On 01/09/2010 10:32, Alastair wrote:
On Sep 1, 8:59 am, Martin
wrote:
On 31/08/2010 23:44, Lawrence Jenkins wrote:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/c...a-could-kill-f...

Thorium could well be a viable nuclear fuel now. Molten salt thorium
reactors have been built in the past. I suspect that advocates for Th232
are cheating somewhat saying that it generates 200x more energy per
tonne than Uranium. I see no obvious reason why the energy released per
tonne should scale other than with binding energy per nucleon.

I think the point they are making is that only the fissile isotopes of
uranium can be used to generate electricity whereas all of the mined
thorium can be used.

I make it nearer to 140x based on 0.7% U235 in natural ore.

That isn't true if you include plutonium breeder reactors in the
equation as they can burn the major isotope. The problem is that
plutonium is rather too easy to make bombs with and that is a political
decision rather than science or engineering.

Regards,
Martin Brown