its folk salts and thorium reactor

China has deservedly consolidated as the country to which all the nations that bet on nuclear energy look. On the one hand, it already has The same number of nuclear reactors that France in operation: 56. only US surpasses them both with their 94 active nuclear reactors. However, ambition in this area of ​​the country led by Xi Jinping is much greater than that of France. And is that China is building 30 more reactors and plans to point another 37.

However, the best asset of this Asian country is its commitment to innovation. And the reactor of Molten Sales and Torio TMSR-LF1 is a very valuable letter of presentation. This machine received the approval of the Chinese Nuclear Safety Administration in mid -June 2023 after having successfully completed the initial testing phase that started in 2021. and since then the itinerary that had set the Institute of Applied Physics of Shanghai, which is the institution responsible for its tuning.

As explained by the American nuclear engineer Nick Touran In your tweetthe TMSR-LF1 reactor officially entered into operation on October 11, 2023. A few months later, on June 17, 2024, he began working at full power. And on October 8 of last year the technicians who operate it detected protacinium-233 (PA-233), a radioactive isotope intermediate derived from the transformation of the thorium into Uranium-233 as part of the fuel cycle of the thorium.

The TMSR-LF1 reactor marks the way to the countries that are committed to nuclear energy

This nuclear reactor is in the Minqin industrial complex of the province of Gansu, in northern China. It has a power of 2 thermal megawatts (MWT), and, although it will not be the first Fourth Generation Nuclear Reactor In activity, and not the first one that Torio will use as fuel, it will be the first of molten salts that will use this chemical element. However, the ambition of this Asian country does not end here; It is already planning to build a molten salts and more capacity sales reactor for 2030.

China is not the only country that bets on this technology. USA, France or India are some of those who have also invested in research programs that pursue the development of nuclear reactors capable of Generate electricity from the thorium. India’s in particular is interesting because it aims to demonstrate the viability of fuel cycles based on thorium in the context of its advanced heavy water reactor project. This technology is still far from being adopted in a generalized way, but its advantages closely link it to the future of nuclear energy.

Nuclear forum It estimates that our planet brings together approximately 12 million tons of thorium, so this chemical element is three times more abundant in the earth’s cortex than Uranium used as fuel in the current nuclear centrals. The largest deposits reside in China, Brazil, Canada, Australia, USA, Greenland, Russia, Norway, South Africa and Venezuela, although prospects reflect that the country that Torio has is precisely one of the ones that is investing most in the development of reactors capable of using it: India.

Another point in your favor is that it is as easy to extract as uranium, but it has the inconvenience that it is not directly physable. It is necessary to introduce it into a reactor that manufactures uranium from Torio, and what it produces is not uranium-235, it is uranium-233, But the important thing is that it is fisible. Once this uranium has occurred, it can be introduced into a conventional reactor like those we have in Spain, which could not work with Torio, but with a derivative of that element. In addition, experts say that molten salts nuclear reactors are safer than reactors installed in the nuclear power plants that are currently in operation.

Two of the reasons are that they use as a refrigerant lithium fluoride and beryllium at a very low pressure, and the fuel remains dissolved in the form of salt, so it is very unlikely that an accident could trigger the fusion of the reactor’s core. Another quality of these reactors that are worth not overlooking is that their architecture allows them to be installed underground, which, again, increases their safety. But this is not all. Another peculiar and positive feature of these reactors is that they allow to recharge the fuel while remaining in operation.

And, in addition, the fact that they do not need water to maintain the refrigerated nucleus allows them to be installed in regions in which water is scarce, or, simply, in areas where there is no river and are not close to the sea. This is one of the reasons why, precisely, China is investing in the development of this technology as a means to build fourth generation nuclear centrals in the most remote and arid regions in the country.

It is also worth not overlooking that the radioactive waste they generate has a much shorter semi -grid period than that of the residues of the reactors that use uranium, which logically facilitates their management. And, in addition, molten salts reactors use less fuel because thorium efficiency is much higher than uranium. Virtually all fuel is involved in nuclear fission, so its use, in theory, is maximum.

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