I have long thought that nuclear energy was our only hope to prevent and recover from global warming. So I have watched a lot of videos about the nuclear business and technology. Three stand out in my mind because they go beyond general principles and show a combination of technical expertise and actual development of real physical products. They also address key concerns that we hear about the widespread adoption of nuclear technology.
Note that Ed Pheil has moved to Exodys Energy, which is at least similar to Elysium Industries, and has probably acquired some or all of its technology.
In a very impressive talk, Ed gives a balanced and informative look at the advantages and disadvantages thorium, as well as presenting his design for a fast spectrum uranium chloride reactor. That reactor is designed to run off spent nuclear fuel from standard reactors, with the advantage that fuel costs are negative since the companies with it want to get rid of it. The world as a whole wants to get rid of it, so that is a big win that is shared by the other reactor designs mentioned below.
It looks like Exodys plans to sell reactors to existing nuclear facilities to allow them to get more energy out of their fuel. This saves the extra complications of transporting the fuel to some other site.
The Exodys reactor uses fast neutrons. Fast spectrum reactors have yet to achieve their promise, which is to breed their own fuel from waste products. The next video points out that a breeder reactor using slow (thermal) neutrons is only possible using thorium.
Copenhagen Atomics started in Denmark when it was very anti-nuclear. They didn't do paper designs, they started designing and building the essential components that they would need. Their molten salt pumps and salt testing technology have found customers around the world. They are building a full reactor that is only missing the radioactive bit, and they express confidence that they will have working reactors this decade. One has to admire them and wish them well.
We hope that advanced reactors, such as the two above, will succeed in delivering cheap energy. We should support the most promising designs by facilitating early installations to allow them to find and fix problems.
But the world needs to start building nuclear plants now, and as fast as possible. To do this we should build existing designs which have a strong proven safety record. In this regard it is hard to go past the Canadian CANDU design which has safely decarbonised electricity in Ontario for decades. And in the next video, Mark Nelson demonstrates that it isn't actually much of a compromise.
While it is not new that CANDU reactors could use thorium and could be used to burn nuclear waste, we now have a company actually making it happen. This amplifies the case for CANDU as the best way for countries to start with nuclear energy.
The first video is not too relevant to Australia, since it is mostly targetted at complementing existing reactors. The characteristic of the other two videos is that they use heavy water. Heavy water is heavy because the two hydrogen atoms in each water molecule have a neutron as well as the single proton. Water slows neutrons down, and slow neutrons work better in a reactor. Heavy water is much better at this and allows the reactor to run with fuel that is less dangerous, less suitable for weapons, and more easily controlled. The CANDU reactor normally runs with uranium in its natural and ubiquitous form, without any of the enrichment required by light water reactors.
Copenhagen Atomics shows what can be done when a country is still in its pre-nuclear phase. What contribution can Australian industry make to advance nuclear energy? There are a lot of options, but the one that comes to my mind is to start making heavy water. It is not itself radioactive so there is no legal impediment. It would pave the way for Australia to start our nuclear journey with CANDU and help other countries to do the same.
