From History to Reactor - THORIUM 232

THORIUM 232 - From History to Reactor
This is a visual summary of all the information about thorium.
Thorium is a weak radioactive element with atomic number 90 and a half-life of 14.05 billion years. About the age of the universe. Although it is one of the rarest metals on earth, its availability is much higher and stable than that of Uranium. 99.98% of this element is encountered as thorium 232 while uranium is mostly found in as Uranium 238 which is a poor contributor for the production of energy.
Uranium reserves are estimated to be about 5.5 million tones but only 0.72% of that is U235 necessary for the reaction. In comparison, thorium reserves are estimated to be 6.3 million tones with a 99.98% usability.
References
www.quora.com/Why-is-graphite...
www.motionvfx.com/store,proje...
BP statistical Review of World energy
www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/bus...
Tonne of oil equivalent
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonne_o...
Nuclear energy Density
www.euronuclear.org/info/ency...
Frederick Soddy
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederi...
United states energy consumption
www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/...
Capacity Factor
www.eia.gov/electricity/month...
How bad is it really?
• How bad is it really? ...
nuclear waste
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioac...
Chemical Processing and Power Conversion
• LFTR Chemical Processi...
What is nuclear
whatisnuclear.com/thorium.html
World Nuclear - Estimated World Thorium resources
world-nuclear.org/information...
www-pub.iaea.org/mtcd/publica...
www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/det...
Land Comparison - Nuclear, wind, solar
www.nei.org/news/2015/land-ne...

[@SubjectZeroScience]

Guys just a few CORRECTIONS. The Image at kzbin.info/www/bejne/mJq3oHtqZ76NkJY is not Fukushima NPP accident, it is the oil company. My apologies, but google screwed me on this one. For the Caesium decay kzbin.info/www/bejne/mJq3oHtqZ76NkJY, what I mean is 2^10, 2 to the POWER of 10 and not 10x.

[@raifikarj6698]

What i like from thorium is they are also by product from extracting rare earth mineral. So it will always alvaible as long as we need electronik equipment. Also if we can use thorium as energy we can justify economically and enviromentally extracting rare earth mineral deposit that currently inactive because high thorium content. So i still worry why the development is slow and not out today.

[@YourEnvironmentSeattle]

Good on you for this correction. Clowns like SciShow didn't even bother.

[@borttorbbq2556]

Your numbers are inflated...

[@borttorbbq2556]

Also the faster a radioactive isotope decays the more dangerous it is that's why uranium u-238 or even u-235 or u-233 itself really isn't that dangerous but say something like iodine-131 is extremely dangerous

[@YourEnvironmentSeattle]

@@borttorbbq2556 No, 10 half lives is 2^10 or under 0.1%.

[@CyberAnalyzer]

It's incredible that such high quality content can be watched for free. Thank you! You are doing something good for humanity!

[@dwalinozzo]

not a great video, made a lot of errors

[@suprememasteroftheuniverse]

High qualities bullshit. I bet you didn't attend a college in your life.

[@Megalomaniakaal]

@@dwalinozzo In terms of editing and video production it is high quality, in terms of technical writing, maybe it could have used a few more eyes on the script.

[@leerman22]

It's amazing he confused an oil refinery fire with a nuclear power plant!

[@Megalomaniakaal]

@@leerman22 MOre like google did, I guess. But hey, late night editing.

[@icykenny92]

1:05 Half life 3 confirmed! 😄

[@HostileSiege]

Exactly my thought :-D

[@martiddy]

I can imagine Gordon Freeman working on a nuclear power plant and creating a resonance cascade.

[@adnan4688]

@@martiddy Gordon was seen lurking around the Fukushima few days ago,two levels above there was a man in suit,people refer to as G-Man! I am afraid they found a way to teleport themselves in to our reality. May god help us all

[@Alorand]

Yes, but he said it will be very short...

[@recklesflam1ngo968]

Well, kinda

[@tristunalekzander5608]

Been seeing a lot of Thorium videos in my feed lately. I'm glad people are being exposed to it.

[@Tresla]

You sadist!

[@marcushall8806]

@@tristunalekzander5608 I believe @Phil Monk was making a joke about you being "glad people are being exposed to [Thorium]" by re-interpreting the statement as 'I'm glad people are being exposed to Thorium contamination." I for one was laughing ;)

[@tristunalekzander5608]

@@marcushall8806 Ah, ya sarcasm and jokes like that tend to fly over my head lol

[@unstoppableExodia]

Haha yeah I got the joke. Over the last ten or so years word has gotten out about thorium thanks to the internet. Now someone with the means needs to say "lets have a serious look at thorium and investigate if it can be scaled up for commercial use at a manageable cost"

[@etmax1]

"I'm glad people are being exposed to it" Can be taken 2 ways :-)

[@Porglit]

Seriously, I'm calling it now: you will be a famous youtuber very quickly. This level of production quality will not go unnoticed!

[@davidsirmons]

It is superb content, though highly technical, which leaves behind most of YT. I eat this stuff up, myself. :)

[@patcypatcy2797]

@@davidsirmons me too. Great video! I've had enough of Climategate change alarmists, I really have. Their lying is full throttle outrageous. Peace.

[@ksnasrma]

True! this is the first time I am seeing any video by this uploader. 4 mins in, I paused, subscribed, pressed the bell icon, and then resumed the video.

[@calvinmay8596]

its because its mostly incorrect

[@konradcomrade4845]

@@calvinmay8596 What? is incorrect?

[@zagaberoo]

"The radioactivity of cesium is reduced by a power of 10": I assume you mean reduced by 2^10, but it comes off like you mean reduced 10x instead of the actual 1024x reduction over ten half lives.

[@billpeiman8973]

Exactly.

[@SubjectZeroScience]

Yes, that is exactly what a meant, 2^10. I thought that power would imply that, but i guess not. My bad!

[@unstoppableExodia]

This is what I like about the science community. It's why science and its methods has propelled our species into the stratosphere and beyond. Literally and figuratively.

[@Vajsmilan]

"power of x" is actually how i hear people say it usually...It's implyed.

[@zagaberoo]

@@Vajsmilan It wouldn't have been wrong to say "a power of 2" here, but really without stating both the base and the exponent you don't get an actual value so you might as well just say '1000x' or similar.

[@RayT314]

Just to follow up on some of the other comments, this is such a high-quality video. Your drawings and color-coding allow for a much more easily understood flow of how the whole reactor process would work. A lot of great background info on this as well. Keep up the awesome work!!

[@flamencoprof]

When I was a pre-teen in the early Sixties I thought Nuclear was the way to go. A bit later, learning of the difficulties of dealing with waste, the decommissioning costs, the dangers of a meltdown, and the long half-lives of contaminants in the environment, not to mention the weapons, I went anti-Nuclear. In the last decade or so, in view of the effects of fossil fuel combustion on the atmosphere and cancer rates, I have unashamedly turned around to being once again a fan of Nuclear sources of energy. Thanks for your informative post.

[@shanemartin31]

I totally agree with you. If we don't do something fast with Nuclear, this species is toast....long live our Roach overlords!

[@C0reCoding]

The only REAL nuclear solution would be fusion.

[@WadcaWymiaru]

I was totally AGANIST the nuclear energy...until thorium smack my head with the hammer!

[@etmax1]

Nuclear is only viable if the waste is short lived as current reactors remain dangerous for longer than civilisation is expected to. These LFTR designs convert long lived waste into short lived so are the only viable nuclear reactors. Also being liquid fuelled they use 99%+ of the fuel rather than the 0.5% of a typical LWR

[@jfbeam]

Nuclear is only a problem because we're too glued to our bomb making designs. If we hadn't been so bomb happy in the 50's and 60's, we might have had a much better nuclear power industry. While we have better methods and designs today, thanks to the fear and loathing grown out of the bomb making era, nobody wants to hear it. (Even Th reactors create radioactive waste. Hundreds of years _is_ better than thousands -- or millions -- but it's still way too much; it's still a problem.)

[@davidelliott5843]

You might want to look at what Ian Scott and Moltex Energy are doing. They have gone molten salt but removed everything possible that needs engineered safety. In particular they do not pump the fuel salt and decay heat removal is entirely passive. Fuel is a chloride salt contained in 10mm dia vented stainless tubes plated with zirconium. The tubes are nuclear spec stainless steel. The fuel is cooled by a tank of the same salt but without any fuel content. Heat is transferred by convection (no pumps in the nuclear island) and heat extracted by a tertiary “solar” salt which heats thermal stores. These are well proven in thermal solar power plants. There is no freeze plug, no dump tank and no fuel pumps. All these are engineered systems which would have to be validated and regulated to nuclear standards. Regulatory approval for pumping nuclear fuel is especially difficult. Carbon moderation is another regulatory issues. Moltex avoided the issue by going to fast spectrum needing no moderator. They use salt instead of sodium to cool the chore. Safety is provided by zero pressure in the reactor vessel and a highly positive temperature coefficient. The reactor can load disconnect at 100% power and not overheat. It gets hotter but that the reaction power drops to zero. The reactor case is continually air cooled at a rate which handles decay heat. Their first plant is going up in Canada. It will burn waste nuclear fuel from the older reactor next door. Being fast spectrum it burns up the actinides found in used fuel. They also have a thorium breeder design but rather than wait for regulations, which could take decades, they have gone straight in with a waste burner.

[@Bobsry16]

My personal favorite design and approach to MSRs.

[@doritoification]

Cant wait to see one in operation to hopefully maybe just possibly get people to calm down about nuclear "waste" and finally see it as the resource it really is. Hopefully before we irrationally bury it all in deep geological repositories making its recovery more expensive

[@prjndigo]

Except the system becomes poisoned if you breed thorium to uranium in it. I bet you don't know that you MUST turn Thorium into Uranium to get a fissile reaction.

[@doritoification]

@@prjndigo pretty sure anyone watching videos like these knows thorium is feryile not fissile

[@monad_tcp]

@@doritoification no one is burying it because they know it's still valuable

[@Skargar]

Thank you! Another very well made video about a very important topic! I'm glad there are so many companies putting money into it now. One thing: I think at 6:06 the picture on the right should have the label Strontium and not Caesium.

[@perryFBA]

This was such a well made video!! I love the on-screen definitions of the technical words you used. When you made a claim you gave the assumptions for such a claim. And the graphics were so clear. So far the best video I've seen about thorium!

[@BogenmacherD]

From your comment I would deduct that you have no clue about the realities of nuclear power plants. This whole video is just a bloke who tries to find a future in a world that has found out that we would be much better of without nuclear power and warheads.

[@kokofan50]

Good video. However, LFTRs aren’t the only type of reactors that can use thorium, and uranium gets many of the same benefits in molten salt reactors (MSRs) as thorium- LFTRs being a form of MSR.

[@WadcaWymiaru]

MRS can burn uranium 238 as well...as fast but i do not reccoment. It is too "fast" to accident...

[@davidelliott5843]

Moltex and Elysium are fast reactors burning irradiated fuel “waste”. Moltex have a thorium breeder design but the regulatory demands put it well into the future.

[@otto.m]

I love the visual quality of your videos.

[@Litepaw]

This is an insanely good channel. Such care when editing. You've got a sub ❤️

[@T0x0By]

Your visualizations are next level! I subscribed as soon as I saw your intro; the visual effects are so satisfying. Keep doing your thing mate 😎

[@samson.xaviers]

Thanks for investing so much time to produce quality content, You deserve more subscribers for your hard work. It also would be nice to see reuploads to address any errors that people point out.

[@stevehill4615]

Gets a thumbs up from me, finally a video that gives some technical information that's manageable and balanced (i'm glad you included what the problems to be overcome are), I also liked the relativism between the various means of power generation including renewables.

[@phillbradshaw7190]

Outstanding vid - best I've seen !! Please keep up the good work

[@r.b.ratieta6111]

Subscribed a few weeks ago. Never been disappointed. Thanks for creating and uploading these videos.

[@orin4116]

Amazing quality of work man, this is literally better than they show on tv. Now its just ridiculous than you have so little subscribers and views comparing to the quality of your work.

[@caesarcch3879]

As always a great video with an exceptional quality!

[@mikeloftin1291]

An excellent presentation in such a concise format. Thank you! If you decide to create more content of this importance, please spend some time in the difference between the uranium-plutonium fuel cycle vs the thorium-uranium fuel cycle and the anti-proliferation issues that are avoided. You touched on it quite well, but I think these issues combined with the onerous treaties the US is shackled by that prevent us from research and development of fuel stock recycling and development should be expanded.

[@BogenmacherD]

You must understand that the only reason nuclear reactors were ever developed and built is the production of more fissile material for nuclear warheads. That is also the only economic reason, as electricity made by nuclear reactors is the most expensive of all when you factor in all cost from safety to the hundreds or even thousands of years of "safe" storage of waste.

[@hume1234561]

SZ, you are a scholar and a gentleman. The visualisation and explanation aid proper understanding of the thorium processing cycle. Something which I never had a firm grasp of.

[@peasley9]

This is one of the best LFTR videos i've ever seen, and i've been a huge proponent for quite a while. Thank you

[@jacksonreasoner1408]

Very high quality video! I have applied to colleges to study nuclear engineering, and honestly every “new” breakthrough I find seems to have already been perfected. I’m a little worried about keeping up enough to make a difference.

[@Asdfghjkl-ls1or]

Holy crap u have 18k subs now?! That’s insane! The effort is paying off 😉

[@philipeono]

Jesus this is one of the most comprehensive video on thorium I have found, great job!

[@GovertNieuwland]

My compliments! Very informative and very well presented! I love your crisp and clear animations and your detailed explanations! You have a new follower! :)

[@donready119]

Thank you for this super quality, may I dare say over detailed, science video.

[@Khepramancer]

SeaBorg xD Should have had a sailor hat on him too ; )

[@RelianceIndustriesLtd]

why is there ink on him? i didn't get it?

[@arsenioschatzimichailidis3996]

@@RelianceIndustriesLtd It's not ink, it's a Borg helmet, from Star Trek.

[@john3pq]

@@RelianceIndustriesLtd Glen Seaborg. One of the brilliant originals from back in the '30s and '40s. He's the one who helped figure out that Thorium was a really attractive way to go when he had one of his grad students calculate the neutron efficiency of a thorium to Uranium 233 chain was sufficiently over 2 to enable a useful reactor.

[@JasonHartsoe]

Your quality and exceptionally creative designs are amazing! Amazing work! Please continue to do great things!

[@abidqureshi9878]

First elaborate information on this important topic. Extremely well made. Thanks

[@KC-yb2xy]

Great video. One of the most concise and informative I've watched on the subject. If you were going to make another, catch us up on what all these start up companies have be doing for the past 8 years. Also, China has been dumping some serious coin into the Thorium cauldron, I read something around 1.2 Trillion since 2012. Thanks for your work!

[@dantepastro8465]

I've been waiting for this reactor type for years. Good video. It will come if the challenges are well solved. I don't think it's public opinion that impedes the development in all the capable countries of the world.

[@fbiagentmiyakohoshino8223]

it will be a good replacement for uranium for now until we get fusion going

[@BogenmacherD]

Oh no, you don't. You will not want such a reactor anywhere near your home, and certainly also not a nuclear waste deposit either.

[@williamlewington3223]

just stumbled across your channel. High quality minimal BS science videos. KZbin desperately needs more stuff like this. Keep it up.

[@harleyb.birdwhisperer]

Nice job. Covered the topic well, good sound, good graphics.

[@D.IronsWorld]

Such a quality content! Keep up good work sir. I love science, you got another sub ;)

[@davesworld7961]

To me anyone who talks about climate change but doesn't want a discussion about thorium isn't credible.

[@TheGargalon]

that's funny because nuclear power is actually a solution

[@epiccollision]

You point to a viable working thorium reactor producing power and I’ll get onboard...until then...

[@raisaapriliani2717]

lets go nuclear energy!

[@logicplague2077]

@@epiccollision People have to get onboard before anyone will invest in developing the technology. The science is solid, and solar/wind can never hope to achieve what nuclear can. If you want true green energy, this is the way.

[@jeremiahnoar7504]

Funny how Bill Nye the Climate Guy never talked about it

[@MrZoomZone]

One of the best quick but thorough summaries of why we should invest urgently in Thorium reactors. As an introduction it complements Kirk Sorensens videos. If fusion research resources had gone into Thorium reactor development we would already be enjoying the benefits. The hardest problem is getting public acceptance since the facts take time, honesty and intelligence to grasp. The fact is that it can be safer, cleaner, more efficient, use less land area, provide useful heat as well as electricity, not dependent on weather, can consume existing reator waste, can source thorium from the rare metal mining industry slag heaps, has already been proven, hugely less costly development than fusion, supports nuclear medicine, exportable skills. This comes from someone who was never a fan of old nuclear.

[@YourCapybaraAmigo_17yrsago]

Just look at half the comments on this board simply above yours to see that the low IQs among the general public are going to be a huge hurdle to overcome to advance this brilliant new technology. I mean anyone with common sense and half a functioning brain would agree with you, but yeah I mean overcoming public ignorance especially something that has such a knee-jerk fearful Pavlovian response associated to it is going to be no small feat.

[@smokingweedcures]

The time and effort put into this video are glaringly obvious. Extremely well researched and flawlessly narrated. A testament to the pricelessness of knowledge, thank you for this.

[@BogenmacherD]

The producer is clearly promoting his field of work, which I kinda understand. Still, he shies away from the really dangerous topics like for the example that enormous radiation is at play in this kind of reactor that is extremely difficult to contain. There is also no word that the Uranium 233 that is produced in this kind of breeder reactor is highly fissile and perfect to produce nuclear warheads. The biggest problem for Thorium reactors may still be economics. Solar and wind power has become "dirt cheap", rendering all nuclear energy a waste of money. It really only makes sense for the production of nuclear warheads.

[@cooblin3607]

Perfect. Easy to understand and god visually. 10/10.

[@AntoCharles]

Awesome job once again 🔥🔥🔥

[@josemesquita9354]

I'm glad that this high quality content has appeared to me in KZbin. You and ALL the others in KZbin that make science something easy to understand is the real Future of humankind. Thank you so much for your videos.

[@modernkennnern]

I've watched a few of your videos in the last few days, and I had kind of glossed over the fact that your animations are incredible.

[@drkissferenc6908]

Thank you for presentations! My hobby is the nuclear and quantum physics, and I understand more good the thorium position in possibility of energy production.

[@KalRandom]

I thought Oak Ridge in Tennessee, US ran one for 3 years, but the waste couldn't be used in bombs so it was shut down.

[@MonMalthias]

It was shut down because Richard Nixon wanted to concentrate nuclear research efforts and jobs in California. At the time, the sodium cooled fast reactor project was further advanced, had more national laboratories across more states participating in the project, and had more funding and scientists, and prospects for a Californian fast reactor seemed imminent. The Atomic Energy Commission was directed to produce a report that showcased the problems with the molten salt reactor experiment so as to justify pulling funding for the people at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and concentrate research on fast reactors. And while fast reactors did get out of the laboratory stage with the production of the Experimental Breeder Reactor 2 (EBR-2) full commercialisation never came. Funding for that was pulled by the Clinton administration when it became clear that the nuclear industry itself was not interested in a sodium cooled fast reactor, having become quite accustomed to water cooled reactors. Rather than build a project for which no utility would want in their portfolio, and due to anti-nuclear senators like Harry Reid, the fast reactor project was shut down.

[@KalRandom]

@@MonMalthias Glad to see someone else did there homework.

[@edelahaye]

@@KalRandom their ...

[@davidelliott5843]

The Weinburg MSRE at Oak Ridge was simply shut down and the drain tank left to cool. It was not allowed to burn down its fuel. That resulted in a serious clean up problem years later.

[@davidelliott5843]

Ed Pheil of Elysium has been asked to dispose of date expired bomb cores. He can do that no worries. He can also dispose the depleted uranium which is another huge storage problem. The issue is regulatory processes designed for PWRs. There are no US regulations for MSRs.

[@JessicaMarinaRushie]

I would love to get my hands on the "material" you used for the thorium, it's gorgeous! Also the liquid one... I could not take my eyes of off it. Nice work.

[@NikolaNevenov86]

lol..half-life logo. Your blender skills and presentations are great.Love these series

[@dtaggartofRTD]

Thorium is definitely going to be an important player in powering the future. That said, Plutonium bred from that U238 shouldn't be discounted as mere waste. In breeder reactors that is usable fuel. Suitability for bombmaking is dependent on fuel cycle. the longer it's in the reactor the less suitable it is for making a bomb due to the formation of an isotope that tends to spontaneously fission. While there's always the proliferation concern it shouldn't be ignored as an option.

[@DunnickFayuro]

@Nik I thought NASA needed plutonium anyway for their RTGs. Looks like a win-win situation here.

[@dtaggartofRTD]

@@DunnickFayuro that too. different isotope from what gets produced from U238, but it is still a useful material. always struck me as a mite silly to toss useful material out with the waste. Even the waste materials have uses in medicine and other fields.

[@rajatgupta8129]

i think due to proliferation concerns only INDIA is trying its hands on thorium based reactors....INDIA is having the most of thorium acc. to research in world wide... if it work as theoretically been said INDIA will build more such thorium based reactors to power its growing need .

[@dtaggartofRTD]

@@rajatgupta8129 It's a good way to go. Builds public trust in nuclear technologies while avoiding the parts that are irrationally feared.

[@TCBYEAHCUZ]

@@DunnickFayuro LFTR can make Plutonium 238, the magic material that powers RTG's for space probes via neptuinium 237.

[@BalancedEarth]

OMG We need this YESTERDAY!

[@IonorReasSpamGenerator]

We got plenty of radioactive waste from current nuclear powerplants where only a fraction of its energy has been used, so it would make more sense to construct power plants that can reuse our nuclear waste supplies we already have than building reactors which do not solve current nuclear waste issues and instead produce even more of it... The issue with older nuclear reactors was not that thorium was that much better fuel, but in fact, that old reactors could not use uranium fuel rods efficiently and so we ended with used fuel rods stored in nuclear waste sites even though they got over 90% of usable energy still in them which new generation of nuclear reactors are capable to utilize while reducing our often poorly stored and secured high energy nuclear waste supplies...

[@duojoshuacindy8545]

such an interesting channel and subjects, thank you so much for creating high quality content

[@roninviking]

kirk sorensen was my introduction to the thorium LFTR and this is such a brilliant presentation, thank you

[@roninviking]

@paul snor troll.

[@TCBYEAHCUZ]

@paul snor He's not a marketer clearly, he's an engineer, so its understandable that Kirk may come off that way, which is purely because he has a passion for what he's doing, anyone who has a passion is going to be biased.

[@14mirage]

Brilliant video, yes... but your audio.....it’s spectacular!

[@ChrisWilson999]

The short half life elements from Thorium reactors are more radioactive and like other wastes require around 10 half lives to be much less dangerous (but not harmless). 2^10 = 1024 so the radioactivity is reduced to 1/1024th of it's initial amount after one half life X 10.

[@hijodelsoldeoriente]

Your videos are so well made! Very informative. Watching from The Philippines. 🇵🇭

[@salehalamri7130]

Thank you ,it's really amazing work you have done.

[@Guds777]

I like your thumbnail logo. It's like a Canadian radioactive sign.

[@AnalystPrime]

Good video, I wish I could have just linked to it couple months back when someone asked me what is so good about thorium. You should have put in more info about downsides of NPPs. You showed the land area needed by the plant, but there is a mandatory safe zone required around them so unless the power company puts it on an island or also builds a wind or solar farm or something that's a lot of wasted space. Not that many people WANT to live near one these days... And apparently due to how rarely anything nuclear is being built, construction companies don't have the experience or high quality standards needed to build the systems; the reactors being built in Europe are about a decade late by now and bad welding by East European subcontractors was named as one direct reason. Long construction times also mean high budget overruns, and they aren't cheap in the first place. Thorium reactors might work better, but I don't see these problems going away or regulations on them easing up any time soon. The funny thing, of course, is that despite taking a decade to build, costing billions, and needing to pay tens of millions every year or two for refueling with stuff that is the very definition of toxic, carcinogenic, radioactive environmental disaster waiting to happen... NPPs are still far cheaper, safer, cleaner and responsible for massively less deaths and health hazards than oil and coal.

[@skulk99fox]

Without a doubt this is the clearest presentation of describing the Chemistry involved. Thank you.

[@RadekAnarchy]

Awesome video. And yes, im defenitly intrested in more vidoes like this. Thank you!

[@lucrativelepton]

Fantastic presentation style. I've always been lost on how to find an efficient workflow for using Blender. Would love to see a video about your process, or at least some references to learn from!

[@Cyclonut96]

I found the graphics of people photo's and text a bit too confusing/different, making it difficult to reflect what was being said. So, for me it looked fancy, but failed to have the right effect.

[@ActiveAtom]

We found this after researching Bill Gates Thorium Reactor investment and current status of progress, interesting to watch this great video sharing what Thorium is thus far mind you. Thank you. Lance & Patrick.

[@WadcaWymiaru]

China will outrun him...

[@burntchickennugget191]

Finally ive been waiting for this to become relevant.

[@iulrril]

Really good,high quality videos, keep up the good work dude

[@Monody512]

"Uranium Hexaflouride" That name alone triggered my fight or flight response.

[@JessicaMarinaRushie]

I was thinking the same, Hexaflouride's are extremely dangerous aren't they? and very damaging to the ozone? I am No chemist...

[@acmefixer1]

And none of you can spell hexafluoride correctly!

[@JessicaMarinaRushie]

@@acmefixer1 Did you also not spell it right and that's why you had to edit your pointless comment? Do you critique people with disabilities in the street too because they do not walk as good as you? Grow up for god sake.

[@Drumsgoon]

great vid! solar and wind are still not equivalent, despite massive areas, because of intermittency!

[@adamsutton45]

I really enjoyed the quality of this video, thanks

[@lab4854]

Tanks for the great info About thorium.

[@arcodax3302]

7:45 La densidad energética real del Torio es de 22 Giga-vatios/hora (aquí esta considerando las reacciones subsecuentes que tendría con otros materiales fuera del kilogramo original), si fuera como en el gráfico estaría convirtiendo casi el 20% de su masa en energía.

[@StefanVujovic]

7:46 you wrote kWk on Uranium

[@houstonwehaveaproblem6858]

Nice job producing this video. Knocked it down to layman bite sizes. Need MUCH MORE content like this.The biggest technical problem with nuclear power is ignorance with the public and politicians who represent them.

[@DavenH]

Very beautiful production and editing.

[@CarChrisMC]

Wow, that was a lot of info to swallow

[@hauntedshadowslegacy2826]

Do NOT swallow the thorium. It probably wouldn't feel good.

[@stormsirens2BACKUP]

1:01 ...A nuclear fuel that produces no CO2 emissions. Are you talking about emisions when they mine uranium ore? Because no nuclear plant produces CO2 unless the plants backup power generators are operating after a site power failure. I found out recently people mistake the "smoke" emminating from Nuclear plant towers is CO2 when infact is just (non-radioactive) steam, funny thing personally I always new it was steam vapors... Just wanted to ask and inform.

[@ThorirPP]

I think that he was just comparing it to non-nuclear fuel there, aka coal and such. Confusingly set up comparison, but that is what I believe his intention was

[@stormsirens2BACKUP]

@@ThorirPP Ok I guess that makes sense...

[@Bless-the-Name]

Yep The reactor uses the fuel to create steam to turn the turbines.

[@nwrked]

all taken in account nuclear is at 12g/kWh. 6 in France because of one recyling cycle.

[@WadcaWymiaru]

Nuclear power plant *EMITS* GHG gas...but H2O not the CO2...

[@aussietaipan8700]

And this is an excellent explanation regarding the Thorium cycle.

[@spaceman6463]

Grate video and congrats on 25k subs

[@agiftfromdracosfather3490]

As well as this we desperately need better Energy Storage methods

[@WadcaWymiaru]

Energy storage SUCK and is expensive. Even sodium for that will cost more than 30$ per kg...

[@AlexiLaiho227]

hey Subject Zero! I'm a nuclear engineering major who is planning on pursuing a career in MSR/thorium development, and i wanted to share my perspective: so thorium is not really a magical fuel, it does the exact same thing as uranium, but it is 400x more abundant than u-235, and 3x more abundant than u-238. u-238 must first be bred into pu-239, and thorium must be bred into uranium as you said, in order to extend our nuclear livelihood for thousands of years. right now, companies have chosen the easy route of enriching u-235, burning it in a once-through cycle, and throwing it away. using nuclear fuel like that, a nuclear powered world will only last about 20 years. we can make breeder reactors that run on either of the fertile fuels. we would need a fast spectrum breeder for the u238/pu239 cycle, and we could have either a thermal reactor (plus processing plant) or a fast reactor to breed thorium. that "decay tank" method using a thermal reactor and online reprocessing to breed thorium is actually a very big proliferation concern. there are other methods for breeding that require a lot less special technology, no fluorination columns, no decay tanks, no proliferation concerns, etc. but in order for us to not have to pull out protactinium, we need the extra neutrons that are available only through a fast reactor. this is what i realized when i started reading up about these things. LFTR being a thermal reactor sounds like a good idea, but it is not politically possible at the moment because of both proliferation concerns and a ridiculous amount of technology development that needs to take place. some other concerns are how to maintain a negative temperature coefficient of reactivity, the degradation of reactor moderator, and how exactly online reprocessing is possible. homogeneous molten salt fast reactors are a lot simpler and a lot more effective at their job. they are just a tin can, filled with salt, and sized for criticality at a specific temperature. they'd need a single kick-start of highly enriched material (like those plutonium bombs they are trying to denature at the moment), and after that they can burn nuclear waste, and get 36x as much energy out of the waste, decreasing its waste lifespan to hundreds of years instead of thousands by burning the minor actinides, and achieve a positive >1 breeding ratio, which means they can be batch-processed and doubled into several reactors at once. there are none of those problems i mentioned with the homogeneous MSR, they have no moderator, they have a strongly negative temperature coefficient (in fact the whole concept is based around the fact that salt expands when it warms), and they have an excess of neutrons so they aren't constantly pulling out fission products or protactinium. also, as the neutron speed increases, the neutronic cross-section of fission products decreases FASTER than the neutronic cross section of actinides, meaning that the faster the neutrons are moving, the more preferentially they will hit uranium/thorium/plutonium atoms over other things in the reactor, meaning you can go a very long time (up to 40 years for some designs) without once having to reprocess your fuel. when i was made aware of this technology, it very obviously became the "nuclear next step" in my mind. we can easily deploy these to nations that have a lot of nuclear waste, which right now is a liability, and we can eat that nuclear waste while producing a boatload of power. it can be seen as an intermediate step between here and LFTR, because the world is currently not ready for that tech. once we can solve proliferation concerns and a few of the tech hurdles, then LFTR is a viable option, but the world needs clean, safe nuclear energy right now, and the homogeneous molten salt fast reactors have a potential to give it to us.

[@markfernandes2467]

Hi, so I really liked reading your comment, it's good to hear from people actually studying this stuff and therefore future professionals. I've been a big fan of SMR'S and LIFTR ever since Kirk Sorensen did his TED talk almost 10 years ago now. but I am always wary of things that appear to be too good to be true and have been worried about Kirk and the small community of original promoters of LIFTR and TH being my main source, so I really appreciate your input. I have a few questions though. 1. you say the "decay tank" in the online reprocessing posses a big proliferation risk. Can you go into more detail as to why/how exactly? I think Kirk claims that there's no way this is a problem due to the material in there being very "hot", which makes it almost impossible to "work with" to make into a weapon. I could be wrong on this as being his defence but in any case, please do comment on what the risk is and how easy/attractive it would be relative to current options for anyone looking to make a weapon. My thinking is it only needs to be harder, more dangerous, or cost more than other methods to make LIFTR's a bad choice for anyone wanting to build a nuke. I also can't understand why Kirk can't see this obvious problem when you can, he even makes a point of LIFTR being proliferation-resistant. Why he would do this if not true, I don't know. I mean maybe he's so wrapped up in the idea of online processing and the benefits it brings, he's convinced himself the proliferation risk is far less than it is. Kind of sunk cost or confirmation bias problem. You obviously like fast spectrum but he really wants thermal, again, I think he loves thermal mainly because of the massive neutron cross-section in you get in thermal. You mention the cross-section in fast yourself, saying that "the neutronic cross-section of fission products decreases FASTER than the neutronic cross-section of actinides", ok, but still much smaller than in thermal, so thermal seems a far better fit for this fuel cycle if only you could make the online processing work. So to me, it all depends on who is right about proliferation risk in their assessment. Of course, there are other problems with online, complexity, cost, new tech development, all things you mention. So maybe it's better to go fast at first anyway. You're right, we need this stuff now, so the simpler the better, LIFTR can come at some point down the road. I'm all for homogeneous molten salt fast reactors asap. You also site "some other concerns are how to maintain a negative temperature coefficient of reactivity" but I thought the MSRE at Oakridge displayed really good characteristics in this regard, No? That was thermal with Graphite as a moderator. At the end of the day, I just want some type of MSR up and running asap homogeneous fast sounds way simpler and much less cost and R&D, you still get to eat spent fuel and way shorter "waste" management timeframes. Hope you and your peers get a shift on then :) good luck. I tend to think that LIFTR is the most elegant, complete and engineers dream choice, but the "tin can" fast is the pragmatic cost-effective and shorter time frame deployable one. Last question, which from all the designs/companies currently in development, do you yourself think is best, safest and easiest to build, maintain and get past regulators? Thanks in advance.

[@SubjectZeroScience]

Guys, I get way too many comments, LOL! Relax on word count. you are right here, but we need to get people to trust the technology, and it has to prove itself safe.

[@mrzorg]

Excellent presentation. VERY well done.

[@pandakees]

You chose some really interesting topics, the animations are extraordinairy slick and the clear vocal explanations along with them make the rocketscience behind these topics sufficiantly understandable, even for a Dutchman without a scientificle background such as me. Sir, you are a magician! Thank you very much, as of today you've definitly got one new discriber !

[@pandakees]

... subscriber that is...

[@jeremytravis360]

I always thought that Thorium reactors were the way forward in terms of energy production. The only reason it was dropped was the nuclear arms race.

[@DxBlack]

_(mentioned within the first 5 minutes of the video, at __3:40__)_

[@Rep0007]

Thorium is bullshit. Industry sales propaganda.

[@GregEwing]

Love the production quality and some of the other videos... However, this makes the typical and misleading comparison of a Breading/Reprocessing Th cycle with a Once through U cycle. Once you compare properly with a reprocessed U/Pu cycle the numbers don't look nearly as good. As most of the once-through waste is FUEL. Also plenty of proposed designed deal with actinides. In fact, the only real upside with Th is abundance. LFTR was proposed to deal with the Problems of Th, in particular, it is very tight on neutron economy and to date it has NOT been shown to have a breeding ratio of 1. All the advantages proposed in LFTR work just as well with U/Pu as fuel. Oh and they DID make a bomb with U233 from Th. Don't get me wrong. I am pro-nuclear, but Th is not the panacea it is made out to be. Also i just can't see public support ever getting behind nuclear in any serious way any time soon. aka the next 50 years.

[@keacoq]

I would like to see those limitations of Th more fully explained. I had the impression that Th reactors can be made more fail safe with much shorter half life waste. Those are compelling advantages if they are real

[@jackfanning7952]

Too expensive in the sixties and even more so now. Beside every kind of nuclear fission generates radioactive waste. None of it has been safely disposed of...ever.

[@keacoq]

@@jackfanning7952 Thorium waste has a much shorter half-life, but still many human lifetimes. And as you say nobody has worked out how to do safe disposal of any nuclear waste.

[@jackfanning7952]

@@keacoq As usual, nuclear proponents are not telling the truth. Thorium reactors produce high-level waste just like today's reactors. The proportions of nuclides vary from other reactors, but in no way will a thorium reactor eliminate radioactive elements that have half-lives measured in the tens, hundreds, thousands and millions of years. In addition, before thorium can be fed into a reactor, reprocessing non-fissile thorium-232 into fissile u-233 produces dozens of highly radioactive elements, like iodine-131, cesium-137 and strontium-90 and large amounts of radioactive water. It is very expensive, dirty and dangerous to the workers. These must be separated from the u-233 before it is fed into the reactors. Waste in the spent fuel from the u-233 reactor contains technetium-99 - 210,000 years, plutonium-239 - 24,400 yrs, proactinium-231 - 32,760 yrs., iodine-129 - 15.7 million yrs.The different spectrum of waste from thorium reactors do not make handling the waste any easier. Decay products build up in the spent fuel and they are difficult, expensive and time-consuming to clean. Stabilization and disposal from the very small thorium reactor at Oak Ridge was the most technically challenging clean-up problem they faced. I think it is still not done.

[@keacoq]

@@jackfanning7952 Thank you for that. Another hope dashed! Time for you to do a youtube?

[@stansuen8072]

This is a seriously great topic and great comprehensive contents. It's amazing. Good job. The topic is highly complex and technical. It will be even 10 times more powerful if you reduce the words on the screen and align with the speech. I have to pause the video all the time to make sense of what I am hearing vs what I am watching.

[@thegiaprophet8402]

Wow the way you explain it sound so simple. Thanks man

[@badreality2]

Kirk Sorensen called: He wants recognition of his effort toward this cause.

[@thoughtcrime.techno]

Halflife 3... I see what you did there! 😂

[@jigglypuff4227]

Woooow such a high quality content, you got a sub more bro. Super impressive.

[@lindseyhatfield9017]

fantastic, so beautifully presented even I understood it, thanks for your work.

[@SteveSong1219]

Been seeing a lot of thorium videos lately. Thanks to Andrew Yang's climate change townhall for popularizing the topic. Can't wait to see further development of thorium reactors!

[@phi9249]

Well, if the lie of human caused global warming gets Thorium up and running, I'll pass on the deception. For now anyways.

[@john3pq]

Actually, it was Kirk Sorensen who popularized the MSR thorium reactor by getting NASA to kick in $10,000 to scan and digitize the old records from ORNL from the MSRE work done in the late '60s. If he hadn't done that and gone on speaking tours (mostly on his own dime because back then nobody would pay to get him to come speak) at mostly universities across the land. That brought the matter to public attention, which eventually wound up in more public debates courtesy of Andrew Yang. You can see many of Sorensen's presentations over the years at Gordon McDowell's channel. It also shows a lot of history from the past 10 or so years.

[@wazza33racer]

Solid uranium fuel rods cooled by water is the A-Model ford of nuclear energy. DO WE STILL DRIVE A-MODEL FORDS???

[@WadcaWymiaru]

There is CANDU, much better reactor. If someone in Japan wasn't corrupted, Japan like South Korea would have those reactos instead of old, French design...

[@matthewgrotke1442]

Thank you for making a thorium video

[@blackdog6969]

3:16 looked at my screen when you said his name. You got me good with that edit. Props to you XD

[@Umski]

Whilst I agree that nuclear by means of Thorium reactors is a good thing and in years to come will hopefully come to fruition, the Nuclear Energy Institute are of course going to suggest other zero-carbon technologies are 'bad' somehow - by that I mean the land comparison - yes, wind and solar take up land but this doesn't have to be the case - offshore wind and on-roof solar easily mitigate this questionable point - in the meantime, how many fossil-based resources are used to build nuclear power plants and then clean up the leftovers? In that respect, solar in particular is a relatively mature and scaleable technology that will help fill the gap whilst they solve making Thorium reactors possible (and genuinely zero carbon from cradle to grave) - if every roof in the world had solar panels rather than a traditional 'dead' roof area, this point about land use is irrelevant...

[@sbearly]

Except that I don't want solar panels on my roof. That's a pipe dream and can be done only by government force. Maybe you're willing to put the government in charge but I'm not. I want more energy for less money. Government dictates can't do that.

[@Umski]

That's fair enough but someone has to pay for cheap energy and ultimately government somehow subsidises all forms to some extent - the decommissioning costs for traditional nuclear are immense and paid for via taxes and higher bills. In the UK at least, solar was subsidised to increase the balance via Feed in Tariffs until recently so small scale generators had panels put on their property (roof or otherwise), benefit from the power generated directly through savings but more importantly get paid for what they generate for 20 years - not the best system from experience (I would prefer a net import system) but they then pay for themselves in 8-9 years and then you are effectively in profit for 'loaning' your roof to generate - doesn't bother me as I don't often look at my roof, but those that don't have them pay more over time as the government claws the subsidies back from suppliers. My point was even if every warehouse, commercial building etc (not necessarily domestic if the owner doesn't wish so) was covered, it would make a big difference. However, as it is, it is a opt in and I benefit with lower bills. Nuclear can't work like that so the huge investments before and after are made via government but private companies that build and run benefit instead and the consumer pays over the lifetime whether in theirs or future generations. Thorium doesn't seem to be an easy one to crack as it were, which is why I suspect there isn't much in the way of big private names e.g. Musk, Bezos, Gates and the like not getting involved - the ROI is far too long and risky...it's a bit like the 'fusion in 30 years' joke in that respect, just that Thorium might happen IF everyone in the know doesn't turn around and decide to drop it due to cost which will be its downfall unfortunately, if it doesn't work out pretty quickly...

[@sbearly]

@@Umski If you are arguing for the removal of all government subsidies I completely agree with you. No subsidies for coal, oil, wind, solar, hydro, nuclear, corn, sugar, farmers, unions - in short no product, resource or persons. The only way to fairly solve problems is for investors to decide for themselves which solutions to problems will work and give them a return on their money and government bureaucrats not only complicate that but add additional layers of cost, mismanagement and even corruption. Like you, governments are willing to make big decisions, and big risks, with taxpayer money because there are no consequence for bad decisions other than taxpayers losing money that could be better spent elsewhere and lobbyists and cronies of government reaping the rewards of their lobbying and backroom deals with politicians. The free market puts all the risk on those who would profit from the investments. Government should not be involved in the investment side nor the bailout side. Nobody can predict the future but one thing we know is that the private sector, when left alone, creates consistently innovative and technologically advanced solutions to every problem while at the same time providing jobs. Government has but a small role in the process, making sure individual rights, including property rights are not violated, that contracts are fairly enforced, safety procedures, etc.

[@ariearie5054]

@@sbearly What you are suggesting fails to take externalities into account. If no more subsidies are given there is only market forces, and they are not always what is best for society. If there is no price on polluting then why even bother trying to reduce emissions? Why not dump all the toxic waste from my nuclear powerplant in the ocean? Why not dump all the toxic fumes from my coal plant in the air? Subsidies are a way to promote alternatives that might be economically less attractive, but are better for society in general.

[@sbearly]

@@ariearie5054 Who gets to decide what is good for society? Think about all the countries in the world. How many of them would you say do the best for their societies? What is it that makes politicians and government bureaucrats automatically care more about society than their own self-interests? What is it that makes them make better decisions about how people should live their lives than the individuals themselves? What is it about them that makes you trust their judgement better than the judgements of those in the private sector that have solved all the problems in the world up to this point? What is it in you that trusts and wants politicians and government bureaucrats to tell you what is best for you?

[@Guardian_Arias]

Half life 3 confirmed! LMAO

[@omarsaifuddin6717]

amazing channel! I feel like I am reading numerous academic journals in one video omg. I am still studying Mechanical Engineering and I think I want to start knowing more about manufacturing Th power reactor from ME stand of view. totally agree with the main problems are the acceptance, mainstream media should start to educate people on the feasibility of Th for future energy.

[@patcypatcy2797]

This is dope! Thank you.

[@Lumineszenz]

While this video is definitely well made and informative, I sadly can't call it unbiased. The main issue with thorium based nuclear power plants isn't acceptance, it's construction time. Current nuclear reactors can not be modified to utilise thorium. We need to build completly new nuclear power plants that are able to use thorium as fuel, which takes 30-40+ years. That time span is too long for it to be proposed as a solution to prevent serious consequences of climate change and likely also too long to be "the solution" to the energy crisis. We'd invest decades of work and billions of dollars into infrastructure that will be too late to become a solution for the issues that are being used to promote it. And ultimately we will wind up with *another* energy solution based on a finite resource. Anyone with knowledge of growth rates knows that thorium won't last a thousand years. Due to the increase in power consumption the reserves will likely last for 200ish years. It won't be "the solution" to our energies woes, that much is unquestionable. And it will likely come too late to address issues like climate change as well. Thorium *is* an amazing element and thorium based nuclear power plants are *vastly* superior designs over uranium based ones. It would have been great if we had come up with these designs 40ish years ago. But now, I don't see them becoming more than a supplementary power source to replace current reactors.

[@shonemumy]

cheep, almost free, energy for the whole world? why would THE MAN ever allow that?

[@ToxicityAssured]

It's sad, but greed will kill all of us one way or another. This seems like a probable way.

[@akashchoudhary8162]

How will it be almost free? The extraction of the raw materials and setting up the power plant and its maintenance must cost something, right? The countries that don't have it abundantly will have to import it just like oil. Sincerely asking.

[@ToxicityAssured]

@@akashchoudhary8162 Don't mistake almost free with actually free. I think the OP was just saying much cheaper than current methods.

[@shonemumy]

@@adiabolicalliberty2614 really good point. thanks.

[@apstuxa]

love your videos man!

[@bassmana2z686]

Thanks for the great content.