of a judgement that discounts nuclear power

The explosion of fifty 15 kt nuclear devices (a total of 1.5 MT, or 0.1% of the yields proposed for a full-scale nuclear war) during a limited nuclear exchange in megacities could burn 63–313 Tg of fuel, adding 1–5 Tg of soot to the atmosphere, much of it to the stratosphere, and killing 2.6–16.7 million people.68 The soot emissions would cause significant short- and medium-term regional cooling.70 Despite short-term cooling, the CO2 emissions would cause long-term warming, as they do with biomass burning.62 The CO2 emissions from such a conflict are estimated here from the fuel burn rate and the carbon content of fuels. Materials have the following carbon contents: plastics, 38–92%; tires and other rubbers, 59–91%; synthetic fibers, 63–86%;71 woody biomass, 41–45%; charcoal, 71%;72 asphalt, 80%; steel, 0.05–2%. We approximate roughly the carbon content of all combustible material in a city as 40–60%. Applying these percentages to the fuel burn gives CO2 emissions during an exchange as 92–690 Tg CO2. The annual electricity production due to nuclear energy in 2005 was 2768 TWh yr-1. If one nuclear exchange as described above occurs over the next 30 yr, the net carbon emissions due to nuclear weapons proliferation caused by the expansion of nuclear energy worldwide would be 1.1–4.1 g CO2 kWh-1, where the energy generation assumed is the annual 2005 generation for nuclear power multiplied by the number of yr being considered. This emission rate depends on the probability of a nuclear exchange over a given period and the strengths of nuclear devices used. Here, we bound the probability of the event occurring over 30 yr as between 0 and 1 to give the range of possible emissions for one such event as 0 to 4.1 g CO2 kWh-1. This emission rate is placed in context in Table 3.

Supposed existential threats to the human kind, the unlikely and extremely difficult use of perhaps reactor waste to produce nuclear weapons, and the very implausible notion that somehow civilian nuclear power will play a causal role in nuclear exchanges between civilian reactor armed states perhaps as often as once every 30 years. The argument depends on numerous implausible assumptions. And the argument that military weapons can be produced from reactor grade plutonium derived from civilian power reactors, has been challenged by physicists who are experts on nuclear arms control.

We thus have our existential threat, but one which seems highly improbable. Proliferation treats appear to come from rogue states, such as North Korea, and apartheid South Africa, rather than states that are heavily involved in civilian power programs. International treaties are intended to limit what nations can do with civilian reactors and any plutonium extracted to them. The choice to build or not build reactors in the United States would seem an exceedingly unlikely cause for the acquisition of nuclear weapons by a rogue state like Iran.

Future energy plans should not be formulated with ideological biases about energy that seem wholly derived without recourse to the use of common sense. Considering the relatively low cost of the mPower nuclear option and the high competing cost of wind, our reverse engineering of the post-carbon energy world should undoubtedly include a nuclear option.

If nuclear critics object, nuclear power is currently by far the safest energy technology, yet there are Molten Salt Reactor options that can make nuclear power far safer. The question then becomes, how safe is safe. When the greater risk that a member of the public will be killed by a wind generator accident than by a reactor accident, shouldn't the environmentalists be more concern about wind generator safety, than nuclear safety?

Nuclear critics object to nuclear power because a once through fuel cycle creates reactor waste, a future hazard. Recycling options are available, but the nuclear critics oppose them, alleging that recycling nuclear waste will lead to nuclear weapons proliferation. There are proliferation resistant nuclear recycling options, but the nuclear critics are not interested. Proliferation based argument seem more intended to obstruct deployment of nuclear power in the United States and Europe, than to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. None of the states which have acquired nuclear weapons during the last 30 years, did so by through use of light water weapons technology. Yet proliferation critics still worry that,

producing material for a weapon requires merely operating a civilian nuclear power plant together with a sophisticated plutonium separation facility

Thus the argument goes that somehow, building reactors in the United States will cause the failed state of North Korea to acquire nuclear weapons, and for this reason we should not build reactors in the United States. Yet the same nuclear power critics offer no rational justification of their view that building new yeactors in the United States, will cause nations like North Korea to set up nuclear weapons production programs.

Thus nuclear critics play tag team with the nuclear waste, nuclear proliferation arguments. Recycling materials in nuclear waste that pose long term dangers is possible, but critics argue, recycling nuclear waste will lead to nuclear proliferation. The critics don't want the public to pay the slightest attention to their highly improbability of their argument, that building of new reactors and nuclear fuel recycling facilities in the United States, will some how contribute to the acquisition of nuclear weapons by nations like North Korea. Greenpeace is not in the slightest interested in rationality. The Greenpeace business plan is dependent on the perpetual creation of moral panics.

Two more objections to nuclear power might be viewed as standing in the way of including at least a nuclear component in a reverse engineered future energy plan. They are scaleability, cost, and sustainability. Proposals, such as that by Babcock & Wilcox to build small reactors in factories appear to address both of these concerns. If more factory built reactors are required, reactor factories can be scaled up. There appears little reason to doubt that building large factories intended to produce small reactors, and that small reactors would require less time to deploy than reactors that are 10 times as large. Finally, multiple factors seem to point to over all cost lowering with factory build reactors. If the cost of factory build small reactors is still viewed as to high, further steps are available to lower nuclear costs. ORNL researchers estimate that reactors designed to use molten salt rather than water coolants, can be built for half the cost of conventional reactors. Building such reactors in factories would pose few problems, and small MSRs can potentially operate with far greater efficiency than much larger water cooled reactors. In addition MSRs are highly safe, and fuel recycling technologies that are directly tied to MSR operations are available. Finally, many experts have suggested that Molten Salt Reactor variants offer highly attractive proliferation resistant features.

Finally we must address the sustainability issue. How long can nuclear power provide society with energy? Again a molten salt reactor option, the Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor, offers very attractive prospects. Thorium is relatively abundant in the Earth's crust, yet it is virtually unused at present. Yet thorium 232 if fertile, and in a reactor can be converted to U-233 a fissionable material. The neutron economy of U-233 is such that the a thorium fuel cycle can be used to breed U-233 in Molten Salt Reactors. There is enough thorium in the Earths crust to supply all of society's energy needs for a very long time. How long? Millions of years. Quite possibly tens of millions of years, or even hundreds of millions of years. A thorium energy economy would be sustainable enough to answer even the harshest of nuclear critics.

In future posts I intend to continue to offer a reverse engineering energy plan perspective, by looking at the potential for reverse engineering solutions for a number of post-carbon energy problems, using nuclear solutions.

MSRs and IFRs, the Emergence of Future Nuclear Technology

Over the last 4 years, a new paradigm for nuclear power has emerged. One which involves the use of Molten Salt nuclear technology and the thorium fuel cycle. The paradigm also includes the factory production of small, relatively low cost, and rapidly built reactors. Proponents believe that this paradigm could would produce a rapidly deployable form of post carbon energy, that could potentially meet high levels of energy demand for millions of years to come. A reactor concept, called the Thorium Molten Salt Reactor in Europe, and the Liquid Fluoride Thorium reactor is associated with this idea, and several potential competing paper designs will potentially embody the concept. No TMSR/LFTR design has yet to emerge as as a project, but considering the fact that 4 years ago, the number of people in the world who knew about the concept, probably numbered in the few hundreds, a great deal of progress has been made towards making Thorium dreams a reality.

A second reactor concept has emerged to potentially compete with the LFTR idea. This is the Integral Fast Reactor, an advanced reactor concept that emerged from Argonne National Laboratory and Idaho National Laboratory between 1970 and 1990. The sociology, and business model of IFR support is different. IFR support relies heavily on the activism of old research veterans, and a small band of insiders, while LFTR support has emerged from a diverse group of scientists, engineers, and thinkers, few of whom were directly involved in Molten Salt Reactor research, prior to their LFTR activism.

There are some significant differences between the way MSR/LFTR supporters and IFR supportors argue their case. Kirk Sorensen, early on, posted a large number of Oak Ridge National Laboratory research reports, and technical papers on line in an archive, as support for his contentions. Although a similar, and indeed even larger set of technical documents could potentially be drawn on to support their contentions, they have chosen the testimony of the old research vetrans, rather than their reports as the primary documentation of their claims.

Indeed, anyone who is curious about what some of those IFR research reports have to say, might discover to their wondermont, that reviews of those reports are more likely to appear on energy from thorium, than on pro IFR web sites like Brave New Climate.

I must say that reading the IFR research literature has given me a somewhat better oppenion of the project, and although I have noted contradictions and discrepancies between the claims of the old Argonne National Laboratory vetrans and the research reports, those contradictions are explainable, especially if the research reports are understood in their political setting. In most instances, I have concluded that the contradictions probably will be settled in favor of the vetrans claims,. But there are still a number of troubling issues which cannot be settled by attempts to resolve the reports, and the claims of the vetrans. Perhaps the most troubling IFR issue yet to be resolved, is that of cost. Marketability is a second, related and troubling issue.

While it is clear that the IFR concept offers utilities many attractive features, it is far less clear that those features would attract utility purchasers to the IFR unless the maufacture could offer reactors at attractive prices. Manufactures will not be able to do that until they have assessed how much it would cost to manufacture and set up IFRs in the field. Such cost estimates are unlikely to be realistic, unless an IFR project has access to a manufacturer with experience building large, high technology projects, and construction engineers who have experience building large construction projects. Among current small reactor projects, only Babcock & Wilcox appears to have reached the organizational stage, that would permit it to begin to understand what it might charge customers for a finished product.

I have already discussed the status of the B&W mPower reactor project, in relationship to the ARC-100, a small IFR project. I have noted that the ARC-100 lacks the mPower project's maturity. The problem here raises a significant issue about the overall viability of the IFR.

General Electric has had a long term interest in the IFR concept, and a set of GE concept reactors, the S PRISMs have been developed as projected commercial implimentations of the IFR concept. All of these concepts require further investments in research and development, presumably with major US government involvement. In contrast, the ARC-100 is based on technology that is past the research and development stage. The ARC-100 technology has already been tested in a prototype, and thus can be considered mature.

If GE and its Japanese partner Tosheba were really interested in moving forward with an IFR the ARC-100 ought to be of interest to them. First because it would serve as a groundbreaker for IFR technology. Secondly, it would provide useful manufacturing and deployment experience. Thirdly, because if the ARC-100 is successful, its success would encourage public acceptance of larger and more ambitious S PRiSM projects.

From the viewpoint of the ARC-100 project, GR-Toshiba would bring many advantages to the table, including both manufacturing and construction engineering capabilities necessary for the ARC-100 project's success. Thus if GE-Toshiba is serious about the development of IRF technology, it would appear to have a stake in the ARC-100 project. Yet no evidence has yet to emerge that GE-Tosheba has the slightest interest in participating in the ARC-100.

This raises a question about how interested GE-Toshiba really is in the IFR as a potential future commercial product. I will be blunt, if GE-Toshiba is not interested in the ARC-100 project, unless another qualified candidate that could bring the necessary skills to the table, the project is likely to fail. But if GE-Toshiba is interested in developing a commercial IFR product, then it has an interest in the ARC-100's success. Therefore a lack of GE-Toshiba interest in the ARC-100 is very bad news for the prospects of the IFR.

The most likely problem would be IFR costs. If the ARC-100 is not cost competitive with small reactors such as the B&W mPower, then investments in it will carry a high risk. And if the ARC-100 is not cost competitive, investments in the IFR are unlikely to lead to big payoffs.

MSR/LFTR backers still firmly convinced that they offer a route to significantly lower nuclear and indeed post-carbon energy costs. While we don't know enough to offer a definitive view, it is likely thatr LFTR costs wiill be substantually lower than IFR costs. This judgement is based on a number of likely factors including lower materials input, simpler reactor design, lower labor costs, the possibility that a larger percentage of the finished product can be factory as opposed to field manufactured.

If I am right about this, potential serious MSR manufacturing efforts will begin to emerge within the next five years, while projects like the ARC-100 will not get past the drawing board stage, and other IFR projects will advance even less. Of course I might be wrong.

Moving Toward Marketable Generation IV Reactors

It is practical to design and build, practical Generation IV reactors today, but ones without all of the bells and whistles. It is becoming increasingly likely that a small Generation IV nuclear plant will find its way onto the grounds of a coal fired power plant near you soon.

There are two potential approaches to the development of commercially viable Generation IV type reactors. The first is to design and build commercially viable reactors that are viable using existing technology. This is a practical approach, because it would limit the Research & Development investment required to bring a product to market. On the other hand, by limiting product design to existing and tested technology, you are reasonably assured of bring a product to market within a reasonable period of time, with a reasonable budget, and at a somewhat predictable cost. In the case of Generation IV reactors, this would mean basing products initially on products that would be based on existing, tested technology. That is technology that had gone into prototypes. Generation IV reactor advocates point to two successful Generation IV prototypes, the ORNL MSRE, and the Argonne/Idaho National Laboratories EBR-II. Both prototypes were stable, highly safe reactors that pointed toward potentially successful future designs. Both were highly safe, and offered pathways to sustainable and safe nuclear energy.

The first objective of any commercial nuclear project is to make enough money from the sale of products. Money cannot be made before products are brought to market. Thus bring viable products to market at a price that will motivate buyers and will allow the business to make a profit, should be the highest priority of any new commercial reactor project. The fewer uncertainties, the fewer risks, the more likely a product can be brought to market within a reasonable period of time and at a competitive cost.

The Babcock & Wilcox mPower Reactor actually sets a benchmark for Generation IV reactors. Generation IV reactors will need to compete with the mPower and similar reactors both in capital costs and in operational and maintenance costs.

The ARC-100 reactor project in the main conforms to the to the practical approach. Its design tracks closely with the design of the Experimental Breeder Reactor-II as it evolved into an Integral Fast Reactor prototype. The ARC-100 will be a more powerful reactor than the EBR-11, but not by an problematic extent. Current thinking suggests that reactors capable of generating 100 MWe represent a convergence point between the maximum financial benefit of factory reactor production, and grid usefulness. Smaller reactors because they produce less electricity, may represent less attractive investments for utilities seeking to replace fossil fuel generation sources, while larger reactors may demand far more expensive field construction. Thus the ARC-100 with an electrical output of 100 MW, is size competitive with the 125 MW mPower Reactor. The challenge then would be to motivate they buyer with an attractive costs.

The flaw in the ARC-100 project at the moment is the announced intention to use a supercritical carbon dioxide closed Brayton cycle gas turbine in the electrical generation system. Thus we are confronted with a plan to use a technology that does not exist. The motive for this is the added efficiency and safety of the Brayton Cycle approach. The downside is that it makes the future of the project dependent on the successful of supercritical CO2 turbine development. A plan B should exist if the manufacture of the turbine is delayed. Plan B would rely on steam turbines for electrical output.

Many of the technical features of the ARC-100 are still unknown. However reportedly will enjoy a 20 span before refueling, thus in house fuel reprocessing, a major feature of the IFR approach is not on the table. This is just as well. There is no discussion of conversion rates, but the 20 refueling year figure suggests that they would probably be about 1 to 1.

The ARC-100 is likely to be a very simple reactor, which aside from its sodium cooling system would give its owners few reasons to worry. ARC-100 design features include underground an silo placement.

The potential rub for such a design would be decay heat dissipation in the event of an emergency shutdown. It would be possible to design a passive air cooling system for an underground reactor with natural air flow facilitated by a chimney effect. Yet concerns about a sodium fire might preclude that.

The underground setting will, however, probably answers the fears of the chicken littles who worry about terrorists attacks on reactors using Airbus-380 size aircraft.

Management and direction of the ARC-100 project leans heavily on National Laboratory management veterans, although investors are fairly well represented on the ARC Board of Directors. Manufacturing and construction engineering, conspicuous assets to the mPower project, are complete unknowns for the ARC-100 project. Perhaps an even more troubling sign is the broken links to any internal documentation on the ARC web page. A June 14 press release, no longer accessible on the ARC web site, states:

The ARC-100 reactor initiates a new model of nuclear power, based on factory fabrication of shippable modules for rapid site assembly that enables the prompt start of a revenue stream.

What ever doubts might be raised about the ARC-100 project, their heads are in the right place. Rapid assembly and a prompt start of a revenue stream would certainly please customers, if those features are combined with a competitive price. Realization of these three goals will not be easy.

I discussed the Fuji reactor project a couple of days ago. Fuji project press releases focuses less on customers' expectations and more on market size. The Fuji plan does not focus on manufacture, but it does discuss projected costs. Those projected costs are, if anything high, and suggest a lack of exploration of cost saving approaches. The reactor housing is above ground, an indication that the designer may not be aware of recent reactor housing discussions. The Fuji has had a 40 year long gestation period, as a reactor design, and draws heavily on the ORNL MSR heritage. The weakness of the Fuji design is that it does not take into account Kirk Seoensen's innovative use of the Open Science model on his blog Energy from Thorium which facilitated the ongoing discussion on LFTR and other MSR designs on Energy from Thorium, David Le Blance's brilliant innovation in Molten Salt Reactor core design, Edward Teller and Ralph Moir's advocacy of underground housing for Molten Salt Reactors, the emergence of the factory manufactured small reactor model, Jim Holm's coal2nuclear concept, as well as my own ongoing exploration of cost lowering approaches that could be applied to LFTR manufacture and deployment on Nuclear Green and Energy from Thorium. Taken all together, between 2006 and 2009 the old nuclear energy paradigm began to die, and a new thorium-LFTR paradigm began to take its place. That paradigm is a modified version of an earlier thorium paradigm which was developed in Oak Ridge during the 1960's and 70's. The Fuji project is rooted in the old rather than the new Thorium paradigm.

While the Fuji project as currently constituted is rooted in the old paradigm, its developers have come into contact with advocates of the new thorium paradigm. In addition at least two leaders of the thorium movement, Kirk Sorensen and David Le Blanc have made moves toward developing molten slat reactors. Significantly both have expressed interests in moving away from the thorium model in the short run, in order to facilitate practical designs that will can move from conception to production fairly quickly. Both appear to be thinking in terms of uranium rather than thorium fuel cycle Molten Salt Reactors. With such realism a rapid transition to commercial prototype and serial produced model becomes a possibility.

The emergence of even a single commercial MSR model on the market, provided it meets practical expectations, would be a great step forward for Molten Salt Nuclear Technology, no matter what fuel cycle is used. As with the ARC-100 the most important step is not to produced the most advanced reactor conceivable, but to produce on at a reasonable price, and with sufficient attractive features that it will interest customers. Product evolution will carry the design forward once a successful model is launched.

White Paper on Global Nuclear Deployment Draft: Appendix 1: The Indian Nuclear System

Homi J. Bhabha, a Parsi physicist, was the father of the Indian nuclear system. A well regarded cosmic ray researcher, he founded the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in 1945. Bhabha was a friend of Indian political leader, Jawaharlal Nehru, and in 1946 the two began to collaborate on the creation of future Indian nuclear plans. In 1948 Bhabba became the founding director of the Indian Atomic Energy Commission. Nahru trusted Bhabba to develop a comprehensive nuclear program, and he did until his death in 1969.

Bhabba's quickly realized that India's uranium resources were small, while it had much larger thorium resources. In order to assure indian strategic energy independence, Bhabba decided to build India's long term nuclear future on a thorium fuel cycle, rather than the uranium fuel cycle. There is little doubt that Bhabba envisioned India as not only a nuclear powered state but a nuclear armed state as well. Yet he placed priority on the development of a nuclear power program. India did not truly become a nuclear armed state, until it conducted nuclear weapons tests in 1998, long after Bhabba's 1969 death.

Bhabba envisioned a three stage nuclear plan. In the first stage conventional reactors would produce reactor grade plutonium (RGP) as a bye product of power production. In the United States, RGP is regarded as a nuisance, but Bhabba saw it as an opportunity. When enough RGP had been accumulated, Bhabba saw that it could be used to fuel sodium cooled fast breeder reactors. In the second stage of Bhabba's plan, a fast reactor technology would be developed that would breed both thorium and uranium. Fast reactors run on plutonium, and in Bhabba's plan, the Indians would produce at least on gram of plutonium for every plutonium gram burned. Breeders operate on something called a neutron economy. There have to be enough neutrons available to produce fuel for the continuing nuclear process. In addition extra neutrons can produce surplus fuel that could be used in other reactors. It was Bhabba's plan to use the extra neutrons to convert thorium into U-233. Now u-233 makes excellent fuel for conventional reactors, and indeed in heavy water reactors a pure thorium-U-233 fuel cycle has a very good nuclear cycle. So good that it can at least break even in nuclear fuel production. Bhabba's third stage was to use specially designed Heavy water reactors as thorium converters, that is to produce enough fuel from thorium to keep the process running for along time.

The Bhabba plan committed India to heavy water technology, so early Indian reactor development was based on collaboration with the Canadians who had with the British, developed Heavy Water reactors during World War II. Eventually in 1974 when India tested its first nuclear device, the Indians had a parting of the way with Canada, over proliferation related issues, and the Canadians stopped providing the Indians support for its nuclear power development.

By 1974 the Indians had built one small heavy water CANDU power reactor, and were in the midst of building another. Although they were not entirely prepared to do so in 1974, the Indians took over the design and production of their own reactors. The started with the Canadian small CANDU reactor whose design they had inherited, and gradually modified it to improve it. While doing so, their technology got better and better. In fact by the end of the 20th century, the Indians were producing small PHWRs at very competitive costs. By then they had build a small sodium cooled fast breeder test reactor, which they used to research their combined uranium and thorium fuel cycle. At first they had a lot of problems, but as time passed, they began to master the very challenging Liquid Metal Fast Breeder technology.

Today the Indians are building a mid size commercial fast breeder prototype, which is expected to go on line next year. It is expected to be followed up by six more commercial fast breeders to be completed by 2023. While this is going on, a second generation of Indian commercial fast breeders is under development. Indian plans call for well over 100 fast breeders to be completed by the mid point of this century.

In addition to its very ambitious fast breeder development program, the Indians are developing their third stage Thorium fuel cycle heavy water converter, the AHWR-300. The prototype is expected to go on line in 2018.

In order to supply the plutonium to run so many fast breeders, the Indian plan is to build many foreign reactors. Reactor manufactures are also in the nuclear fuel business, and along with the reactors expect to supply their fuel for a long time to come. Since Indian uranium supplies are limited foreign reactors mean fairly assured fuel supplies. When that fuel has been used, the Indians plan to extract RGP from it, and then use the RGP to start their fleet of FBRs, while using the remaining "depleted uranium" to breed more plutonium in their FBRs. The need to find sources of imported uranium explains why India is buying foreign reactors as if they were going out of style. In fact, Indian PHWRs would probably cost less and require a less expensive industrial base, but uranium supplies would be less certain.. The expansion of the Indian industrial base, required to build foreign reactor has an economic side benefit. India expects to produce large reactor components for the global as well as the local market.

The purchase of foreign reactors does not mean that India has abandoned Homi Bhabha's three stage plan. Quite the contrary, that plan is being expanded and elaborated. It has lead India in the second decade of the 21st century to be among all nations to have the clearest path forward into the post carbon era. However, as good as Homi Bhabha plan was, in the 21st century it is not without its flaws.

The most conspicuous flaw is the plan's complexity. Currently the plan calls for the use of three distinct reactor technologies, each with its own path of development. In addition to its complex reactor technologies, the Indian plan calls for multiple, expensive and complex fuel reprocessing technologies. Although a simpler plan was not possible in the 1950's, this was no loner the case in 1970 after Oak Ridge National Laboratory had demonstrated the potential of Molten Salt Reactor technology. Not only was a thorium breeding MSR possible, but it could be started with RGP and then switched over to U-233, replacing both fast breeder and AHWR in Bhabba's plan. In addition the Thorium Breeding Molten Salt Reactor, the LFTR offered technically superior, less complex, and less expensive fuel reprocessing system, that could take place in the reactors "hot cell," where the diversion of fissionable materials would be completely unlikely. In addition the MSR technology "bag of tricks" offers other potential paths for proliferation avoidance. Those several proliferation avoiding methods could be used individually or simultaneously. A LFTR based plan, would most likely to have proceeded more rapidly, and to cost far less to develop, as well as costing far less to build and manage, than the Bhabba three stage plan.

But there should always be a Plan B, in case Plan A does not work. The argument in this White Paper is that Plan A for post-carbon energy should involve the mass deployment of LFTRs. Plan B would be the Homi J. Bhabha three stage plan.

Understanding Molten Salt Reactors: 1. How are MSRs Different from LFTRs?

The name Molten Salt Reactor (MSR) is more inclusive than the name Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor (LFTR). The LFTR is a type of Molten Salt Reactor that features the use fluoride salts and a thorium fuel cycle. Strictly speaking a LFTR need not be designed to produce fuel in a breeding range, but breeding is an important justification for the use of the thorium rather than the uranium fuel cycle.

In chemistry a salt is an ionic compound that is produced when acid undergoes a neutralizing reaction with a base. Some salts are compounds of metallic and non-metallic elements. Salts become molten (or liquid) when heated. Different salts have very different melting temperatures. Some salts may melt at relatively low temperatures, while other salts require several hundred degrees centigrade of heat before they melt. Mixed combinations of salts may melt at a lower temperature than individual salts will melt.

Some molten salts are very good conductors of heat, and some molten salts may not boil until they reach 1400 degrees centigrade, or even higher. These qualities make molten salts potentially excellent coolants for high temperature reactors. Research on high temperature fluoride salt cooled reactors continues at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL).

Two families of salts have been identified as potentially excellent reactor coolants. They are Fluoride and Chloride salts. Of these two salt families, ORNL scientists quickly chose the former, as presenting fewer developmental challenges while offering greater opportunities for commercial reactor use. Liquid chloride salts were identified as presenting more problems for reactor developers. Chlorine was, in particular, less useful as a neutron moderator than fluorine. However, Chloride salts were suitable for fast reactors, and a Molten Chloride Fast Breeder Reactor was both possible, and probably technologically less challenging than the Liquid Metal Fast Breeder Reactor, as a uranium fuel cycle breeder. In addition, the MCFBR would have offered far fewer safety problems than the LMFBR, while offering a route to technologically superior and lower cost fuel reprocessing.

ORNL Scientists however, also noted that liquid fluoride salt offered a superior performance precisely because of their neutron moderating performance. Moderation removes energy from neutrons. Heavily moderated neutrons are called thermal neutrons, and reactors that are built with large amounts of neutrons moderating materials such as graphite or heavy water are called thermal reactors. Neutron moderation decreases the amount of fissionable material required to sustain a chain reaction, and graphite and heavy water moderated reactors can produce chain reactions with natural uranium. While graphite and heavy water moderated reactors are useful tools for the production of plutonium, they are not particularly efficient tools for burning Pu-239 or even U-235 as nuclear fuels. However, it is possible to breed thorium in thermal reactors. Thermal reactor breeding of thorium offers significant advantages over fast reactor breeding of U-238. Thermal Reactors can operate with 10% perhaps as little as 3% of the fissionable material required to operate fast reactors. Thus thermal reactors can potentially be started at a far more rapid rate than fast reactors.

Fast reactor advocates claim that it is possible for fast reactors to breed at a much more rapid rate, but there appear to be safety problems involved in more rapid fast reactor breeding, and current documented advanced fast reactor designs appear to breed at a similar rate to thermal thorium breeding molten salt reactors.

The term breeding refers to the production more nuclear fuel than is used in a nuclear reactor. If a fertile material, either uranium 238 or thorium 232, is included with the fissionable material placed inside a reactor core along, the result will almost inevitably be the conversion of some of that fertile material into a fissionable material. In the case of thorium, a thorium 232 atom inside the reactor can absorb a neutron, and then becomes a thorium 233 atom. The nucleus, that is the center, of a thorium 233 atom is unstable. A neutron in the unstable Th 233 atom will eventually emit an electron, changing the neutron to a proton, the new proton in turn converts the atom to protactinium 233, and Pa 233 is also unstable. After a few days, a Pa neutron emits an electron, and as a consequence converts to a proton. The added proton makes the atom uranium 233. U 233 is fissionable, and can be used as reactor fuel.

The uranium fuel cycle is similar. If an U-238 atom absorbs a neutron a process that is similar to the process we find with thorium 233 occurs, and the U-239 atom is converted into plutonium 239.

Most reactors produce added nuclear fuel by converting U-238 into Pu-239. The amount of plutonium produced usually equals somewhere in the neighborhood of 60% of the amount of U-235 burned in a conventional reactor. Neither U-235 nor Pu-239 are ideal nuclear fuels at conventional neutron speed. WASH-1097 states

From a nuclear standpoint, the use of U-233 in a thermal reactor makes it possible to achieve higher fuel conversion ratios and longer fuel burnups than is practical with either U-235 or Pu-239. . .

The higher conversion ratios which can be obtained in thermal-spectrum reactors when using U- 233 instead of Pu-239 can result in a significantly better utilization of natural uranium fuel resources with thorium-fueled reactors than with the low-enrichment, light-water cooled uranium-fueled reactors . . .

WASH-1097 defines the fuel conversion ratio,

The fuel conversion ratio (CR) is the ratio of the amount of fissile fuel produced per unit of fissile fuel destroyed. . .

Breeding takes place when the conversion ration is greater than 1 to 1. While plutonium theoretically produces more neutrons and therefore faster breeding in fast reactors,

A higher breeding ratio can be obtained with Pu-239 than with U-233 in a very high-energy, fast- neutron spectrum reactor. On the other hand, in a degraded (10 to 100 keV) fast spectrum, U-233 would probably be as good as, or better than, Pu-239. Also, the variation of U-233 and Pu-239 cross sections with energy are such that improved reactivity coefficients would be obtained with the use of U-233 in a large sodium-cooled FBR. This leads to improved nuclear safety characteristics. . . .

The energy dependence of the fast-fission cross sections of Th-232 and U-238 is such that the use of Th-232 would produce an improved reactivity coefficient in a liquid-metal-cooled FBR. The fast fission cross-section of Th-232 is much lower than that of U-238 so that use of the latter leads to much larger conversion ratios in fast-spectrum reactors.

Thus not only is thorium breeding attractive in molten salt reactors, thorium breeding in fast reactors enhances their safety, and increases their conversion ratios. This point has not been lost on Indian reactor scientists who plan large scale production of thorium-uranium fast reactor breeding hybrids. Breeding thorium as a nuclear fuel in fast reactors would produce a large amount of fissionable U-233 that can be used as nuclear fuel in conventional reactors. This point has not been lost on Indian nuclear scientists, who plan to use the extra U-233 in Advanced Heavy Water Reactors. U-233 fueled non-breeder or converter Molten Salt Reactors offer attractive, safer and lower cost alternatives to conventional water cooled reactors, while reducing but not eliminating the nuclear waste problem. Thus, a modified Indian system could be developed, that would feature thorium breeding in IFRs, with U-233 burning MSRs. The rub for such a system would be that LFTRs would be cheaper to develop, cheaper to build, safer and cheaper to operate, and would virtually eliminate the nuclear waste problem.

The LFTR then is a thorium breeding MSR, that offers what may well be the simplest and best solution to the problem of producing sustainable nuclear power.

Small Reactors, Mass Reactor Deployment, and the LFTR

There is at present no end of projects to build small and mini reactors. Most of these projects will not get beyond the concept stage, but a few probably will. I distinguish between mini and small reactors by power output. I would class reactors that generate less than 100 MWe as mini reactors, and reactors that generate from 100 MWe to 400 MWe as small reactors.

Mini reactors are primary useful in situations in which you need small stand alone energy producing units. Think of cities like Juneau, Alaska, where about 30,000 people live. Juneau is too small to rate a big power plant, and too remote to rate an electrical grid hookup. Juneau thus needs a very reliable and low cost, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year electrical technology, to keep all of its dishwashers, and hair blowers running. The 25 MWe Hyperion reactor would appear to offer everything Juneau needs, and at a cost Juneau can afford. Of course. the prototype Hyperion mini-reactor has not been built yet, so estimates of cost and claims about practicality might be subject to revision.

In addition to providing electricity, mini reactors could provide district heat for cities like Juneau. If Juneau had a water shortage, electricity from the reactor could be used to desalinate sea water through reverse osmosis. Local industries could use the Hyperion's heat as input into chemical and manufacturing processes. Clearly then mini-reactors are potentially useful then, but perhaps most useful to smaller communities that are off the grid.

Small reactors are large enough to be useful on a grid, but small enough to be partially or completely factory produced. The proposed Babcock & Wilcox 125 MWe mPower reactor is an ideal example of the small reactor. While engineers will argue in theory that small reactors will be more expensive than large reactors, factory production can change that. Babcock & Wilcox appear to be planning to build their small reactor as a lit in a factory, and then assemble the kit on site. Westinghouse is planning to build the much larger AP-1000 using the same kit system, so Babcock & Wilcox does not seem likely to save a great deal of money with its small reactors, and indeed the amount of on site labor Babcock & Wilcox appears to believe it will need to manufacture the mPower will not lead to a major cost breakthrough.

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is planning to buy the first mPower, and to set it up in East Tennessee. Was planning to build as many as 4 big reactors, and still might build them, but the mPower means that TVA can buy reactors in smaller chunks and thus encounter lower financial risk. A large reactor could cost the TVA as much as $7 billion and possibly more. The mPower would be expected to cost under $1 billion, and begin producing power more quickly than a large reactor. Producing power means you don't have to carry interest.

Thus the advantage of a small conventional reactor like the B&W mPower, is that it lowers risks. The mPower has some slight advantages in deployability, but apparently very little advantage in price over larger reactors.

One way to get costs down is to to get better control of labor costs. One good way to do that is to build your reactors in India. Indian built reactors are, even by Chinese standards, inexpensive, and as I have frequently argued the Indians may be about to eat everyone's lunch through low energy prices. The Indians have been building small reactors for years, perfecting their design, and trying out cost savings tricks. What they have learned is impressive, and if they start manufacturing reactor kits in factories as the Chinese are doing, they will stand on

the edge of an energy revolution.

So one way to lower nuclear costs would be to employ Indian labor in reactor construction. But that would not work in the United States or other advanced societies. We have to bring labor costs down by increasing labor productivity. In addition we face a time limit. Climate scientists say we need to bring CO2 emissions under control by 2050. Under control means something like an 80% reduction in CO2 emissions, so that means replacing most of the world's current sources of energy. Thus energy replacements need to be hugely scalable, and they need to be cheap. Conventional reactors are neither scalable enough nor cheap enough, The mPower example demonstrates that small conventional reactors are not going to do the trick. In order to meet our need for low cost and high deployment, we need a compact reactor that is small enough to be transported by rail, truck or barge, easily and quickly assembled on site, and online within a few months. The whole energy generation system has to be low price, and its nuclear fuel will have to be both low cost and abundant.

When I figured this out, the answer to how to do this became amazingly clear. My father had done research on just such a reactor over a 20 year period of time at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. That reactor, the Molten Salt Reactor, was known to be capable of operating on the thorium fuel cycle. Researchers believed it to be extremely safe. It was so good at destroying nuclear waste that it had been actually proposed for use in a nuclear waste destroying system. The MSR was both simple and compact, ideal for factory production, and transportation. The MSR was extremely efficient. Thus building a huge reactor was not required in order to efficiently produce electricity. In fact a 100 MWe MSR could produce electricity more efficiently that a 2000 MWe conventional reactor. Nor did the power production system require elaborate housing. You could ship in the turbines and generators by truck, rail or barge, set them up in an old power plant or factory, hook them up to the grid, and to the reactor, and you are ready to produce power.

If you are worried about terrorist attack, you can dig a hole and stick your reactor in it. Kirk Sorensen has produced such designs. Once your reactor is in the hole, it is not going to be damaged by truck bombs, or aircraft attacks. On-site set up and assembly can be facilitated by highly automated machinery.

What about fuel, you ask. It turns out that there is a great deal of thorium just laying around. There is something like 400,000 tons of thorium sitting on beaches in India. As David Walters would say, all you need is 4 Indians with shovels and a pickup truck. In an afternoon, they can dig up enough thorium to produce 1 GWe for a year. Thorium in easily recoverable amounts is found in mine tailings, thus we don't need new thorium mines to produce it, we can simply scoop up thorium that is already on the surface. Even in seemingly small concentrations the energy recovery potential from thorium is such, that the energy investment required to bring about that recovery is worth while.

There would not seem to be any potential impediments to the Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor solution to our energy issues. They can be built in large numbers in factories. Small LFTRs are efficient and easily transported. They can be set up anywhere. The do not require water for cooling, they can be cooled with air. They are not good nuclear proliferation tools. They are safe. Their materials output is safe after 300 years, and need not be considered waste.

What is wrong with the LFTR? Some money needs to be spent on their development. A crash development program that cost less than what is spent on the NASA Space program in a year would probable come up with a commercial LFTR model in 5 years or so. Thus considering the enormity of the energy challenges we face, the LFTR provides a doable solution.

So called energy experts claim that there is no such thing as a silver energy bullet, but there is a thorium bullet, and we have every reason for using it. Small Liquid Salt Thorium cycle reactors hold amazing promise for solving the energy problems that confront us during the next 40 years.

Letters to Jesse 5: Lowering LFTR Costs While Increasing Nuclear Safety

Dear Jesse, Even if the LFTR could not be assumed to have excellent potential for lowering nuclear cost, its safety features, and handling of the nuclear waste problem would make it an excellent candidate for the role of future safe and nuclear waste free electrical producer. In addition the LFTR has excellent operational characteristics, that give it a flexibility comparable to natural gas turbine generators but with much .lower fuel price. For this reason, low cost LFTRs can replace carbon emitting natural gas turbine generators. My analysis of potential backups for renewable electrical generation facilities, pointed to the LFTR as the best backup technology. The LFTR would be priced at a competitive cost, would have lower fuel costs than natural gas generators, and would be far more flexible than batteries, pumped storage, or compressed air storage. LFTRs can be kept spinning for days with no fuel expenditure, and for indefinite periods of time with very little fuel expenditure. In fact the LFTR's performance in the back up role for renewables, would be such that the renewables being backed up would be redundant. This analysis led me to the conclusion that a single technology approach to post carbon energy could lower energy costs, while greatly increasing electrical reliability.

There are numerous sources reporting on Molten Salt Reactor/LFTR safety. (see here, and here). Since the core fluids of the LFTR are well below their boiling point, the LFTR operates at atmospheric pressure, and thus poses no danger of a steam explosion. Coolant leaks are far less likely in a LFTR are far less likely than in a water cooled reactor, and far less dangerous than in a LMFBR. Coolant leaks in a LFTR tend to be self limiting, because the coolant immediately freezes when exposed to the cooler temperature of the environment outside the reactor. Once the coolant freezes, further leaks are blocked.

Because the LFTR is safe in ways that water cooled reactors are not, safety features that are unique to water cooled reactors can be eliminated. Consider the now classic reactor dome, depicted here in a schematic for a relatively small Indian PHWR. This dome is much larger than the reactor, and one of it's safety features is that it has two separate containment walls. This design testifies to the Indian commitment to nuclear safety, and in Europe or North America would be very expensive to build. Indian labor costs are much lower, than those of more developed economies, hence the dome does not represent the sort of cost factor to Indian reactor designers that they would represent to European and American reactor designers.

The massive walls to the reactor dome not only prevent the escape of radioisotopes in the event that a steam explosion breaches the reactor pressure vessel or a pressure tube. But what if there were no possibility of an explosive release of radioisotopes? We have seen that this is exactly the case with Molten Salt Reactors including the LFTR.

During the Mid-1960's Ed Bettis, who is often credited with inventing the Molten Salt Reactor, created a number of design studies for a cluster of 4 small MSRs. Bettis's design is startling and the most startling thing about it is the way the reactors are housed. Each reactor is contained on a small cell.

Note how compact Bettis design is. The three cells Bettis drew would take far less labor and materials to build, and would require far less time to build than the Indian reactor dome. Now look at another of Bettis's schematics:

Note that no dome is depicted, only a small structure that is robust enough to contain radioisotopes released in a reactor leak. In Bettis's design. the reactor core, the heat exchanges and even the coolant plumbing could be factory built, lowered into the reactor and hooked up. The reactor housing structure itself could be built in a matter of months, or if required be prefabricated, and assembled on site. In contrast to Babcock & Wilcox small mPower reactor, the LFTR could be assembled withe much less labor, and in a matter of months rather than three years.

But would the Bettis design be safe from terrorist attack? First we should note that the Bettis design provides robust protection against the diversion of fissionable materials. The reactor housing would be around 600 degrees C, far too hot for even the most fanatic terrorists to tolerate. In addition radiation from the reactor, from the fuel cleaning process, and from fuel storage, would be far to intense for terrorists to survive more than the briefest of exposures.

But what about terrorists attacks by aircraft or truck bomb? The late Edward Teller always believed that the underground siting of reactors would create optimal conditions for nuclear safety. In his last paper, Teller and his associate Ralph Moir advocated underground sited Molten Salt Reactors as the best possible nuclear technology. Even in relatively shallow underground placements, LFTRs would be well protected from truck bombs, and aircraft attacks. Fissionable materials would be in an underground setting similar to the Bettis design and would be inaccessible to nuclear terrorists. In addition gravity, earth, the chemical nature of the hot salt fuel fluid, and the reactor housing structure would prevent radioactive materials from reaching the surface in the event of a nuclear accident.

Although Teller and Moir did not pay overt attention to the cost of their underground siting plan, it probably would not be more expensive than digging and building a small utility sub basement for an office building. Hence with the LFTR we can dramatically lower site construction costs, while improving nuclear safety.

Paradigm Shift: The Liquid Thorium Bullet

I am returning at least briefly to the paradigm shift theme that I developed last year. My posting are again touching on the theme, and I want to remind my readers, and in some cases inform my readers of my earlier statements on paradigm change. I originally posted this post originally on December 29, 2008.

Probably no more than a thousand people in the entire world fully understands the paradigm, although thousands more understand bits and pieces of it. Much of the paradigm was shaped by Eugene Wigner, a authentic genius and a man of singular vision. Wigner foresaw the need for extracting the enormous energy potential from thorium and using it to sustain human civilization. Wigner's vision included a heavy-water fluid-core reactor as the instrument through which thorium was to be transformed into nuclear fuel. Alvin Weinberg, Wigner's former student and another genius, later realized that the Molten Salt Reactor was a far superior tool for realizing the full energy potential of the thorium fuel cycle, and the potential to increase energy efficiency to increase its energy potential even further by coupling it with massive desalinization projects in desert countries.

Later Oak Ridge scientists pointed out the potential of Molten Salt Reactors to destroy nuclear weapons materials, the very real safety potential molten salt reactors and the potential to use closed-cycle gas turbines rather than steam turbines to enhance energy conversion efficiency. Lars Jorgensen, following the lead of researchers in several countries has proposed that a type of molten-Salt Reactor, the Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor, can destroy nuclear waste while producing vast amounts of energy. The Chinese and the South Africans plan to build large numbers of small, low cost Pebble-Bed Reactors in factories and to set up clusters of small reactors to duplicate the power output of large nuclear plants. Kirk Sorensen and I have pointed out that the model of factory-built small reactors clusters as a flexible low cost alternative to large and expensive Light Water Reactors works even better with LFTRs than with PBRs. Kirk Sorensen has proposed underwater siting for LFTRs, while Ralph Moir and Edward Teller have proposed underground siting.

During the last year I have worked on a conceptual level to explore the LFTR paradigm and its limitations on a conceptual level. That is I have attempted to explore the Paradigm as it presently stands. My findings are that the LFTR paradigm answers all of the traditional objections to nuclear power. It is very safe, it is proliferation resistant and the paradigm works best if the LFTR is used to destroy nuclear waste as well as nuclear weapons material. Because the LFTR is safe, unconventional siting approaches are possible. I have pointed out the environmental advantages of the LFTR. It would occupy a very small foot print. The LFTR would produce little tp no nuclear waste. It could be used to destroy transuranium reactor products rather than produce them. Fission products have uses in the economy, and in an era of increasing resource scarcity, LFTRs will become an important source of rare and valuable materials. Design concepts for the LFTR conforms to the standards of Green Engineering, and its input output matrix is consistent with the goals of Green Chemistry.

The LFTR is capable of providing base power at a very attractive price, but because of its potential for load following and rapid power output buildup from a standby condition, and its potential for low cost manufacture, the LFTR holds potential use as a peak power generating source.

There is enough Thorium in the United States that is above ground in the form of mine tailings to provide the United States with all of its energy needs for thousands of years. AEC sponsored research, during the 1960's showed that the total recoverable thorium reserve in the United States was large enough to provide all of the United States' energy needs for millions of years.

Research conducted in Oak Ridge from 1948 onwards solved many of the technological problems Molten Salt Reactors. Other researchers have solved other potential problems of the LFTRs indirectly. If a crash LFTR development program that would be similar in scope to the World War II Manhattan Project were to be undertaken by 2012, large scale factory production of LFTRs could be undertaken by 2020.

Given a crash program of LFTR development in the next decade, and the potential for rapid deployment through factory production, most American electrical production could be coming from post carbon sources by 2030, and at a lower cost than from either conventional nuclear or renewable energy sources.

The LFTR paradigm offers a comprehensive low cost solution to the problem of switching the generation of electricity to post carbon sources. Because of its potential for rapid expansion, LFTR technology could also provide the generating capacity to support the electrification of ground transportation. Mini-LFTRs could be used to power ships. Stand alone small and mini LFTRs could provide electrical energy and heat to isolated communities. LFTRs can be cooled by either water or air. Waste heat from sea side LFTRs can be used to desalinate sea water.

The LFTR paradigm then suggests that the technology for a low cost transformation of American electrical generation already exists, and is capable of rapid development and deployment in little more than a decade provided Manhattan project type resource commitments are made to realizing the paradigm. Like all new paradigms, the LFTR paradigm is poorly understood, and its potential is only seen by a limited number of people. However the LFTR paradigm is being discussed on the internet, and knowledge of the paradigm could spread rapidly. Skeptics might argue that there is no such thing as a silver bullet to solve the energy problem, yet the paradigm suggests that there is a liquid thorium bullet.

Update: Early phases of paradigm shifts are often periods of confusion. There is now a great deal of confusion about the LFTR. People, who fail to understand how radically different the LFTR is from better understood Light Water Reactors still wonder how the LFTR could not have all of the flaws of LWRs. In fact the LFTR paradigm offers solutions to all of the major problems of LWRs without difficult and expensive fixes and workarounds. Until people adjust their thinking to include the new paradigm, the confusion will continue to be common

Large and Small Reactors: David Walters

David Walters posted an essay about reactor size yesterday on Left Atomic, My view has been that large reactors carry cost penalties, and that clustering small, factory built modular reactors will produce nuclear power at a far lower cost than building large reactors. A small reactor would be a reactor that is transportable by truck or rail. At the very least the core of a small reactor must be rail transportable as a single unit. The upward size of a small reactor would be is often defined as being around 350 MWe output, but David LeBlanc has designed a 400 MWe LFTR core that is easily truck transportable. My view is that optimal size is very much a matter to be identified by engineers. Middle size reactors would be too big to be easily transported in a few modules, but small substantially smaller than the standard Generation II, III and III + reactor. Generation III + reactors generally run from 1100 MWe on up, but the Chinese are still building a generation II reactor that is less than 1000 MWe in generating capacity. The transition between middle and large reactor size runs somewhere between 750 and 800 MWe. A medium reactor should produce half of the power of a large reactor, and not be transportable. The Indians are building a 500 MWe LMFBR that is quite obviously too big to be a small reactor, but only about half the generating capacity of a large reactor.

Indian accounts describe the PFBR reactor vessels:

The main vessel made of stainless steel measures 13 metres in diameter, 13 metres in height, weighs 200 tonnes and will go inside the safety vessel to hold the coolant liquid sodium, reactor fuel, grid plates and others.

The third and smaller of the three vessels is the inner vessel - 11 metres tall - and supports equipments like pumps, heat exchangers and others.

We are clearly dealing with a reactor that is far to large, heavy and complet to be truck or train transportable in a few modular units. The Indian PFBR is clearly a medium size reactor, but the 300 MWe Indian AHWR is a small reactor, that is probably suitable for factory manufacture. Current Indian PHWR designs run about 700 MWs, and it is not clear if the Indians intend to build the 300 MWe AHWR in serial production, or use it as a prototype for a larger commercial power generator.

The usual economic advantage mentioned for large reactors is economies of scale, although the empirical evidence for the economies of scale does not seem especially convincing. However, the skill set required for large reactor construction project managers is extremely demanding. Given the same project to project learning curve, constructing a 1600 MWe will yield the same advance on the learning curve as constructing a 200 MW reactor. Thus if it is possible to build 8 small 200 MWe reactors in the same amount of time as one 1600 MWe reactor, The project manager of the small reactors will be 8 times further advanced on the learning curve as the large reactor project manager. Indeed it will take the large reactor project manager another 21 years to catch up to the point where the small reactor project manager arrived after 3 years.

I have elsewhere argued that large scale construction projects are inherently less efficient in their use of labor in factories. The skill set of factory workers is typically smaller for factory workers than for nuclear construction workers. Wages for factory workers will be lower. Factory workers have assigned work areas allowing for convenient storage of work tools. Factories are more amenable for labor saving devices, and those devices can be employed to typically greater effect in factory settings, Work patterns in factories are likely to be better organized and production lines laid out in a rational fashion to begin with.

David W. recognizes the usefulness of small reactors and indeed he argues in effect for the use of mini reactors (reactors of less than 100 MWe output):

The LFTR is unique from all of the above because it is amazingly scalable...there is no real downward or upward limit to the size or use a LFTR can be employed in. Say, from a small LFTR 'battery' of 20 MWs to a large, base load plant offering 1800 MWs gross base-load power to the grid.

It is my contention that there will be a 'market' for all these sizes. We should first review what these markets are.

On the smaller end, the LFTR, as a high temperature reactor, can provide process heat. A small chemical plant, requiring thousands of tons of steam an hour, can use a LFTR to provide this heat and, to electrically power the plant. A slightly larger version may be able to provide power and vast qualities of heat to an oil refinery or a tar-sands operation thus providing carbon-free process heat to what otherwise would be a huge carbon-spewing operation.

These smaller LFTRs, from 20 to 200 MWs could provide, also, site specific load balancing for a grid that has a lot of load in place but generation many hundreds of miles away. Using a 200 MW LFTR to 'anchor' the grid would be very helpful to any utility. Additionally these smaller LFTRs could be plopped down in various transmission substations to provide quick, peaking power or variable load changing that responds to frequency changes throughout the day.

Arguably here David has conceded that the bulk of reactor output will be from small reactors. The argument between us then boils down to the relative economies of clusters of small reactors verses a single big reactor as base power sources. David wants to phase

out gas and coal plants with big 1000+ MW units.

I have employed a variety of arguments for the economy of the small reactor cluster in the past. We are simply mapping potential parameters. It will be up to those assigned to turn those parameters into tangible realities to decide what size to build, and assign to specific tasks. What we offer the future is some possibilities and the potential for flexibility. David correctly notes:

One thing that is important for this discussion to note, however, is that LFTRs, from the get go, are cheaper to produce, having a much higher power density than any currently running or under-construction Generation II or III Light Water Reactors. From the reactor core itself to the turbine, size is about 1/2 to 2/3 smaller, thus allowing for a cheaper, and therefore far more efficient, product based on size/cost per MW output. We are looking at, generally a similar ratio in cost reduction.

My argument for the factory production of of small LFTR cluster however, is based on a rapid deployment expectation. We simply have to convert our entire energy system from a carbon base to a post carbon base. Factory production works best for rapid deployment, and small reactors work better for factory production than large reactors.

David correctly points to the price per Watt as the critical issue, and this will not be determined before we know a great deal more about the economics of factory produces reactors in general and LFTRs in particular. I have tried to provide some ideas about factory produced LFTR costs, but my hat does not say expert, and indeed if I were an expert, I would probably say, "We don't know enough yet."

Clearly what we have is potential that should be investigated. I have offered a vision of the future which suggests that low cost, abundant and sustainable is a possibility if we want it. i believe that this would be a better future be far for the bulk of humanity than the future offered by the advocates of so called renewable energy, and the cult of limited future resources, It is not in my power, however, to choose this future. Rather it is my role, as well as David's, Kirk Sorensen's, Robert Hargraves, and numerous others to provide the information that this choice is possible, and to suggest that the investment required to make the suggestion that sufficient research and development money be provided so to assure that the choice be available if it is considered desirable.