Thorium is a naturally occurring, mildly radioactive element.

To use it in a nuclear reactor, thorium must absorb neutrons, a process that eventually converts it to an artificial isotope of uranium, uranium-233. U-233 is fissile, and when it absorbs a neutron it generally fissions, releasing two or three neutrons plus a million times more heat (energy) than burning an e uivalent mass of fossil fuel. !t ta"es two neutrons to release energy from thorium and U-233 can supply them, which means it is theoretically possible to sustain energy release from thorium indefinitely. This is the basis of a thorium reactor.

The Thorium #nergy $ycle, by %u&anne 'obbs, (op)tomic %tudios *rom the early +,-.s to the mid-+,/.s, an active 012 program at 3a" 0idge 4ational 5aboratory in Tenn. came up with a promising way to use thorium for ma"ing large amounts of energy cleanly and safely. !t was based on a revolutionary "ind of nuclear reactor that uses li uid rather than solid fuel. 5i uid fuel has significant theoretical advantages in operation, control, and processing over solid fuel, but a basic uestion had to be answered6 78ill it wor"9:

To that end, 3a" 0idge engineers built four li uid-fueled reactors. Two used water-based li uids, and two were based on li uid fluoride salts. The waterbased reactors had to operate at high pressures to generate the temperatures needed for economical power generation. They could also dissolve uranium compounds, but not those containing thorium, which made fuel reprocessing as complicated for the water-based rectors as it is for solid-fueled versions.

5i uid and %olid *luoride %alt ;i<tures The fluoride reactors had neither of these drawbac"s. They could operate at high temperature without pressuri&ation. They could also dissolve both uranium and thorium in their fluoride-salt mi<tures, and the mi<tures were impervious to radiation damage due to their ionic bonds. Therefore, 3a" 0idge engineers opted to concentrate on the technically superior li uid-fluoride-salt approach in future 012. !n the late +,=.s, however, the director of 3a" 0idge 4ational 5ab, )lvin 8einberg, was fired by the U.%. )tomic #nergy $ommission for his advocacy for this type of reactor and his efforts to enhance the safety of conventional light-water reactors, a design he had patented. 8ith 8einberg>s departure, the )#$ s uashed research in li uid-fluoride reactors in favor of li uid-sodiummetal-cooled fast breeder reactors, which were based on converting conventional uranium to plutonium. Technical overlap between the two programs was almost none<istent, so after cancellation, research into li uidthorium reactors faded away. 0ecent efforts to resurrect the thorium-fluoride reactor technology has focused on a new variant of the concept called the 5i uid-*luoride Thorium 0eactor (5*T0, pronounced 7lifter:). !n a 5*T0, the reactor vessel contains two types of li uid-fluoride salts. 3ne, the fuel salt, holds the fissile fuel (U-233) that

sustains the nuclear reaction. The other, the blan"et salt, has enough thorium to absorb about half of the neutrons from fission and produce more U-233. The blan"et salt also shields the reactor vessel from neutron damage and gamma-ray irradiation. )s thorium in the blan"et converts to U-233, it is physically transferred to the fuel salt, where it fissions, releasing neutrons and heat. 'eat moves to a coolant salt outside the core, then to the wor"ing fluid of a closed-cycle gas-turbine engine to generate electricity. 8aste heat can be re?ected to either air or water, depending on the availability of cooling water. 8aste heat could also be used to, for e<ample, desalinate seawater, letting it profitably produce potable water.