A recent note regarding an energy supply issue stirred thoughts about energy strategy – the necessity for and absence of – in regards to our country. In my musings I came across some information on thorium, thorium in place of uranium for producing nuclear energy. By reflecting on this example of replacing uranium with thorium, we begin to see the potential in a wholistic approach, an approach that demands of us a different nature of commitment and pursuit than is currently active in our energy strategy… an approach that has the potential to work for all children in the world. Some intriguing aspects of thorium are…
- Oak Ridge Laboratory developed a process for thorium in the sixties. More development is needed, but feasibility has been established. Its biggest weakness was that the thorium process does not produce plutonium which is needed for nuclear weapons.
- Thorium reactors could produce electricity at a cost comparable to burning coal… and with no greenhouse gasses.
- Thorium reactors are far safer, cheaper, and easier to operate than uranium-fueled reactors. Thorium reactors do not melt down and they produce less waste, with the waste being much less radioactive than that from uranium-fueled reactors.
- Thorium is more abundant and easier to mine and process into reactor fuel. The United States has the largest supply of economically available thorium rich ore of any country in the world.
- Current nuclear waste could be used as fuel in thorium reactors… essentially eliminating currently existing and accumulating hazards.
- Thorium-fueled reactor design has advanced such that it can come close to a perpetual process – that is, the process generates waste which becomes fuel, a cycle that may need very little new fuel.
- There is more energy contained in thorium reserves than in all fossil fuels on earth.
This all sounds quite promising in the sense of what becomes possible when we think more wholistically. We have been slow to pursue this change since we have uranium, but nuclear waste is a significant and growing problem. This might cause us to wake up. Coming from potential versus problem could cause us to put focused effort on perfecting the thorium process we invented fifty years ago. Others seem to understand this. China, India, Israel and Russia, to name a few, are actively pursuing this technology. They see distinct and obvious advantages to their country in such pursuits.
Transcending fossil fuels (requiring us to see stored carbon as a source of perpetual products versus as fuel) is a path of high hope for our country, for all people, for all of life on earth, which requires us to question the current starting point for our thinking. Coming from a country energy strategy versus from economic extraction may be a good place to start. It takes little imagination to see the economic and wellbeing potential in a country strategy that includes thorium technology.
It is interesting and somewhat reassuring to see that the ultimate direction for industry, regardless of product, is that of coming from and aiming towards the virtue of being perpetual – perpetual products and perpetual processes in regard to energy. I can see the notions of “sustainable” moving up to the more wholistic virtue of “perpetual.” I have always thought it is important to differentiate that which is truly evolutionary from that which may be common, popular, etc. For a long time, business has been moving towards commodity – commodity versus uniqueness of offering. Driven in a large part from the mind of efficiency and self-centered extraction, commodity is definitely not an evolutionary value; it is more aimed at milking that which has been produced. In recent discussions regarding intentional entrepreneuring in community, we dealt with the working of space. As you move towards commodity, space decays, leading to less and less space to operate in, and to more aggression being required to gain sufficient returns to stay alive. On the other hand, as you move towards uniqueness, space becomes infinite, able to nourish all who operate in accord with that.
