Liquid fluoride thorium reactor
- Liquid fluoride thorium reactor
Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor or LFTR (pronounced “Lifter”) is a specific fission energy technology based on thorium rather than uranium as the energy source. The nuclear reactor core is in a liquid form at low pressure (i.e., ~1 atmosphere) and has a completely passive safety system (i.e., no control rods). Major advantages include: significant reduction of nuclear waste (producing no transuranics and ~100% fuel burnup), inherent safety, weapon proliferation resistant, and high power cycle efficiency.
It is a derivative of the Molten salt reactor or MSR technology, which was successfully demonstrated at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in the 1960s. LFTR ideally couples to new closed-cycle turbine power plants with nearly 50% efficiency. Rather than the historical MSR development, today the LFTR is a thorium technology approach being actively discussed as an alternate to uranium based Boiling Water Reactor (BWR).
ee also
* Liquid fluoride reactor
* Generation IV reactor
* nuclear reactor
References
* [http://www.energyfromthorium.com/pdf/ Energy from Thorium's Document Repository] Contains scanned versions of many of the U.S. government engineering reports. This repository is the main reference for the molten-salt fueled reactor's technical discussion.
* [http://www.geocities.com/rmoir2003/COE_10_2_2001.doc Moir, R.W; Cost of Electricity from MSRs; Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, U.S.]
* "The First Nuclear Era : The Life and Times of a Technological Fixer", by Alvin Martin Weinberg (1994). Book by a former director of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and a promoter of nuclear power and molten salt reactors.
* [http://atomic.thepodcastnetwork.com/index.php?p=61?; Atomic Podcast Program] Audio interview by Rod Adams and Shane Brown.
External links
* [http://thoriumenergy.blogspot.com/ Energy from Thorium] Blog
* [http://www.npsfoundation.org/research.php?rp_id=18 Naval Postgraduate School]
* [http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikiversity:Nuclear_Engineering Nuclear Engineering]
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