in the 1950s nuclear power promised endless amounts of energy too cheap to meter
but after over half a century as groundbreaking as nuclear power has been it hasn't been without its
fair share of calamities and unanswered questions but as the threat of global warming grows
a question remains will sources like wind and solar be enough on their own what if there was
another nuclear option one that was cleaner and safer and more efficient researchers in china
may finally unveil a nuclear reactor that checks all those boxes how do they do it by using thorium
but what is thorium and how do thorium reactors work and can they really make nuclear energy clean
and safe we thought those questions and more deserve a deeper dive today on two bit davinci
special thanks to extra for sponsoring this video build your credit score even without a credit
card today using extra as much as we love wind and solar some question whether they can truly
provide enough clean sustainable energy that we so desperately need while nuclear energy has a
questionable track record it could potentially be an excellent source of abundant emission-free
power before we go further let's take a quick look at how traditional nuclear reactors work as always
this is a significantly reduced overview the full breadth of nuclear physics is just a little bit
too much for a 10-minute video on youtube every nuclear reactor on the grid today is a fission
reactor which we've covered in our videos on modular nuclear reactors which you can check
out here this is separate from nuclear fusion which we've also covered in a video here fission
starts by finding an element with the right kind of nucleus certain elements like uranium
and plutonium contain very large nuclei that can split into smaller nuclei when struck by neutrons
once they split they release energy as well as a bunch of fast-moving neutrons these stray carini
neutrons smash into more nuclei breaking them apart and creating a chain reaction that energy
produces a steady amount of heat which boils water producing steam which turns generators to produce
electricity which then power your computers or phones so you can watch more tuba davinci videos
it's a beautiful cycle what makes nuclear power so attractive is that it can produce ample energy
in a consistent manner without carbon emissions a major win for the planet well sort of for all
the benefits of nuclear energy there are some major risk the looming threat of meltdowns the
proliferation of nuclear weapons nuclear waste with shelf lives of tens of thousands of years
all of these aspects have led some to give nuclear energy a big no thanks but the truth is many of
these risks have less to do with nuclear energy as a whole and more to do with the specific elements
used to produce those nuclear reactions in particular uranium but what if there was a
different element one that was more common and could potentially produce even more energy than
uranium but without the risk of meltdown nightmare weapons and whose waste lasts hundreds not tens of
thousands of years this then just might be the answer ladies and gentlemen may i present to
you thorium so what is thorium it's one of the 15 heavy metallic radioactive elements found at
the bottom of the periodic table just two spaces lighter than uranium thorium was first isolated
by swedish chemist john's jacob brazilis back in 1828 but it wasn't until about 70 years later that
two chemists gerhard schmidt and marie curie both separately discovered thorium's radioactive nature
what makes thorium so attractive to researchers right now most nuclear reactors use uranium one
specific isotope uranium-235 is particularly attractive because of its highly fissile nature
the problem uranium-235 makes up less than one percent of naturally occurring uranium
so nuclear power facilities make do with the more common isotope uranium-238
however this isotope can't undergo fission on its own you first need to enrich the uranium
to boost its proportions of uranium-235 this is where the problems begin during the conversion
process uranium-238 transmutes into other fissile elements u-239 which decays into neptunium-239
then finally plutonium-239 an active ingredient in nuclear bombs but the fun doesn't stop there once
the uranium-235 burns down to about 0.3 percent the fuel is depleted however it leaves some lovely
parting gifts like americium tectidium and iodine elements that can remain harmful for over 10 000
years meaning there is no guaranteed safe way of storing it here on earth if you've been watching
our show for a while you've probably noticed that our backdrop has changed and well that's because
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huge thanks to extra and all of you for supporting the show so how does this stack
up to thorium to begin with thorium is a much more abundant material three times more abundant
than uranium plus all but a trace of the world's thorium already exists as the ideal
isotope thorium-232 meaning no enrichment another major win for thorium is that overall it is a much
safer element to use than uranium for one thing it is not fissile on its own but when thorium-232
absorbs another neutron it becomes thorium-233 which quickly decays into protactinium-233
from there it can be chemically separated into uranium-233 which is fissile but the true benefit
here is that because thorium itself is not fissile it will never start to break down on its own
to start the reaction you'd need to start throwing neutrons at it to make the process stop simply
turn off the neutron source and voila the whole process shuts down no rogue reactions better yet
researchers estimate that thorium could be even more energy efficient with one ton of thorium
producing as much energy as 35 tons of uranium and nuclear waste while thorium is not entirely waste
free it produces anywhere from 1 000 to 10 000 times less waste than uranium and the waste it
does produce is significantly less radioactive and only stays radioactive for about 500 years which
is way better than 10 000 years thorium could also significantly help curtail the proliferation of
nuclear weapons first it doesn't produce plutonium which again is a key component in nuclear weapons
also in creating uranium-232 the process can lead to a strong field of gamma radiation which can
enhance its traceability this could present an ideal solution for countries like iran and north
korea to have nuclear power without the fear of developing nuclear weapons thorium is versatile
able to work in just about every type of nuclear reactor when it comes to nuclear
reactors the two main categories are water-based or thermal reactors and molten salt reactors with
the latter gaining the most traction with thorium the vast majority of reactors are thermal meaning
they require a moderator to slow down the fast neutrons to the right thermal level so the
fission can continue the most common moderator is just good old-fashioned h2o water because of this
most reactors need to be built near a water source molten salt reactors use a liquid salt base which
gets heated to super hot temperatures over 450 degrees celsius and they have several benefits
over their counterparts first because they don't require being near water they can be built
anywhere even in remote locations china's thorium reactor which uses a fluoride based salt is being
built in the gobi desert not only do these types of reactors open the doors for inland nations to
develop their energy independence but building the facilities in more remote locations also
reduces their impact if something should go wrong the best benefit of molten salt reactors over
thermal reactors is that they're way safer the thermal process involved in water-based reactors
requires constant monitoring and can lead to major problems every major nuclear disaster three-mile
island chernobyl fukushima all had issues with cooling failures in the thermal reactor molten
salt reactors on the other hand use molten salts as both the coolant and the fuel which allows
the system to self-regulate the liquid fuel runs through a reaction chamber filled with graphite
rods which slow down the speed of the neutrons to stop the chain reaction all you need to do is
remove the rods should a more catastrophic event take place in a liquid fluoride thorium reactor it
would automatically drain the liquid fuel into the storage tank away from the graphite and just like
that the reaction would come to a halt so we have a safer more efficient nuclear reactor that can be
built anywhere can't be weaponized and can't melt down while molten salt reactors are very promising
they still have some hurdles to overcome for one thing melting salts requires an immense amount
of heat at such high temperatures that salt can corrode the reactor's structure requiring
more protection which means higher cost so far molten salt reactors have not proven themselves
cost effective then there's the thorium itself the jury is still out whether the cost of extracting
and converting thorium into fissile materials is less expensive than uranium the main roadblock
is simply a lack of research due to you guessed it a lack of funding in the u.s nuclear programs
grew during the cold war but the goal was not simply a warm light for the whole world to share
it was to build bombs once it was determined that uranium held potential as both a weapon and a fuel
source the us basically stopped looking for other elements and since thorium can't be produced into
plutonium it was pushed to the wayside outside the u.s countries like china and india have continued
pursuing thorium even though the u.s has not as of now china plans to test its thorium reactors
which could prove itself a game changer in the world of clean energy for now we'll have to wait
and see while renewables like wind and solar have seen a major growth in the past decade
is there a chance they might not be enough what if we need a reliable base load energy source
that works rain or shine thorium then might just be what the doctor ordered and with the benefits
so vast it's no wonder so many are excited about thorium's future in energy but what do you think
is thorium worth exploring as a nuclear power source with all the risk nuclear power poses
should we just abandon it all together let us know what you think in the comments below so that is a
look at the thorium reactor it's interesting a lot of you guys have requested this video and
i do think the technology is pretty great if we are going to pursue further nuclear power plants
i think thorium really is where we should be investing even though it will require some
retooling and some reimagining i think it's pretty promising stuff again not going to be easy molten
salt you could imagine the engineering challenges involved with with all of that but something we
should pursue nonetheless i apologize if you heard background noises in this video i'm in my backyard
we just moved this is the new headquarters for tuba davinci but our office and our studio is
not ready so we will be shooting wherever we can for a little while so bear with us like that all
right so that is a look at thorium salt reactors thank you so much for watching and if you want to
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take a look around we have a ton of videos that we think you're going to love especially around this
topic and until next time remember i'm ricky with tipa davinci and the future is going to be awesome