Thorium and the Future of Nuclear Energy
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- čas přidán 30. 06. 2019
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Energy too cheap to meter - that was the promise of nuclear power in the 1950s, at least according to Lewis Strauss chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission. That promise has not come to pass - but with some incredible new technologies, perhaps it still could. The question is - should it?
Hosted by Matt O'Dowd
Written by Matt O'Dowd
Graphics by Leonardo Scholzer
Directed by Andrew Kornhaber
Produced By: Kornhaber Brown
If we want to convert mass into energy, fission gives the most bang for our buck. Unfortunately that “bang” can be literal. Use of nuclear energy may risk the proliferation of nuclear weaponry, and there’s also the problem of nuclear waste, and the specter of horrible accidents. This last one was painted in terrifying detail in the recent dramatization of the Chernobyl disaster. Nuclear reactors sound scary because the disasters are pretty epic. However the reality is that far, far more people die from straight up air pollution due to coal-fired power plants than ever died in a nuclear reactor accident. In fact the radioactivity around coal-fired plants is also higher due to the trace but completely uncontained radioactive products of coal burning.
But the most compelling attraction is that nuclear power doesn’t directly produce carbon emissions. In fact nuclear power may be our most sure path to reducing carbon emissions and halting climate change. But can we do nuclear power safely enough? There are modern ideas - including the much-hyped thorium reactor - that suggest maybe we can. Before we can understand those we’ll need to review how nuclear reactors work.
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سلطان الخليفي
I've never understood the "Nuclear OR Renewables" argument. We should be using both.
In the end the usage of the renewable sources of energy is unavoidable. Unless we found out how to harvest fuel from other planets and / or asteroids this is our end game. Additionally nuclear energy has a very bad rep while oil industry for decades has been hidding the real cost of all the byproducts produced by them
We like to believe we will be able to develop the renewables before fossil fuels will be depleted and before climate change destroys our beautiful planet
Radiation is easier to be scared of because it's invisible while one can smell and even see air pollution. It feels more avoidable even though it's only an illusion
We could also stop using two-tonnes of steel to move one body and one donut for short jouneys.
the argument is if you build enough nuclear to cover renewables not working, you don't need the renewables.
Yes.
Solar on existing human made surfaces (roofs, car park canopies, canopies over roads, etc) and avoid solar farms in areas which compete with other uses/habitat. Wind in select areas.
Nuclear to make up the difference.
Distributed power makes a more robust democratic energy grid and helps prevent price gouging.
imo nuclear has an understated advantage of compactness compared to renewables. A lot less time, space, money, or materials needed for power or backup power, therefore less indirect emissions or material waste. Also, nuclear would be great for CO2 sequestration. Sequestration is an underappreciated step in stopping climate change, because otherwise temperatures are likely to keep rising for centuries even if we stopped emitting gas right now.
The question is no longer, "Should we?" but rather, "How long can we afford not to?"
Not much longer
Imagine the decades of co2 emissions as we create prototypes, test, scale and implement Thorium reactors. The massive cost to build them enough to make any difference to CO2 emissions and the amount of renewable projects sidelined while we wait for these technologies that are a long way away from feasible . Its a literal pipe dream
@@bertthompson4748, renewable energy sources and updating our electrical grid will slow the bleeding, but only with a stable, dependable base load energy source can we close the wound. Barring another better technology, breeder reactors will get us through the next few centuries, but they will not help us in the next 20 years, unless their development becomes a moonshot project. And before you think I'm ignorantly belittling renewables, I have solar panels, a wind turbine, and a storage battery on my property. I am intimately aware of each of their shortcomings.
@@EdricLysharae thats a lie. Base load isnt needed, multiple countries have dedicated their energy sector to move away from baseload
@@bertthompson4748 Baseload isn't needed? That statement doesn't even make sense. Baseload is just the constant demand for energy on the grid, it's a LOAD and it doesn't just magically disappear.
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Countries like Germany, which are attempting to eliminate their more stable forms of energy production, are growing increasingly dependent on imported energy from countries like France, which produce large amounts of stable energy. France, thanks to the push for renewables in the EU, is now the largest exporter of electrical energy in the world. Have a look at how France produces electricity.
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Anyway, we shouldn't wait on thorium reactors to start building out a nuclear energy system, we should be building Gen IV reactors until thorium becomes practical on a large scale. Nuclear is already the safest energy source on Earth, there's absolutely no reason that we shouldn't be making the switch.
Correction: every accident has been in a pressurized light water thermal reactor. The pressure (and loss thereof) is the weakness. The American nuclear power industry was financed by the US military, whose focus was a reactor that could be deployed on a ship; the industry outside the US has been much more innovative. Also, the first molten salt thorium fuel cycle reactor was brought to criticality in the early fifties in Oak Ridge; it's not new at all, it was just ignored because it wasn't useful for weapons production.
Only TMI accident has been in a pressurized water reactor...
RBMK anyone?
Chernobyl also used Graphite as a moderator instead of water meaning it had a positive temperature coefficient of reactivity, and they designed the actual system really really flawed, producing steam in the reactor core itself (which turns out not to be a super useful means of cooling fuel). Also, despite the few pressurized water reactors that have had accidents, the US Navy has managed to run them entirely safety since the 1950’s beginning with the USS Nautilus 😉
@@tehdoctorinmc7684 Not like any issue with US navy reactors can't be hidden. Even major meltdown dumped into ocean would be unnoticed if you don't know where to search. Ocean is pretty big, you know. And I don't think US navy shares patrol scheme of their ships and submarines with environmentalists.
Still US uses a lot of BWR (boiled water reactors) and built a lot ot them around the world, producing steam in the reactor core itself and having core tech design same as RBMK. Enjoy en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_boiling_water_reactors
Flaw of RBMK was in too flexible control design which could potentially turn it into nuke with no passive safety backup due to BWR core type. As well as general design of fuel/ inhibition rods is quite compromised. This reactor had to be flexible to safely put into and extract materials from reactor core producing isotopes which cost horsepile of money. Cost for this flexibility was a reliability and actually cost of preventing of the most critical flaws of inhibition rods made reason of constructing of those reactors pointless.Actually even CANDU reactors share this flaw while being maybe the most advanced commercial reactor design in use. Still CANDU has several major issues - price of heavy water and huge nuclear waste production.
Still already built ones is always in exploitation, actually there is more than ten of RBMK reactors in use. Still, when time of major maintenance comes, they have tendency to be decommissioned.
Have to agree, that RBMK (correctly translated as HPCR - high power channel reactor) design is extremely unsuccessful. For energy production Russia uses PWR design (WWER - water-water energy reactor - yeah, Russian naming in its best) mostly.
« every accident has been in a pressurized light water thermal reactor » : this is incredibly wrong.
Thorium reactors could also be used to burn off our current global nuclear waste.
no, fast breeder reactor create more waste than they consume. SuperPhenix dismantling created 7000m3 of waste
@@ddoumeche So what's your point, SuperPhenix is a conventional fast breeder nuclear reactor, not a Thorium reactor.
@@HarrySerpanosand Oaks Ridge thorium reactor was ... a molten-salt reactor, not a pressurised wter one.
@@ddoumeche your initial comment was about a French fast breeder reactor, not the US reactor
@@ddoumeche You can also build them to any size so they can go on trucks for field work as no containment building is required. I can't believe they refused to use them all over America. Now we are all Fracking and gassing ourselves to death.
FINALLY! A mainstream video for molten salt reactors. Thank you, Space Time!
Nothing to be cheerful about, come to think of it. When so called mainstream comes to senses, it is usually far, far too late.
Ayooo my boy thorium is lit, Sam O'nella Alumni REPRESENT
This was my senior project, so glad to see PBS Spacetime doing a video on this as well.
@@piotrd.4850 the chinese already working on a msr prototype with like 800+ engineers
@@piotrd.4850 My guess is you are not a cheerful person.
CHEERS!!
I Love it, i have been a huge proponent of generation 4 Nuclear Reactors for years now. Generally you cant have a conversation with it about people because it instantly becomes emotional. One fun fact about Thorium is that if we where to switch to a Thorium Fuel cycle and powered the entire world with it. It would last for 2 Billion (yes thats a B) Years. Making it in essence renewable.
With Nuclear power we can generate Hydrogen cheaply aswell. With that we have a brilliant storage medium for energy, since a fuel cell will combine it with oxygen, create electricity and the waste product is water. This is a closed Cycle! I could literally (and i often do) go on for hours.
But i am very happy that i have a great video to share now that nutshells at least some of my points in a very nice way. Thanks for doing this.
The funny thing about liquid fluoride thorium reactors is that the technology is 60 years old now. Check this out and have your mind blown.... czcams.com/video/tyDbq5HRs0o/video.html
Just nitpicking l know, but nuclear is classed as sustainable rather than renewable. Same as things like plantation timber, the timeframe that the processes can be continued is far beyond human compression, but technically not renewable. Then again l would make the case that solar and wind aren't truly renewables either unless all the components can be fully recycled.
Yeah, anyone who is taking the AGW doomsday stuff seriously, should be screaming for nuclear power. Although thorium is not as economically viable as the conspiracy theorists like to claim. Their only explanation for it not being implemented already, is the standard boiler plate Tesla free-energy suppressed technology stuff. Reactors have been built. I believe the UK still has one liquid salt experimental reactor operating. It's been explored for decades by people who would jump all over it if they actually could make it more cost effective than current technology. If they could even approach traditional reactor costs per kwh, while negating the propaganda and fearmongering about nuclear waste disposal, they'd do it.
@@st0n3p0ny How is the world supposed to get over the waste fear mongering when this video and others like it, continue to spread it. Burying waste in rock miles deep away from water sources is essentially foolproof. No radiation would escape that much rock regardless of how long it remains deadly.
@@st0n3p0ny whatisnuclear.com/msr.html
The major problem with MSR lies in the name: molten salts.
"It is the invisible dance that powers entire cities without smoke or flame. It is really quite beautiful."-Chernobyl Miniseries
Nuclear Power is the true path to zero carbon emissions, and I would also claim that it is humanities path to the stars as well.
How fitting, to use the power of the stars to reach the stars.
Nuclear fusion is the power of the stars. Nuclear fission powers the hot cores of planets like Earth.
@@davidelliott5843 they are quite similar in fact. Similar force opwering them. Its like a mountain of balls falling appart vs throwing a bunch of balls and see them fall appart...
Its main difference is the fuel, efficiency and that one is in 30y into the future from any given date.
I think the path to the stars pass through successfully producing fusion reactors
Zero? Mining uranium requires strip mining acres of land and tons of diesel to power vehicles strip mining the land. Not to mention the not so green methods needed to refine it. Fusion might be our best option, not fision. But then we have to worry about how we get our hydrogen, deuterium and tritium
Literally can't understand why anyone would downvote these amazingly impartial & wonderfully educational videos.
Is this sarcasm?
@@bababistril jesus christ.
@@hevans900 I love the irony that your reply to hand fondler was most likely also the answer to your original question.
@@buzzthebuzzard5267 meta sarcasm. My original question was actually not sarcasm, but I did immediately see why people thought it might be. I actually love these videos lol.
@@hevans900 I knew what you were getting at, my point is a lot of religious people spam dislike science type channels.
A shout-out to Kirk Sorensen for making his life mission to educate and advance molten salt and thorium. We are discussing this because of him. Thanks!
Always nice to see Mr Sorensen get mentioned. Thanks to youtube I've seen him make his case and I wish him the best. I really hope his vision of power production takes hold.
Nuclear Thomas Aquinas
yea dude i remember watching that whole 3 hour video awesome dude
Agreed, Kirk Sorensen has made a huge contribution by stimulating interest in advanced reactors. This is a great topic for Space Time, however the first half of the video reinforces many exaggerated fears about nuclear energy. This may be because the reductionist and first-principals thinking that is so useful in physics, is not very useful for understanding safety. Empirically nuclear energy is exceptionally safe. To characterize currently operating reactors as anything but safe is demonstrably false if you compare any other available energy technology. Hopefully future Space Time episodes will do a better job of making a clear and unambiguous case for that safety. Our shared environment, and progress as a civilization depends on putting aside the phantasms and superstitions that haunt us.
@@EvidentlyChemistry Couldn't agree more
It's ironic that a coal power plant releases more radiation than a nuclear plant.
@a guy ooh gotem
@@nubitynub1757 hold the fuck up, chernobyl was more of a deliberate failsafes-turned-off experiment gone horribly wrong than a meltdown by itself.
No coal power plant ever rendered a large area uninhabitable for 30000 years. There is no need for either these days. Nuclear power is simply not worth the risk, nor the penalty of the long-term storage of waste.
@@hrino94 It was the result of an errant test.
@@onehitpick9758 that's true, although the only nuclear reactors that have ever melted down are boiling water reactors that are not very safe. Which were built with 1960s technology. Modern nuclear reactors, especially thorium reactors that are currently in research, not only do they not meltdown because rather than using a safety system to stop it from melting down, the reactor is designed in a way that it needs systems online to keep it running, and it shuts down itself if there is an issue because the reactor requires it to keep running.
Also, ironically, you are exposed to about four hundred times as much radiation living 10 mi from a coal plant as you do live in 10 miles from a nuclear plant. The ash from the coal actually releases more radiation than nuclear plants. On top of that, nuclear breeder reactors fuel by products only have to be stored for a few decades instead of a few million years.
While I completely understand your concern, these concerns were only valid until about 1980. Fortunately, every single nuclear reactor in the United States currently running is of a pressurized water reactor that uses water moderation. Even if all of the water leaks out, the water leaking out is actually stopping, not speeding it up.
Nuclear energy is the safest form of energy in terms of deaths by kilowatt hour by a significant margin.
think about all those poor uranium atoms you're murdering
@@TransRoofKorean My thoughts and prayers to the families of the uranium atoms that died for the greater good 🙏🙏🙏
Compared to what exactly? Were renewables included in this comparison? I legit don't know, I'm asking.
No. You haven't any research about that till now, and add that this kilowatt hours will be killing for next ten thousand years and more, not counting of new deaths by present obsolete, unmaintained and worn out nuclear power-plants. In US only you have dozens which malfunction is near for 10-20 years.
@@glowingfatedie Compared to Solar and Wind, by a VERY SIGNIFICANT margin that is. Even including Chernobyl, Fukushima and Three Ridges, it is still more safer than Solar and Wind. Its also more cleaner than Hydroelectrics because of the fact that Hydro secretly also has CO2 Emissions, while Nuclear doesn't have any CO2 Emissions.
Humanity’s rejection of Nuclear power was a massive mistake, and the environment has payed dearly for it as we continue to rely on fossil fuels for our electricity
I totally agree, the irony is that it was the Greens that demonised nuclear power.
Now we are paying the price, through global warming, for allowing ill informed and technically ignorant Greenies to dictate long term energy strategy.
Humanity hasn't rejected anything. It's been small but powerful interest groups like establishment energy and ideological environmentalist in conjunction with a corrupt government. The difficult times ahead of us will make change a necessity.
The environment is doomed because of this 'mistake'. But calling it a mistake is being very generous.
@@nomdeguerre7265 What's your null hypothesis? How much longer would the environment have to continue on without a mass dying before you'd say your hypothesis of increasing carbon leads to a mass dying is wrong? 10 more years? A 100 year?
@@TuxedoMedia I’m not talking about ‘climate’…
You said, "should we?" Yes, we should. Molten salt reactors are the best choice.
The same could be said for lead-cooled reactors, with 2 advantages over molten salt. One, molten salt is flammable in open air. Two, lead naturally cools solid in the case of a leak, effectively plugging the leak.
@@timgravierjr.4241 But lead is poisonous to humans, making it risky to have around humans
@@dethcubegaming1556 So is salt. Everything is poisonuss in the rightvammounts, even oxygen
🤣
Correct. Molten salt reactors are our best option.
You spoke of thorium reactors being "new tech". In fact, we had an operational research thorium reactor back in the 50s/60s. The US government decided to go with the light water design because they couldn't make bombs out of anything a LFTR produced.
Do we need it? YES without a doubt we need it.
The benefits of of LFTR tech are nearly endless while solving the immediate problems of nuclear waste and accidents be default.
Volcanoes block the sun. It can be fairly dark anything from hours locally to globally dark about seven years for a super volcano. The loss of sunlight also reduces the wind which is mostly convection currents driven by the sun. Wind & biomass are solar driven and vanish soon after the sun vanishes. Solar driven power sources are nearly absent when most needed. ASAP we need to build a few MSR (Molten Salt Reactors) nuclear power plants designed to use up our piles of spent nuclear fuel. It is still good fuel, leaving it bumming around because we didn't build the type of reactor that can use it is dangerous & we need to use that stuff up.
Thorium is down the road a few. The best route to thorium is through MSRs and there is still work to be done to scale them up and get approvals from a non-authoritarian government to produce them. Thorium is an additional second set of approvals, which I think pushes thorium down the road a few years after MSRs get past the regulatory hurdles. Thorium is the future but it is a two step process. Our early MSRs should burn U-235.
My fave grid sized battery is the liquid metal battery. At grid scale batteries make a lot of heat, so a battery that needs to be hot is less trouble. Ambri makes those, and they are ultra efficient & last functionally forever. At grid scale, batteries are enablers that allow the grid to be stable with intermittent, erratic, unstable power sources like solar & wind providing sizable amounts of power. But we must guard against our exuberance causing over-dependence on solar & wind because the sun switches off like a light switch after volcanoes or asteroid impacts and stays off for years for super volcanoes. We need a dependable power source and the sun certainly can’t be called dependable. You need something that won't fail with a several year loss of sunlight, like MSRs. MSRs are the right thing to make a power mix that is dependable.
I am not convinced anyone wants to cool the planet. White roofing is low hanging fruit that costs almost nothing if we only do new roofing and re-roofing. Solar roofing costs almost nothing if it can be financed so it saves enough energy costs to pay the loan payment.
I also like natural gas fuel cells for homes with solid state lithium batteries and solar roofing, but that still makes less CO2 instead of none. Our species needs to install a thermostat on our planet and control its temperature for both heating and cooling, but that's a different conversation.
@@tsamuel6224 So we should prepare for a volcano eruption that darkens the world for 7 years by building nuclear plants you say? Sorry, I cannot follow you. When the world darkens for several years we all die because we starve. No nuclear plant will save us then. So in my opinion it makes more sense to invest in renewable energy that helps us with a real climate problem, than to invest into nuclear plants that are maybe better in a possible, but unlikely, super volcano eruption.
@ShaunDoesMusic Sorry, but I don't buy that. All information that I have tells me a different story. My point of view is that renewable energy is our future. The arguments typically brought up against are either things that are exaggerated and not really that problematic or just occurring during a time of transition that we are in, when some developments, that are not so difficult, are not yet finished. I give you one example out of many: Anti renewable propaganda says that wind turbines use a lot of space. This is obviously not true. The space can be (and is everywhere) used for other things simultaneously (like agriculture or fishing). So the space is not used up. This is an example of exaggeration. Another topic is energy storage, that people say is impossible on a larger scale. I gave the information where to find the information why this is not true in another comment here. We could continue, but I don't really like to. Often it comes down to a simple choice that everybody who cares about this topic has to take. Which path he believes in. Looks like I made my choice and you made yours.
@@halfan100 You could literally produce electricity for massive greenhouses.
Fissile technology is nothing new everyone knows that, I mean scientists in the 1940’s created fission bombs and the processes by which the fuel for those bombs were refined, and all without use of a computer. But most of the nuclear power plants in the United States are very old, the newest being 24 years old. And an argument that I’ve heard is that continuing to refine uranium for new plants is dangerous, creates pollution etc... meanwhile I live in NE Pennsylvania 8 miles from a big coal mine that is astoundingly filthy, I wish I could post pictures here because it’s amazing what fossil fuel companies can get away with
Western world: Should we be doing this nuclear thing?
China: We're gonna go ahead and do this nuclear thing while you search your feelings, mkay?
Also, France: What are you talking about? We've been doing nuclear for a long time.
Finland: We commissioned a single reactor in 05, it might start producing power in 2021, we should probably not get the next one from the french
Germany: We're fucking idiots so nuclear has to go. Coal can go afterwards
Never been more disappointed in my country. Our electricity bills (highest in all industrial nations, more than twice the U.S.) speak for themselves
Kuro Surprised Germans are some of the best engineers in the world. Leaders are plotting Germany’s demise.
Wonderful! we should be a dictatorship like China so no one can object to nuclear waste. What does China do with its nuclear waste and can Chinese citizens object?
I've been hearing about Thorium reactors for years now and it's about time it hit the mainstream. Renewables will not be able to meet our needs until we have some major leaps in technology. Let's make this happen!
Not "until." Rather, "unless." And the energy density of every so-called renewable source is way, way below what it would need to be.
@@garymclaughlin9559 a world completely powered by “rewnewables” is pretty distopian a world where every dessert is covered by solar panels a world where every forest is full of wind turbines slashing entire ecosystems for a innefeciant form of energy
Ah no. Deserts are a terrible place for solar panels too much sand partials and dust would block the photovoltaic cells. Not too mention the maintenance cost if you were to put it in a desert. But assuming you can, you wouldn't need that much space to power all of human with max efficiency solar farms. I think real life lore did a video on this.
But the most feasible method we have to get off fossil fuels has got to be nuclear.
@@thefoundingtitanerenyeager2345 nah at that point you would need a Dyson sphere, because otherwise there would be nowhere for infrastructure with all the power generation buildings
People love exaggerating in the comments section 😂.
It's unfortunate that public perception has such a huge influence on progress. Nuclear reactors seem doomed to the same fate as airplanes: The accident involving them get sensationalized, and people's fear grows disproportionally. And, even though the accidents *can* occur, they're extremely unlikely, and you would do much better to be concerned with more immediate threats like people who text and drive.
Someone gets it.
the same fate as airplanes? Or Rockets? Or interplanetary travel...
Airplanes are doing just fine - yet the airline and travel industry have been crushed.
Thanks for trying!
social licenses are extremely hard to regain after they are lost.
The energy industry is not completely out of fault here either.
Yes, an airplane accident caused by corporate greed should rightfully be a concern for the public.
Another issue is the oil and gas industry. They cannot accept any threat to their rule.
Yes. Please debunk all this anti nuclear propaganda!
I'd watch an episode of him debunking that for sure.
@Pretentiousness Exactly! It's sad as fuck.
"...It is almost impossible to win an argument with a genius;
It is impossible to win an argument with a fool..."
(something like that) - Greek Philosopher (I think)
The galen winsor video czcams.com/video/aq3BUDw6HIk/video.html (the 2 hour full leng video is also in youtube) this revelation will blow your mind , and our understanding of the problem of energy !
Then we have just one problem: egoystic human behavior ! and the solution is a new educative model. with a new economic model, we are talking about a new society. e-nation.org unitycoin.net also the vision mutualwelfare.org/
aeon.co/ideas/nuclear-power-is-not-the-answer-in-a-time-of-climate-change
"New nuclear power seemingly represents an opportunity for solving global warming, air pollution, and energy security,’ says Mark Jacobson, director of Stanford University’s Atmosphere and Energy Programme. But it makes no economic or energy sense. ‘Every dollar spent on nuclear results in one-fifth the energy one would gain with wind or solar [at the same cost], and nuclear energy takes five to 17 years longer before it becomes available. As such, it is impossible for nuclear to help with climate goals of reducing 80 per cent of emissions by 2030."
@Pretentiousness
Nuclear waste is no joke, it shouldn't be taken lightly.
Radioactive leaks into water reservoirs are no joke either, it's VERY serious stuff that needs to be permanently monitored.
Sure, plenty of people assume that "spent" rods are far more dangerous than they actually are... but plenty of other people downplay the danger they pose.
Don't hate on nuclear just because... but, also, don't be a nuclear fanboy just because... apply common sense and inform yourself, always.
The relatively small size of Thorium Reactors also allows for "Power at Point of Use", cutting down on electricity transmission losses.
Of course the additional reactors would be a security use.
Compact nuclear reactors :O
on one hand, small reactors are nice idea, but in places, which already have infrastructure, it make more sence making big plants, also for mini reactors, there may be problem safeguarding against atacks, it is in the end easier guard one place instead of thousants,...
mini reactors have uses thou, like Academic Lomosov, in places whitout infrastructure which need some local power.
A modern small modular reactor producing several megawatts of power fits in the footpribt of 2x4x4 cargo containers.
That includes the entire machinery to keep the thing running with minimal human interference for several years
doubtfull that nuclear as it is (even with thorium) will ever be a power at point use. They'll still centralize it due to safety demands etc. because while the plants might be passively safe in operation, it probably can still be sabotaged with desastrous consequences. And public opinion wouldn't help either. Even if this opinion shifts for nuclear to be accepted, there is a huge difference between supporting nuclear at a "remote" site vs in your backyard.
@@maxwyght1840, Interesting! Is the thermal energy of an SMR converted into electricity? And if so, what's the method for doing that conversion?
The music of Space Time is highly underrated and I would love a list of the songs played in each video, if possible.
"Can we do it safe enough?"
We've had 1 man-made disaster (Chernobyl), 1 act-of-God disaster (Fukushima), and 1 smaller kerfluffle (Three-Mile Island) in the entire history of nuclear power. The United States Navy operates hundreds of reactors every day, with operators that aren't even required to have college educations. **Yes we can do it safe enough.** It's been safe enough for decades - it already is *far* less dangerous in terms of deaths-per-kilowatt than even wind/solar power.
That is not entirely true - all US Navy vessels that have nuclear reactors have engineers onboard to operate them that have university degrees in nuclear engineering
Xavier Harkonnen Naval officers are required to have college degrees, but the officers are not the ones that actually *operate* the plant. They supervise the enlisted which do the actual operation.
@@AmoebaMan23 I'll be sure to let my nuclear engineering officer friend know that. He'll be floored when he realizes that he could have had enlisted guys do his job for him his whole career. Even a 5 second google search will take you to the job description page on the navy's website that explains that nuclear operators run and maintain the auxiliary machinery, and the officer runs the plant. Good try though.
@@xavierharkonnen6424 While it is true that the reactor officer is the one calling the shots, there are enlisted sailors manning the watch stations on the plant. ETs (electronic technicians) who are senior in rate (meaning they are fully qualified) stand reactor operator. Meaning they control and monitor reactor power and many other parameters. Enlisted nukes do not require a degree. Source: I'm a nuke electrician in the navy.
@@xavierharkonnen6424 here, take a look at the navy's own website. I'm sure they got it wrong, too, right? Good try though. www.navy.com/careers/nuclear-operations
Skip to 11:34 if you know how nuclear reactors work and just want to get to the bit about thorium.
Lol, my thoughts too. Good for newbies though.
Thx m8
I watched Chernobyl so I'm nuclear physicist now lol
get this man out of here he's delusional
You're doing the Lord's work.
Only person I’ve ever heard talk about Thorium reactors is Andrew Yang and here i see it on space time. That guy is really ahead of the curve
It's not so much that he's ahead of the curve, it's that mainstream media has been so spooked by anti-nuclear hysteria, we generally don't hear about developments in this field.
Joe Scott talked about Thorium reactors over a year ago.
Another master arguments for preferring nuclear over 'renewables' are these:
• Renewable energy _cannot_ be dispatched on demand, which makes it unreliable for industry
• Even with proper energy storage, renewable energy not being dispatchable means that dispatchable energy must be installed _in addition_ which only raises the environmental and financial costs
• Renewables' low performance means that you need to install significantly more power capacity than you'll ever actually produce, meaning it's gonna be far more expensive to use all renewables than to use all nuclear
• Renewables take up far more space and reduce urban and crop surfaces, which is the last thing we wanna do in context of an ever growing human population
• Renewables _do not_ accomplish the thing they claim to do. _All_ current historical accounts show that due to the dispatchability problem, *they don't reduce the number of fossil fuel plants.*
They are just built in addition to them. And the more renewable power you install, the more dispatchable fossil power you install in parallel to satisfy industrial demand.
• The only reliable renewable energy that doesn't have the issues listed above is the one we've been using for about a century: hydro. It's awesome, and it's the best option... when it's available. Geothermal plants are cool too, but it's even more rarely available, and you need to regularly dig up new wells so, it's not super renewable.
• Last but not least, some renewable energies are only pretending to be 'green': renewable doesn't mean decarbonated. The most common example to cite are biomass power plants. Sure, it's renewable, but what is biomass? It's wood... You know... high amounts of carbon. So not only will we burn trees faster than they grow, we'll also release _more_ carbon than say, natural gas. 🤦♂️
And after that some dare say nuclear isn't green because it's not renewable...
Bio mass is green because the trees are farmed
*enewable energy cannot be dispatched on demand, which makes it unreliable for industry*
Which is why nuclear should be used for industry and renewable for commercial and residential.
*Even with proper energy storage, renewable energy not being dispatchable means that dispatchable energy must be installed in addition which only raises the environmental and financial costs*
This is a ridiculous statement, with proper storage, the storage would be dispatchable. and it would work faster than coal, gas, hydro, oil and nuclear, which isn't really dispatchable seeing how long it takes to turn off and on, though theoretically considered dispatchable.
*Renewables' low performance means that you need to install significantly more power capacity than you'll ever actually produce, meaning it's gonna be far more expensive to use all renewables than to use all nuclear*
Well, no. At this moment renewables range from 2 to 4 times cheaper in generation compared to nuclear. So even if you need to install 2 or 3 times the capacity, it can still be cheaper or at worst as expensive. And renewables are still becoming cheaper, while (at least for now) nuclear is becoming more expensive.
*Renewables take up far more space and reduce urban and crop surfaces*
Ehm, no? The amount of space needed for a wind turbine is tiny and can easily be incorporated in farms or even industrial area's without really taking away much space. Offshore this is even less of a concern. Solar panels can be placed atop of roofs, parking lots, ... without any reduced space usage. They can also be placed above farms without taking too much away. Test projects (one in Germany for example) have shown that you can get 160-170% of yield from a combined field (producing +-80-85% of crops vs without solar above and +-80-85% of electricity production compared to if the crops were fully replaced, together thus 160-170%). In certain more arid area's (like southern US) they can actually increase crop yield and reduce water consumption due to shading from the hot sun.
*Renewables do not accomplish the thing they claim to do. All current historical accounts show that due to the dispatchability problem, they don't reduce the number of fossil fuel plants.*
They don't completely reduce the number of fossil plants (though there is some reduction), but they do reduce fossil reduction. Also once storage really becomes commercial (probably somewhere by 2030), it will replace fossil powerplants. Already there are battery plants at +-150$/MWh and other (more longer) storage options are also underway.
*Last but not least, some renewable energies are only pretending to be 'green': renewable doesn't mean decarbonated. The most common example to cite are biomass power plants. Sure, it's renewable, but what is biomass? It's wood... You know... high amounts of carbon. So not only will we burn trees faster than they grow, we'll also release more carbon than say, natural gas.*
Yeah, partially true. If you use fast growing trees, biomass can work. Though to me it is more like a "transitional renewable" which also need to eventually be phased out.
All in all the lynchpin for renewable is cheaper available storage. Now this is coming up and will be available in the future. And while you can say "but we need it now, not in x years", I'll say this, current gen new nuclear powerplants are several time more expensive than renewables, sure maybe next gen is cheaper, but for that we too need to wait, don't we? By 2030 we will have a better look on what will win out: nuclear or renewables (+storage). Though eventually a mix will probably be used, seperated along the lines of industry and commercial/residential use.
@odegaard I don't see that as a negative, on the contrary. This just means renewable can sooner be replaced by new more efficient models. A nuclear power plant can't really do that, since it needs to run for these 60 years to earn backs its investment and make a profit.
This is kind of similar to the argument "we need only 1 nuclear powerplant vs 350 wind turbines". Yeah, you need more turbines, but if one or even a few of them go offline for some reason, it isn't a big deal. If the powerplant needs to go offline (especially when unforseen), it is a big deal.
@odegaard
*I once bought an iPad and was disappointed that after 3 years it was basically dead.*
And?
*What is more expensive something that costs $600 but has a service life of 3 years or something that costs $1,200 but has a service life of 6 years?*
What is more expensive, something that produces 1MWh for 30-50$ or something that produces it for 120-200$/MWh? whether these produce the electricity at this price for 10, 30 or 60 years, that doesn't really matter, since the life expectancy already is calculated in this price. Only if they don't reach their expected end of life do things change.
*Mathematically they both cost the same $200 / year. However this time I opted for the MacBook Air for its superior performance.*
Yes, in this case ofcourse the Macbook is the better choice. However the prices of electricity production already are already normalised. The nuclear powerplant operating for 2 times longer doesn't change this number. It would be like the ipad costing 50$/year and the Macbook air cost 200$/year. Which one are you going to choose then? Well then it depends whether an ipad will do what you need it for.
*The Chinese recently built a 3rd generation nuclear power plant at a cost of $3.2 Billion per 1 GW*
And we all know how well the costs in China translate to other nations, especially the western nations, right? When translating cost in China to the west you usually have to factor in a significant increase. Why? I don't really know, maybe different standards? Maybe because the construction companies are state owned? Maybe because the cost for material there is lower.
I get the numbers from actual data from studies, not just one or even a few examples you found. LCOE numbers show that overall nuclear has become more expensive nearly every year.
Before you call me a liar, use something more than just one example.
@odegaard Since it is Denmark, I'd rather use euro cent than dollar cent, to avoid confusion. It is 30 cents/kWh in Denmark, for industry it was as low as 8 cents/kWh in 2019. There are a lot of taxes involved in Denmark. Also wind has become cheap in the last few years. In 2010 is was around 2,5 times more expensive, this while Denmark back then already got 20% of their energy out of wind. The prices of old wind turbines do remain high untill they are phased out and replaced by new cheaper ones. It is not that because new wind turbines are cheap, that suddenly the old ones can just lower their prices also. This higher cost of old installations still needs to be calculated in the total price.
And 35% of Danish wind production comes from offshore wind, which is (for new, not older) 70$/MWh. Also increasing the price.
If you thought this was a "gotcha" argument or something, you couldn't be further from it. So often use people "then why is electricity more expensive in x?" and always there is an easy explanation, taxes, older installations, ....
For example in Germany the production of electricity is only around 2 cent/kWh higher than in France, this while France uses old nuclear, which is considered at this moment priced around 25 euro/MWh and Germany includes more expensive solar and wind due to the transition having started when prices were still high. Now ofcourse early on, due to the high prices, German government offered large subsidies to offset the cost somewhat, that now is itself offset with a 6,5cent/kWh tax, though is expected to go down every year and dissapeared by 2030.
So to close, the prices I talk about are for new installations, whose effect on the electricity bill will not be seen for several more years, due to the higher prices of older generation still being in the mix. And old subsidie taxes also are often still present for the next few years.
So do you have source that contradict the LCOE prices for new installations, that ofcourse isn't just one example?
I think we'll need Thorium or fusion reactors to replace coal as renewables won't provide enough energy soon enough.They'd also be useful on spaceships.
Renewables on their own will not provide enough energy, period. Energy demands will only increase. Renewables + batteries take way too much land/resources to be truly viable for 100% of our needs.
"soon enough"? You must know that the timescale for constructing a nuclear reactor once it's proven to be viable (which thorium and fusion have not) is like 15-25 years right? That is too slow for the short term requirements of not rendering half the planet unlivable.
Energy demands *must* decrease or we are *fucked*
renewables don't have to provide 100% of demand to still be the best option, as long as we can take a big portion of coal power offline that is a win.
@@timframe570 Irony is, that renewables, when become mainstream, can affect nature and climate as much as any other source of energy. You know, change albedo, direction of winds, kill birds, blind insects, etc.
There are two categories of renwewable energy: The conveniently compact and reliable ones that are hardly available anywhere (like geothermal and hydroelectric), and the ones that are available in most (but not all) places at least some of the time if you set aside enough area (wind and solar). Nuclear is a great choice for areas where renewables aren't practical, and a good stopgap for dark/windless times in areas reliant on solar or wind.
@@Volodimar Completely agree. You would have to clear cut forests, hill tops, and other undeveloped land across the country to be even somewhat viable. This destroys ecosystems, not to mention the loss of trees and other vegetation that remove c02 from the air, which compounds the overall issue.
Efficiency is key in my mind. If you think of these technologies in a power generated / sqft you will see that nuclear is orders of magnitudes more efficient than solar/wind.
Is fission a perfect solution? No. However, it impacts the least from an environmental perspective.
Glad to see LFTR is actually FINALLY gaining momentum in the power producing world, should have been done a long long time ago.
I support advanced reactors, but LFTR is not something I think should be made in general.
*Chad does T-posing*
"Bro, do you even LFTR?!"
Is it actually gaining momentum in the power-producing world, or just in the world of popular awareness?
@@mvmlego1212 Popular awareness. The other more modest molten salt systems are actually going forward with development because they took on less technical risk. Terrestrial Energy gets my vote. But Moltex is also very promising since they got their wish of being able to use HALEU (High-assay low-enriched uranium )
TheCimbrianBull “LFTR? I barely know her!”
The "red alert" sound effect when he talked about the potential for accidents was *chef's kiss*.
Let’s just figure out this Thorium sh n get it done
One big mistake/misinformation in this video. There is no such thing as something which is highly radioactive and has a long half life. If it has a long half life, then by definition, it decays slowly and isn't very radioactive. What makes some radioactive elements dangerous despite having a long half life is that they can bio-accumulate. Anything that has a half-life of more than a hundredish year and doesn't bio-accumulate is probably safe. For example, you drink a pretty radioactive(half life 112 years) version of water every day(HTO and T2O) but it isn't considered a problem because hydrogen doesn't tend to hand around in the body very long. Same can be said about the radioactive foods we eat like bananas.
Not saying nuclear waste is safe, just that you gave the wrong reason for why it is dangerous.
Another mistake that's related to waste is that he suggests the limited efficiency of thermal reactors is due to the low concentration of U235 in natural Uranium. The real problem is that some of the reaction products are "neutron poisons" kill the reactions before all the U235 is used. According to the link below, about 1.6% of the "waste" is fissile Plutonium and remaining U235, which is actually around a third of the original 5% fissile Uranium that it started with. This is the actual waste in nuclear waste. A lot of this can be recovered with reprocessing, but this is unpopular due to proliferation concerns, quite expensive with respect to fabrication of fuel from mined Uranium, and can be hazardous due to all the handling and manipulation of very radioactive materials.
www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-cycle/introduction/nuclear-fuel-cycle-overview.aspx#ECSArticleLink6,
Amir Abudubai, Thunderf00t has released a video recently on the real dangers of radioactivity where he gives exactly the same explanation. And he has hands on experience on the field so I guess , on this topic, he is somewhat more trustworthy than a theoretical physicist.
@@pansepot1490 What Thunderf00t did not address was what radioactive elements from "inside" our body can do (yes alpha and beta radiation is easily absorbed by our skin and might not increase cancer rates, but having them in our bone marrow is not that funny). I found this very interessting - he only addressed what was highly overblown in the HBO episode and is often used to scare people (what I don't like either).
While I like your comment, because things that are radioactive on the scale of a million years are almost always harmless, something that is 10,000 years halflife is still really harmful at long-term exposure. Also the TYPE of radioactive decay is a big deal, Alpha beta and gamma decay are hugely different.
@Jesse Hoffman there's a trade off for everything. However do we need nuclear? Yes. Do we need fission? Yes. Do we need fusion? Yes, but not right now. I think the research should be done, but I don't think that should be priority over safer fission techniques and technologies right now. It's like the world is skipping from wood to gas and skipping coal and crude oil, by going straight to fusion.
Renewables certainly have a role but it is not as a main power source, it is a supplemental and situational role. For Mass power needs nothing but nuclear comes close to safety and scale right now.
Does that view make me a shill for nuclear? Maybe as much as I am a shill for breathing because it is necessary for life, not because I like to breathe. It is similar for the nuclear discussion. I believe nuclear is the answer not because of what it is but because it is but because it has the highest ratio of pros to the cons.
I've been a fan of the Thorium Molten Salt reactors for a long time. One of the benefits is that it uses up any Pu that it makes.
The best part is that it's the element that Thor is made of!
And yet it doesn’t create plutonium... whereas conventional reactors and about 20% of the thermal output from conventional reactors is fission from bred Plutonium 239 that it doesn’t necessarily intend on using
Makes U-233 though, which could be a proliferation issue.
@@harpfully and Brian - It does make a small amount of Pu, but it tends to burn that up as well as the U it makes.
All reactors running on Uranium, including Thorium reactors, produce some Plutonium. You get different isotopes though, not all of which are useful in weapons. U233 is a weapons material but the MSR or MSFR deals with weapons materials in a very simple way; it keeps them in the reactor. The proliferation concern is at its highest when you remove fuel from the reactor. MSRs and MSFRs as part of normal operation, have very long burnup times. We're talking a decade or more which means that all the weapons material and all the nasty actinides and fission products stay locked up in the fuel salt. If you really ever have to open your reactor to remove spent fuel, there's effectively no chance of it getting diverted for weapons. And as a further guard, there's really no reason to remove the nuclear material from the fuel salt at the end of it's useful life or the end of plant life. Drain the waste mix into a storage cask, let it freeze and it's safe for the next couple centuries until it's back near it's original levels of radioactivity when it was uranium (or thorium) ore. If you wanted to make a weapon from it, you'd need to melt the salts and come up with a refinement process which is just not worth the trouble.
I think molten salt thorium breeder reactors are the future. They have so many potential advantages that it really needs to be researched even more.
Wind and solar sounds nice in principle, but in reality it's very difficult. Wind turbines take up a LOT of space and make a LOT of noise AND kills birds. Solar could work well in areas with a lot of sun, but manufacturing the photoelectric panels requires quite a lot of energy to begin with. Mirror farms that focus sunlight to a boiler solve this problem, but then you are back to the problem of killing birds and taking up a lot of space.
So, I think a combination of thorium nuclear and hydroelectric (a renewable energy that receives far too little attention) is the best solution. In certain areas where it's most useful you can supplement with wind and solar, but I think the bulk of our energy requirement should come from nuclear and hydroelectric.
Ever thought bout how much hydroelectric dams ruin the ecosystems around it by holding back all the water
@@cherrydragon3120 Very true. Hydroelectric dams are far from ideal and take up a late of space as well as hurt the local ecosystems. It can also pose a threat if the dam breaks during floods and such.
But still, I think it's superior to coal/oil/gas. And although it's hard to measure how bad something is exactly, I feel that wind turbines do too much damage to ecology AND take up too much area compared to the power produced.
No power production is perfect, but we have to try to focus on the ones that do the least harm. And in my opinion, right now, that is nuclear (+ future nuclear like thorium or fusion) and hydroelectric.
The ideal would be a power production with no pollution, no noise and no area demand, but I don't think that is possible.
I see nuclear energy as entirely necessary, not just for immediate energy concerns or environmental issues but because we have no other viable means of powering true interplanetary or interstellar space travel if we want to achieve it any time soon without wasting decades or generations on the journey. Or colonies on the moon and Mars, or asteroid mining industries. And without those things humanity is doomed, anyway.
We can do these safer reactors already: Oak Ridge National Laboratory built a working (albeit prototype, as far as I understand it) Molten Salt Reactor back in the 1950s. Nearly 70 years ago! Much smaller, much safer, much less complicated safety systems, much less chance of human error causing a radioactive disaster, much better fuel efficiency, and much cheaper fuel. What else are we going to power spaceships and colonies with? Solar? It took an automated craft with no crew (and all the things necessary to sustain a crew) or intention for a return flight over 8 months to drop Curiosity on Mars. If we want manned colonies, manned spaceships, reasonably short journeys through the dark, we currently only have nuclear as an option for power generation. Yes, we also need the other technologies like propulsion systems (Alcubierre warp, anyone?) and habitat environments, but what's the point in having those without a suitable power source? How will we use them if we give up on what is currently our only option?
Humanity needs to curb its environmental impact, yes. But even more than that we need to get off this planet even if we save it and turn it into a paradise! Do you think a stray asteroid (/meteor / comet) would care that we fixed the climate and stopped senselessly killing each other or anything else we might achieve? We are unbelievably lucky that the current COVID-19 strain isn't more lethal than it is. Think about how bad the Plague was, and then factor in modern worldwide shipping and travel, and the access to and speed of domestic travel that we enjoy. We could all be dead by now, instead of supermarkets drawing lines 2m on the floor and American homeowners finally having a use for their guns to defend their hoards of toilet roll.
The only way to really protect humanity is to spread it among multiple planets, preferably multiple solar systems. Multiple galaxies would be nice, but without actual sci-fi technology that's barely even a dream right now.
ehm.. we might first want to face the problems we have here in our ow backyard no?
it's not that I'm saying you're wrong, but it's not the issue that is addressed here. we humans of the modern era use vast amounts of (electrical) energy that we use in everyday life, transport, recreation, production, etc. with the living standarts of "3rd world countries" going up and reaching a place where everyone wants to access electricity around the clock aswell, we'll need a lot more than we're producing right now.
hence the nuclear solutions presented in the media, as well as on yt and such. thorium in a liquid salt solution provides a very good option, but it still has a few kinks to be worked out; the salt is very corrosive, what would make a reactor last not too darn long befor it would need a major overhaul. paople are working frantically on solutions for the problems encountered in these types of reactors over the last 10-15 years and progress is beeing made.
once we would be able to have a reactor that could last a long time without any real issues... it would just take off as never known befor; if we want to or not, it's just too good. if only you would use them to burn away 90%+ of the waste we have produced in "conventional" nuclear plants and turn to energy, even that would help the world out a lot.
the ADDED benefit of use in space is just that...... added bebefit.
Why protect humanity? What is in it for us in our life time?
@@persiathiest1963 "what is in it for us in our lifetime" is discussed in the video and widely in the comment section, so I see no need to repeat them here just for you. Not to mention that the benefits of clean and safe nuclear energy within our lifetime are obvious if you think about it for a few seconds.
As for your first question: why protect humanity? That's a dumb question. Do you also advocate for the banning of all human reproduction? If you see no point in protecting humanity's future then surely there's also no point in continuing to have children, as that is a form of protecting the species, and in that case I doubt anything I say could persuade you. If not, if you agree with having children, then admit that you want the species to continue. The logical extension of that would be to ensure a disaster on Earth is not the end of us, which requires colonising other planets or making liveable space stations or interstellar ships - which essentially require clean and safe nuclear energy to be made feasible.
@@TheNonplayer personally, I think the fossil fuel industry has a lot to lose from the development of this nuclear energy. and due to the nature of the dictatorship of the rich resulting from capitalism and its global totalitarianism, I think that nuclear energy has a humongous battle ahead in order for it to materialize in the way that humanity needs it to. it's not that it's actually difficult, it's that the people who benefit from fossil fuels, the capitalist class, have a motive, incentive, and ability to sabotage and subvert, and distract resources and funding and basically control the government and society into avoiding the development of nuclear energy. I would imagine that if the capitalist class didn't have so much to lose from the advancement of nuclear energy, we'd probably already be there by now, considering the fact that some of these technologies are around 70 years old. it's the only real reason I can think of that the development of these technologies could take so long. yes I know that sometimes science moves slowly, and sometimes it moves in great leaps, but for something as important as this, it's hard to imagine a bigger obstacle then the status quo of the capitalist class.
After speaking with environmental professors whom study global warming and the collapse of bug populations and algae biomass, and coral reef health, and etc. I've learned that realistically if we want to save the non-human life on this planet we would need to switch to nuclear NOW, and then while running on nuclear work on switching to renewables or fusion
xXPORTALXx don't let the greenies see this.
Non-Human life is very important. If we ever get serious about expanding outside the solar system we will need/want to send as complete a collection of non-human life as possible along with the humans. A humans-only colonized world would be so boring and in the long run harder to make sustainable. All the life needs to come along for the ride to the stars.
Most politicians and power elites do not care about doing what is in their power to come to as close to utopia as is possible, even though they have the power to do so.
Thorium based nuclear power is a technology over which we, humans, have mastery and control, and can lead to society across the world with much less material scarcity than presently exists, and expansion into the solar system and beyond, but presently the most powerful politicians and power elites do not want to change to that sort of paradigm.
@pyropulse, the technological and financial wherewithal exists to achieve most of what I have stated within 40 to 50 years.
@pyropulse, you are an extreme skeptic it seems. Please, honestly, I am genuinely asking, please follow science and futurism with Isaac Arthur. Just type 'Isaac Arthur', he has hundreds of video. Also specifically to see a likely vision for the better not too distant future 'Isaac Arthur nuclear fusion'.
I think we should develope nuclear technology if only to replace the older generation of reactors with safer designs.
love this channel! no politics, no ideology, just straight out science and rational thinking.
my country [germany] is infested with anti nuclear propaganda even on gov TV.
a shame what this country became.
fragile nationalism much?
@@paavobergmann4920 hm?
"propaganda even on gov TV.
a shame what this country became."
my spidey senses are tingeling
@@paavobergmann4920 your spidey senses should have tingled years ago...
I have always been a fan of the salt reactors and thought this should be the way to go for the future...I don't understand why we are no headed in this direction it makes way more sense and is way safer.
All my physics proffs wanna talk about are thorium reactors, nice to see it become even more popular
Kirk Sorensen has been at LIFTR for a long time ~ glad that it's finally getting more attention!
Yea let's hope it enters the collective consciousness !
@@CraftyF0X BORG? BORG!!!!!!! 😱
And the efforts have stalled because LFTR is likely not a good design for civilian nuclear power. His videos sent me down the nuclear engineering path, but I think other reactors will see the light of day before LFTR! Don't need thorium or liquid fuel to make a good, passively safe reactor system.
"Bro, do you even LFTR?!"
He's where I first heard it from. And I tell everyone about them
I have to say, no matter where Andrew Yang's candidacy goes; whether it be nowhere or to the White House; he has brought some fantastic ideas to the public's attention and the debate stage. One is using Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTR) to help transition from carbon based energy generation to renewable sources.
The planet is heavily dependent on hydrocarbon fuels. the LFTR could supply energy to synthesize hydrocarbon fuel on the scale needed. The resulting Zero CO2 cycle would allow the planet time to completely move away from hydrocarbon based energy before destroying it.
More of a Kirk Sorensen guy myself.
"Energy too cheap to meter" was in reference to fusion, not fission and it never meant that the energy would be free, just that the fuel would be so cheap that only a monthly service charge would be needed.
Wind and solar won't build battlemechs... just saying.
More importantly it won't sustain the current world population.
@@GearZNet Not quite true. Wind and solar can sustain any arbitrarily large population you like, provided cost isn't an issue. You will obviously get diminishing returns over time, as the prime spots for either get used, forcing you to choose progressively worse and worse sites, pushing up the average cost / KwH.
You also really need a truly global grid to make it efficient enough to work. Whilst one of the drawbacks of both wind and solar is that it is sometimes dark / not windy / both, it is always sunny and/or windy somewhere in the world. A global power grid would allow relatively stable supply at scale from inherently unstable sources. Of course, building and maintaining a global power grid is politically impossible, and also inconveniently needs room temp superconductors for the very long range wires to be even remotely economically viable. But, y'know, other than those small things...
Good to see people focusing on what is important. Lol
I want my GHR-5H Grasshopper! :p
@@whohash8312
WHM-7M of gtfo.
I don't think it's likely renewables solve all of our energy needs. If we want to get off fossil fuel we need to start embracing fission or get fusion working yesterday.
Safer fission is possible today in a way that lets us dig up tons and tons of nasty spent fuel rods and "burn" them in molten salt reactors to get rid of the mistakes of the past. Fusion is bloody hard, but real tangible advances have been made lately... but the time it takes to build a 200MW fusion plant is decades because the plumbing for the hydrogen cooled superconducters is a nightmare.... We will get to fusion eventually, but we need to roll out molten salt reactors ASAP.
@WTFPurpleAlpaca The fact alone that we have to consider not using some element because it can be dangerous for militar usage is stupid. How bout stop killing youselfs stupid specie.
True. Oil companies actually love wind and solar because they increase reliance on fossil fuels due to how they aren't producing energy most of the time. Never mind how wind and solar pollute way more than nuclear, are much more expensive, don't reduce carbon dioxide emissions, pose a great to birds and bats, and require destroying large swaths of land to work.
@mars laredo consider www.brightnewworld.org/media/2017/5/29/what-if-nuclear-power-was-invented-today
@mars laredo Those numbers are definitely not right. And besides almost all of those countries that get high amounts of energy from renewables get them from hydro and geothermal, sources that work if you have them nearby but obviously aren't a solution everywhere. And last I checked, most environmentalists want to phase out hydro as well.
An amazing amount of effort and knowledge went into this video. Respect.
Canada's CANDU reactor can run on Thorium alone, and only needs a small amount of fissionable material to get the neutrons flowing. It is safer, as Thorium cannot go critical, and the half-life of Thorium is in 100's of years, not thousands.
wrong the thorium that is used as fuel is Th232 which has the half life of 3 times the age of earth which is a good thing because no enrichment is needed
Do we need fission?
No.
Is it the fastest, safest substitute for fossil fuel as our base load energy?
Absolutely.
Actually we do need it 100%. We are at a point where even if we produce 0 green house gases the planet will keep heating up. So we need to produce a huge amount of energy while only producing small amounts of CO2. Renewables produce a ton of CO2 which is why they alone wont save us. We need a massive surplus of electricity to use for CO2 scrubbers and we will only get that by using nuclear power.
Electricity is a luxury, not a given. Humanity got along for quite a while without electricity.... If we want our civilization to continue this pace of growth I don't see another option. If we want to continue in this way of life, we need a new base load source of energy. Fusion is too far off imo... So that leaves fission, or a period of techoprimicy. Again electricity is a luxury NOT a given!
@@toohardfortheradiopodcast
I'm always left despondent when I hear somebody buying into the Coldicot, no electricity dystopia that she actively advocates for.
'Mozart wrote by candlelight...' _so why not do heart surgery that way?_ From a physician of all people!
Because it's a bad idea Helen, A VERY BAD IDEA!
I'm just a lineman... I'm a realist, I only know what I have seen, and studied. I went to school to learn about the grid, and how to fix it. I learned about all forms of energy generation, but my crew(trade school, we had crews)choose to focus, on next generation nuclear reactors for our overall project, and imo replacing oil/coal with fission energy as our base load energy is the only logical choice. Hopefully as reactors are being built the designs can be updated, until next generation reactors, like thorium reactors can take over, and last until fusion plants are ready for widespread use. I worked up in the baken in ND, and I understand how people view electricity. People in general think, and ack as if electricity is a given, not a luxury. The grid has been so consistent, and cheap for so long that people have come to depend on it for not only their business, but their lives, which is very irresponsible. The grid is an absolutely amazing technology, but it isn't infallible. It took decades to build, but under the right conditions, it can ALL disappear at the speed of light. Solar Flare, CME, EMP, computer attack ECT... If the equipment fries due to any of those things were screwed for a while. We don't have an extra grid protected in a cave somewhere as a backup. The factories we need to produce the equipment we would need wouldn't have power. Without power we have no communication, no leadership, and things don't get fixed for a long time. I'm sure the government has plans for situations like that, but imo that's not something you can actually plan for, and any plans they have made, are not going to go to plan... You can't plan for chaos.
@@excitedbox5705 The Planet heating up is guaranteed, it has been since 1999. It would be good if the socialist democrats green new deal would embrace nuclear power, but they won't bc they are frauds
The pressure to heat water to the temperatures needed to promote nuclear fission in Fast Breeder Reactors, is around 70 to 90 times normal atmospheric pressure. Salts, melt at those temperatures with no added pressure. That is a huge safety improvement. High pressure water tanks can explode. Liquid Salt tanks just ooze salt. There is no high pressure to cause seals to go bad. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, build a Molten Salt Reactor back in the 1950s. They should have been the reactor that got built instead of the ones we have today.
I'l never understand why we went with the current design, unless the sole purpose was to stock-pile weapons-grade material for nuclear bombs.
@@andywolan That was the reason.
@@yoshi6236 Molten salt makes seals go bad. It's still a breeder and will likely need U235 to breed U233 from throrium. Details=Devil.
@@kithraya7081 However the molten salt proposals now have a "kindney" which has need of actively pumping fissioning seed. I believe there is no data on rotating shafts seals needed for pumping.
@@andywolan The fact that those same reactors were made in the 1950s, at the height of the Cold War and when the panic over the USSR having The Bomb was still very much in effect should have made that answer obvious.
>Start of intro precap
>Question is: should it?
A resounding yes! 😸
Lots of comments, so may have missed a correction, but the Chernobyl reactor was graphite moderated, not water moderated, which when mishandled caused the problem. Other 2 accidents (TMI and Fukushima) were only accidents rather than disasters, except the authorities completely failed to understand the difference between the fear of radiation and the actual ( v small) dangers associated with radiation.
This needs to be pinned!
A mainstream video for molten salt reactors. Thank you, Space Time!
6:32 thank you for actually putting an image of Fukushima, every other video that mentioned it showed photos of an old refinery that doesn’t have anything to do with Fukushima
next time you're but hurt about not seeing it, just do a google search, you'll get there
What an incredibly good video, thanks for your efforts, very well done.
Did anyone else notice that the periodic table has Plutonium (Pu) listed twice in a row? The second one should be Americium(Am) I think (going from memory, not a chemist/physicist)
Yes! It really messed with me to begin with trying to work out what was missing (it is Am for americium). Glad I’m not alone.
It sounds to me like someone tried too much getting rid of reverb and cut too much of the decibels. Be careful with that next time.
sounds like he's speaking underwater
I was thinking maybe a denoiser caused this?
Sounds like you're paying attention to the irrelevant stuff.
Too much compression on his voice channel, or a bad microphone maybe ? I agree the sound on this one is awful compared to their usual standard.
I don 't have an ear for that, but I can confirm that there is something wrong with the audio. Sounds like there are chunks of frequencies removed randomly here and there
Until we have a workable and scalable fusion reactor nuclear fission is necessary for progressing.
Compact, commercial and economies of scale fission reactors such as LFTR's are not just necessary, but a human right IF we expect to live through this next millennia as a species.
I find it stunning that the argument that nuclear energy isn't "safe" has essentially stopped it in its tracks. Environmentalists have pretty much done the exact opposite of thier intended goal, and have played directly into fossil fuel companies hands.
Here's to hoping that reality returns to the conversation and we can get back to solid scientific research and fill the gap to fusion with fission and actually get to helping the environment.
@@damondziewiontkowski5623 Nah, what stopped it is the fact that it is one of the most expensive forms of energy (per kWh). Which is partly due to all the extra security needed for safe operation, but the long planning and building times and the(ir) inherent inflexibility contribute as well.
@@mokovec that is only true if you don't account for the cost of carbon dump, and the colossal failure of renewable energy. They don't scale, they don't store, they don't balance with current grid technologies, as well as nobody takes the decommission costs into account.
France has some of the lowest electricity rates in Europe, and Germany has some of the highest. Two guesses as to whom is using nuclear, and who isn't....
Sure, sure, nobody knows what an LCA is. Come on ... (And good for Germany, electricity is too cheap now, so there's little interest in optimisation)
When someone talks to me about climate change, the way I know they are serious about the issue (and educated) if if they also talk about nuclear power. Ignoring nuclear power while the earth warms is like a person (who lives near the ocean) with their house burning down claiming they they don't want the firemen to use readily available salt water to put out the flames because it might ruin their carpet, and instead want the firemen to wait another 30 minutes until a truck arrives with fresh water.
bad analogy downvote.
"but sir, spraying all that SALT water is going to ruin the ground around your house"
@@DomyTheMad420 I disagree, I think it is a pretty good analogy:). Also, I'm not sure who you are quoting.
“Assuming advances in battery tech” ...that’s why we need to start beginning this process with nuclear. We don’t have time to wait for technology to catch up. It will take half a century at best to reformat our global energy grid and waiting for wind and solar to become feasible is not a real solution it’s just hand waving.
Are you not worried that nuclear is unfeasibly expensive?
@ShaunDoesMusic What people fail to realise is that should society invest in nuclear fuel we will be able to buy us time until we are able to advance technology to a degree were other energy sources (eg. solar, wind, eco.) to something that is much more practical both economically and environmentally. Sadly, society and governments do not understand the urgency of climate change and how in a few decades time the food chain will be disrupted completely and many more will die, leaving resources scarce, causing even more inequality than now. Sadly, due to consumerist needs and capitalist greed the older generation in power is more interested in their short term profits than actual societal needs.
Good comments btw I totally agree with you.
Gabez101 oh right right we should definitely use the DEFINITELY FEASIBLE solar and wind farms to compensate for entire terawatts of power without any interruptions to production. Good thing the sun always shines and the wind always blows
" waiting for wind and solar to become feasible is not a real solution it’s just hand waving."
Counterpoint: Wind and solar are already feasable and can be deployed en masse *now* .
Building LFTR everywhere needs as much time as developing energy storing tech for fluctuating renewable energy sources. A few exist already (e.g, ETES for electricity and thermal energy and water based thermal energy storage systems for warm water needs (web.archive.org/web/20160103170837/www.solarmarstal.dk/media/2854117/summary-technical-description-marstal.pdf) that can be deployed on a large scale within this decade.
The moduladity and de-centralized aspects are also covered by wind and solar energy. Solar energy on every (feasable) roof and/or balcony also has the *huge* advantage of not taking any additional land for energy generation.
So it's not either or. Every energy generation tech has its place.
Vulcano fair enough. I’m largely arguing against the popular notion that wind and solar can fully replace all carbon emitting forms of power generation and that’s simply not feasible for the vast majority of countries. Modular nuclear tech however eliminates the need for mass electricity storage and has much less of a carbon footprint upfront and no e-waste in the back. That doesn’t mean solar and wind can’t be used in loactaions where they get their best returns (frequently sunny and windy sites benefitted by geography), but even deserts and valleys have cloudy and still days. Just look at Germany and France and their breakdown of clean energy sources. You’ll see that despite very heavy investment on the German side, they are a long way away despite being one of the worlds wealthiest countries. France took the nuclear route with old style plants and with good regulation, electricity is cheap and there have been no major accidents. This is a matter of pragmatism, not a black or white situation.
- Thorium is crustaceanally abundant. Especially relative to Uranium-235, the fuel in LWR/PWR designs.
- Liquid fuels in solid moderators, such as FLiBe and a graphite matrix, are dramatically more effective at achieving complete burn-up of all fissile material. Less than 5% of the fuel in today's LWR/PWR designs is burned. Thus, the terms "spent fuel" and "nuclear waste", both implying no energy production value, are simply misnomers.
- Because of the completeness of fissile burn-up, MSR's generate a small fraction of the waste created by LWR/PWR designs.
- Additionally, the waste that is generated is massively less toxic with half-lives of a few hundred years vs. hundreds of thousands of years.
Most importantly, MSR's are "walk-away safe" as the liquid fuel is inherently non-critical as during a loss of power event when the freeze plug opens, redirecting the liquid fuel to dump tanks.
MSR's are also drastically safer during operation as the high temperature molten salt liquid fuel functions at near atmospheric pressure.
So, no risk of thermal runaway, resulting in steam excursions and the ensuing hydrogen explosion. No risk of meltdown. Significant waste advantages. And a smaller and thoroughly manageable proliferation risk. That's, as they say, a no-brainer of a decision!
The facts are that both China and India are ahead of the United States in MSR R&D. What's needed is governmental acknowledgement of climate change and a moonshot-like effort on a national scale akin to the Manhattan Project. Only then will the U.S. regain technical superiority in the area that has the dual potential to generate abundant, "clean" energy while creating thousand upon thousands of jobs as pent-up demand domestically, as well as internationally, is responsibly satisfied.
(Former Navy nuke ELT who operated on three PWR designs (MARF, S3G and S8G). In civilian afterlife, worked in Naval Nuclear Fuels (enrichment) and Defense Waste Processing Facility (high-level radioactive waste vitrification). "Clean" energy proponent, including solar, wind, hydro, geothermal and nuclear, as well as distributed smart grid technology with grid-scale storage capabilities.)
There are fewer concentrations of economically-viable-to-extract Thorium, it has the same issue of rare earth minerals, abundant in the crust but without many concentrations near the surface. Using uranium in MSRs is far easier and far more practical than thorium.
"Less than 5% of the fuel in today's LWR/PWR designs is burned."
I'm trying to find a source for this. You, this video, and a few others have mentioned this figure, but I can't find verification online. (I'm writing an essay for school about the benefits of nuclear energy, and I want to be accurate.)
If you have a link to a source, it would really help a ton!
@@gingerale1591 This is probably late but the reason only 5% or so of the fuel is burned is because only about 2-3% of the fuel is fissile U-235. The rest is U-238 which will essentially stay unburned. Here is a wikipedia link on the subject: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_fuel_cycle
Well said, one might word it as the best way to clean up 95% of current nuclear waste is the LFTR/MSR that ran safely for 6,000 hrs half a decade ago.
What does a Nuclear Technician hang on his door in the morning?
Gone Fission
I'm not sure how to reactor that!
@@IveJustHadAPiss this reply makes it a chain reaction
@@brianwade8649 This thread is rad
@@JeremyKolassa Stop it your killing me
@@gameglitcher Don't laugh too hard or Chernobyl fall out.
"All hail the 👍 Alliance!" 'coming to a planet near you.' lol
PBS SPACE TIME & OTHER TEAMS behind this fine piece of art , BIG THANKS, GREAT JOB.
"the real question, should it?"
Yes, emphatically and wholeheartedly, only the insane or intellectually dishonest would suggest not to.
*Roll credits*
It is a little odd that they pose that question without exploring both sides of it. If they think there's some chance of a Thorium fuel cycle producing weapons-grade material, then it would have been nice to hear some details on it.
@@mvmlego1212 Need part 2
fossil fuel kill more people with pollution, which is now the nuclear power plant victims also suffer from it, so why they have to suffer fossil fuel pollution together, but nuclear radiation alone, that is why they want you to be victim of nuclear power plant as well...
aaaaaaaaaaaaaand now everyone has weapon's grade uranium ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
None if you seem to realize just how rare and inaccessible Thorium is, the whole thing is a moot point
Thorium is cool but the real leverage point is to produce MSR (molten salt reactors ). many fuels can be used including our current nuclear waste as fuel thus actually reducing our gross "nuclear weapons risk".
Indeed, "thorium" as a gateway drug to other advanced reactors is nice, but it does distract from other non-thorium reactors that are amazing.
Molten Salt Reactors are the way to go. The most interesting one today being the reactor being developed by Moltex Energy.
Yeah! Molten salt reactors are way to go ... after we find out how to construct a molten salt power plant which doesn't corrode into a pile of radioactive junk before it has produced enough electricity to be profitable.
@@TheUglyGnome We found that out 50 years ago. Nickel-based alloys are very robust and even more, regular materials can withstand the challenge when replaced on a robust time schedule.
Water is corrosive and high pressure and reactors do just fine not corroding themselves. I find this talking point rather an odd one.
@@BeCurieUs Dude clearly doesn't know what a molten salt reactor is.
I like how the periodic table has Plutonium on it twice.
HA HA! I guess he's anti-Americium.
@@sandal_thong8631 What a terrible joke! I bet a lot of people are going to PuPu your comment.
IDEAL: Mass-enrichment of Pu for arms race of thermoelectric generators and proliferation of deep space exploration
Nuclear energy doesn't just have fewer total deaths than e.g. air pollution, it causes fewer deaths _per megawatt_ (IIRC, even without counting air pollution; mining things as flammable as fossil fuels is pretty dangerous).
I think you're right, except that it probably should be 'per megawatt _hour_'.
Stupid argument. You can avoid air pollution, you can't avoid fallout.
how do you know if the nuclear waste didn't go through their half-life yet?
@@anibaldamiao If it matters, just grab a Geiger counter. Maybe a scale, if you want to figure out how long it's been around and not just the remaining radioactivity.
@@FutureChaosTV Stupider argument. Fallout comes from nuclear explosions, not nuclear reactions in general. Even nuclear meltdowns don't cause big explosions; reactors that melt down _melt._ That's why they _call it_ a "meltdown".
Thanks for this informative video. We need to start a rational discussion on nuclear power again.
But it not one most people(including myself) are qualified to speak about.
What's rational about one or even three corporations dictating electricity prices to you?
A Firefly reference?
You just made my day!
An open comment section, and open dialog, on PBS? Wow PBS you found your balls.
I would add that proliferation using thorium reactors and U-233 would be very difficult because of (n,2n) reactions, which produce small amounts of U-232, which produces Tl-208 in it's decay chain, which is a hard gamma radiation emitter , which makes U-233 contaminated with U-232 a lot harder to handle and hide, which makes it hard for proliferation. Sorry for all the whiches.
you could use arrows instead (of the whiches) :D
@@MsSonali1980 Thanks for the suggestion, which I will use in the future. Ok that's enough.
If what I've heard elsewhere is correct, TI-208 is also likely to fry nearby electronics, making the bomb unstable for its handlers, even if radiation-hardening steps are taken. Obviously, this would also inhibit proliferation. Is this accurate?
I would have preferred wenches, myself.
India managed to produce the Shakti V, a tiny 0.2kt device using U-233. Most proliferation studies focus on traditional reactors. With a molten salt reactor, couldn't you isolate the Protactinium before it becomes U-233 and avoid U-232 contamination?
But Homer Simpsons is a very capable nucular technician, the plant is still standing after nearly 30 years with Homer on the job
And homer seems to be the only one doing that job. Did you ever see a colleague replacing him?
which is kind of an ironic example of how safe nuclear power actually is in the grand scheme of things. This weapons-grade idiot couldn't create a Chernobyl level disaster despite his incompetence. Which shows just how bad Chernobyl actually was in poor decisions. And how the over-regulation of nuclear power becomes its forte. Per Watt of energy produced - nuclear power by FAR outscores every other type of energy, even renewables like wind and solar - per death. Yes, this includes 3 Mile Island, Fukushima, and Chernobyl.
Problem is we don't hear of every solar panel installer falling off a roof, every wind turbine technician falling off the ladder, every oil worker getting split in half from a pressure blast, a natural gas worker getting caught in a fiery explosion and left hanging in pieces off of the derrick he was maintaining.
BUT GOD FORBID A SINGLE NUCLEAR REACTOR HAS A MELTDOWN! That is international news with a headline and will be talked about for months and even will get dozens of documentaries cutting it down to microscope slides.
For all the fear of nuclear power the Simpsons created it made a parody of its overly exaggerated fear.
@@Jitts.the.caffeinated The Simpsons are not quite a documentary xD
Nuclear power is only relatively safe when its handled carefully. We have to learn from accidents. Energy is inherently dangerous, since too much in the wrong place can always do damage.
Capable, you say? Need I remind you that he caused a nuclear meltdown inside a truck that had no nuclear material in it?
@@salzstangl actually it had that other guy that was the night shift safety supervisor that used to clean up all of homer's mess, and when he retired homer got super nervous.
For more widespread interplanetary and potentially interstellar travel, Thorium is the only option currently on the table.
Love your intro music! Super.
Thanks for the video. well put together
Considering the cost of batteries - as well as the environmental hazard their production and disposal represents - nuclear energy is essential for a low-carbon-emission future. Simply put, if you want to replace fossil fuel base load with batteries, you need massive installations that will cost trillions of euros, will require the mining of heavy metals and rare earths, and will need to be disposed / recycled, just a few years later, further driving costs up. Moreover, a miraculously effective and cheap new battery technology is no closer than nuclear fusion, while you need base load now. Today's answer, natural gas, only suits natural gas providers. Moreover, transitioning from internal combustion to electric cars means a 50%+ increase in power demand. Electric cars that are charged overnight means that they aren't hooked to solar, and if there is no wind, you need to turn to your base load provider. If you need 50% more of what you have today, assuming there will be enough battery capacity at an affordable price is just not realistic. My guess is, people will end up demanding nuclear power before long when they realize what the numbers really are.
You are absolutly right! A german physics professor roughly calculated the energy demand for recharging around 1 million cars over night (germany has around 50 million cars at the moment). When I remember correctly he came to around 350 giga watts of power. The current grid in germany provides around 65 giga watts of power. So replacing the current power supply with renewables will not be enough, we have to increase our power ouptut by orders of magnitude. I think this can only be done with some kind of nuclear energy, be it fusion or fission. (If we accept CO2 as main driver for climate change)
Your answer assumes only todays technology. It is why research into better forms of energy sequestering (MUCH lower environmental impact, higher retention value, etc) is crucial. We shouldnt stop research on any form of energy production or storage, but develop them to fit within an environmentaly safe and higher utilization form.
Well said! Nuclear energy for the win.
@@mariodrakos1029 And the calculations were bollocks as quickly noted by his peers.
So let's stop playing the guessing game for a moment and use real data for a change [1]: 612.80 bn kWh is the annual production in Germany.
On the 26th of June, electricity production peeked at 80.68 GW [2], so *no* , the grid capacity is *not* 65 GW - otherwise it would have collapsed that week!
A car that is not using any kind of fast charge technology is limited to household 3-phase power at 400V and a typical 16A power limit. That's a maximum of 6.4kW, though sustained load is limited to 10A (alternatively 16A @ ~230V), therefore 4kW is the maximum safe recharging power available to a typical German home.
That's 4 GW max for 1 million cars - or roughly *5%* of the observed lower limit of the grid. And that's only if *all* cars are recharging at the same time with the same power - sensible extensions like smart grids aren't even considered with this. This is just as ridiculous as assuming that all 47,1 million registered cars (as of 1st January 2019 [3]) are 1) currently in use or usable at all (case in point - I know for a fact that some cars are currently in the shop 😜) and getting refuelled on the same day, or even within the same hour.
So yeah, there's a lot of irrational BS floating about in the context of renewables, electric vehicles and all that. Just do the calculation and consider that infrastructure isn't set in stone and has always changed along with the requirements. In 1910 years ago, petrol was sold in pharmacies and no one could have imagined a vast network of high speed roads and petrol stations. Yet the first high speed road opened only 11 years later in 1921 and one year later,in 1922 the first standardised petrol station in the German Reich was opened.
Finally, there's no reason to "accept" CO² as the "main driver for climate change". What kind of double-speak bollocks is that? Either go with the currently established state of knowledge (e.g. science) or don't.
[1] www.worlddata.info/europe/germany/energy-consumption.php
[2] www.energy-charts.de/power.htm
[3] www.kba.de/DE/Statistik/Fahrzeuge/Bestand/bestand_node.html
Yeah we need something. Fussion would be great. I think fussion is only a matter of time, since its been proven to be theoretically possible.
I see no reason to spread the lie that Co2 has a high positive feedback though. Thats a hypothesis from psuedoscientists, and people are literally taught to preform psuedoscience on climate. There is literally a giant U.N. entity devoted to helping people preform psuedoscience and spread the information to law makers. They intentionally introduce bias, and they slaughter peoples work. Scientists sue them and ask to have their names taken off the published work, because they will pick apart their work and make it support this hypothesis. People intentionally introduce bias for funding, and many have been caught. NOAA doesnt publish error bars and intentionally lowers past temps while raising current ones. NOAAs record and satelite data disagree.
Its a shameful religion and it hurts people.
That said, solar does make sense for extremely underdeveloped areas. I hope we can give fusion to africa and india in the future. Imagine how much more food we could produce with vast networks of robots that already exists finally replacing farming by hand. Its like when we switched from oxs and other animals to tractors, except people want to go backwards now and hurt people to give people some sort of dignity. Going as far as introducing legislation to prevent ample food production and lead to starvation all over the world.
This leftwing b.s. makes me sick.
I say rip out of those damn primitive coal power plants that grandma uses and put in some badass thorium reactors ASAP!!!
Anthony Max or let the market decide what energy they want to buy. If thorium is the cheapest and most reliable, it will win.
lol meanwhile in Germany they're shutting down all their nuclear plants and replacing them with coal.
Roman Dovhan clearly you’re not adept at basic word comprehension, nor written communication. Please try again.
@@n-wordaficianado2990 Germany has committed to closing all their coal fired power stations by 2020
@@brkbtjunkie - The "market" isn't the average person, it's corporations and other large organizations. Those groups, unless managed by some outside force (regulation) will spend as little money as possible, no matter how bad that is for everyone else. ie - they will continue to go with the cheaper and known fossil fuel plants rather than finance something that is better for the populace/country/world.
loved the video. but you should have mentioned that the Chernobil reactor and the Light water reactor that you have described in the beggining are not the same type at all. The PWR that most countries use today (and the one that you decribed) are the non-boiling type, so the chernobil accident can never ever reoccur. Althought reactors of type in Chernobil do still operate in Russia, they are slowly decommissioned and they are, understandably, considered "old" and "non-reliable"
Energy storage is our biggest problem at the moment.
Seriously though. Nuclear energy MUST be used along with renewables.
Humanity is literally at stake.
Also, can the fusion guys please hurry it up?
lmao why do we need renewables if we have nuclear
New nuclear costs more and takes decades, while incrementally getting another 5% of energy from wind and solar is cheap and quick. What exactly will make electric utilities spend the billions on nuclear that I agree is needed to get to zero CO2 emissions? Just saying MUST won't cut it. Should government just spend the money to build nuclear regardless of the cost per kWh? Should government raises carbon taxes so high that nuclear is cheaper than firing up gas generators when it's calm and dark?
@@skierpage I agree we have to be nuanced about it. I'm only saying we should not shut down any nuclear plants (supposing they're efficient) and work on it in parallel to renewables cost reduction.
@@LordMichaelRahl I'm not arguing for nuance. I would love some politician to say this is an emergency therefore we will immediately build and iterate on versions of all of these next-generations nuclear plants in an Apollo-style new energy program. But if she dares to propose paying for it with a carbon tax, there might be riots as there were in France.
@@skierpage Ah, I see.
I've never understood not using nuclear in favour of coal.
A. C. Clakre wrote in one of books, that buring fossils for energy is stupid beyond reason - you can't grow crops with uranium, but oil is for food, not for fire.
@@piotrd.4850
You can grow crops with Uranium. Economical desalination is an imperative if we want to take the burden off our river systems.
When I take public office, I want you to testify for my nuclear energy plan of action. Your series of science education is accessible and thoroughly usable by world leaders. Thank you for your work.
The molten fluoride salt Thorium reactor is a fantastic option for the near future as we iron out the details of positive energy generation using nuclear fusion reactors. It sounds like you got your info from many of the same sources that I did. And it seems we like the same features of it. I do believe ITER will be the first major successful fusion reactor. But I believe the design that uses 36 plasma guns firing simultaneously at the same point will provide another viable design.
Though I believe the single event that we're likely to see in the future that will have the greatest impact on the human race as well as the earth will be the large-scale production of graphene. It will greatly improve EVERY industry. Just looking at the power industry, it will improve energy transmission and storage. It should improve energy generation as well as consumption in providing more efficient devices on the generation as well as consumption side. I do hope to see molten salt Thorium reactors - if for no other reason than to reduce the nuclear waste that we've already produced up until this point - as well as fusion reactors in the near future. But I believe graphene mass-production will be the greatest accomplishment of mankind. Comparing it to fire, the wheel or electricity is apples to oranges; but it will have that great an impact
I didn't hear you mention that a working Thorium reactor was in use in the 1960's and that the Thorium LFTR people ( do web search) have been trying to get someone interested in this for going on 20 years. It seems as though the only interest in LFTR, is with a few people in the west, were as India, China, and I think Russia are looking into solid fuel Thorium reactors.
Thanks
Bill Gates founded a company called TerraPower. The reactors they gonna use are TWR, which burn spent nuclear fuel which everyone calls "waste". He is one of the few big guys who promote Nuclear power. Bill Gates FTW!
Actually China is aggressively working on both liquid and solid fuel thorium reactors.
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molten_salt_reactor#China
This is probably the more detailed kind but too much readingng for most.
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molten_salt_reactor#China
I'll have to find my copy of "Thorium Dream" ( I think that is the title). Of course it was only a research project, still, the significance of having a functioning reactor 50 years ago. Well? I also believe that one of the benefits that is purported is that weapons grade materials are almost impossible to obtain, and the Thorium cycle can be used to recycled other "Fissile Material." Again I'll have to reread my text book, as it has been at least 5 years since I've read it. I just thought that some exaggerations were being made as to the difficulty of the project, when it appears to me that the only reason that the LFTR was not produced was that it could not produce "Bomb Grade" materials. Maybe I'm just naive though. I was told by one of my Physics professors that Fusion reactors were only 50 years away. That was in 1972.
@Mytheroo still far more than fusion crowd has or will accomplish by end of 21st century.
Weinberg didn't do a thorium reactor in 1960, he did a liquid-fueled uranium reactor. He speculated on using thorium in it.
_Watches random CZcams video... sees a thorium energy video from SpaceTime_ ... "It's what we've been asking for!!!!" _drops everything and clicks_
This is a pretty interesting and informative vid. PBS Spacetime and PBS Eons are doing a good job of filling the hole in popular science programming since the BBC intellectually neutered Horizon in 2012.
Thank you very much for this video. It is well explained and easy to understand. This video should be mandatory education for all citizens so that they can understand the differences and that nuclear power is not a singular term with the same meaning and risks.
You know it's serious when PBS posts a vid about it.
Be careful to ascribe infallibility to PBS, especially since it is now funded by Koch enterprises.
Well let me see:
Build reactors on small plots of land that produces huge amount of stored energy at your finger tips or build tons of wind and solar farms dependent on the weather elements that are spread across thousands, if not millions of acres invading the natural wild life and farm land.....Yes! We need the reactors!
Not to mention manufacturing the solar panels create huge amounts of environmental contamination. And disposing them is another headache altogether.
Not sure what you mean by a huge amount of stored energy at you fingertips tho. A high energy output capacity perhaps but I think I’m misinterpreting your comment.
@@jakeneylon1853 The biggest issue with solar and wind energy is that there is no potential amount of stored energy to keep up with supply and demand. Not like coal, nuclear or hydro. If all we had was solar and wind attached to the grid we would have blackouts on a daily basis.
@richard mccann You been reported for spam and harrassment go away paid bot.
It's not a hard question lol!
Andrew Yang is going to go down in history as the guy America should have listened to.
Maybe not on UBI, but on everything else for sure he's our guy
To those who say that wind & solar are terribly inefficient, like, only 20% efficient:
the internal combustion engine is only 20% efficient.
Yet, it has been monumentally practical.
20% of a millions is 200 000. 20% of a hundred thousand is 20 000. Efficiency is a thing, but the amount of energy in your fuel is also important
Finally a Thorium episode! Great job guys.
This video needs to be shown to every person that is involved in global energy production.
Thank you. Great video!!👍👍
Those who put a dislike on this great video what was flying through your brains?... do you even have any?
As to your question at the end: "do we need it?"
Not only do we desperately need nuclear power in order to avert catastrophic climate change; the current focus on renewables is _ACTIVELY HURTING_ our chances of surviving.
Bullcrap. Anyway, energy generation is only part of the emission budget and cheap energy could even make things worse. The same thing happened when we streamlined coal: efficiency increased, but then we just used more, so the overall effect was worse.
mokovec you are flat out wrong m8. Solar power emits more CO2 than just straight burning coal. Due to one simple issue, building big fuckoff batteries is extremely, unbelievably, UNFORGIVABLY inefficient. So most nations (Germany is a brilliant example) just switch to fossil fuels when the sun goes down. But due to efficiency reasons turning fossil fuel plants on and off again would burn 3 times as much fuel (this is a generalisation but the effect is universal) than if we just left them burning away and only connected them to the grid for the night period.
Additionally due to the massive surplus of electricity during the midday period of daytime (which is when electricity is used the least) turning off power plants is the only way not to blow the grid.
Recently there has been experimentation with electrical sinks of sorts but this can only go so far.
And before you say let’s just settle with big bugger off batteries. 1. They are really expensive and most smaller nations would be unable and/or unwilling to fit the bill and 2. There is a lithium shortage combined with a colossal demand for mobile devices. There is literally not enough lithium to power the world overnight.
So currently nuclear power is the path of least resistance and in this modern world that is the only way things get done. If there is a battery breakthrough then I will eat my own phone but until then nuclear is the only way forward for the foreseeable future.
Plz respond I’m lonely and have a little too much free time. I would love to hear your side of the argument.
@@jakeneylon1853 If you take issue with Germany abandoning nuclear, I have bad news for you - they're doing the same with coal: www.latimes.com/world/europe/la-fg-germany-coal-power-20190126-story.html
And to dispel your "coal is better than solar absurdity", here's the simplest LCA overview of GHG emissions I could find: energyforhumanity.org/en/briefings/carbon-emissions/lifecycle-carbon-emissions-of-electricity-generation-sources/
@@jakeneylon1853 Yeah, In an otherwise informative and interesting video, I was pretty flabbergasted the way Dr. Dowd glossed over an extraordinarily chikundus problem with renewables with his phrase, "Assuming advances in battery tech." That is no trivial assumption! It's like saying, "Interstellar travel is easy and affordable, assuming advances in FTL engines."
Yes we need nuclear. It should cover base load and fuel, (hydrogen and carbon based) generation.
If you are using power plants to produce fuels then there is absolutely no reason not to use wind and solar. They are much cheaper generators. At the moment USA only has about 17% of electricity produced by renewable. That needs to quadruple before it starts to matter if generation is base load or load following. If we are aiming for 0 fossil fuels by 2035 then for the next 4 years there is no good reason to build anything other than wind and solar. The liquid cores in a LFTR cannot crack. So they should be able to adjust their output. If we anyone manages to build a LFTR it will be very likely be load following so it can compliment wind and solar.
we need it lol ... get lost dude its a disaster... look at dana durnford
@@stefanr8232 Wind and Solar have too many limitations to completely replace fossil fuels own their own.
@@stefanr8232 ground-based geothermal is a better choice
@@infocat13 Geothermal has limitations too with the biggest in that it can not be cheaply applied everywhere. At the moment It can only places it can be cheaply applied is in geologically active regions such as Iceland
I'm glad that Yang is taking this approach for future energy.
Great explanations as always...ty
"Why do the powers that be fear Space Cowboys so much?"
I LOL'ed at this so much. Bravo to Matt for keeping such a straight face :)
Thorium reactors are just the thing to power civilization until and unless fusion reactors are created. wind and solar are so diffuse they cannot be as efficiently extracted & used. Thorium reactors can be placed close to cities where the power is needed, and it is available 24/7
An important point missed in this piece is LFTR reactors can use a gas turbine (jet engine) to generate power. No need for water. China is looking to build these out in the desert specifically because they don't need water.
For that Mars colony, you need energy to run it. LFTR reactors are on the order of 1,000x more energy dense per unit of mass than solar while at the same time being immune to Martian dust storms.
LFTR based nuclear electric is also probably how you want to haul cargo and fuel to Mar's orbit. As LFTR is mass efficient for the power produced and can be made to have a high conversion efficiency, meaning less radiator mass, your dedicated cargo and fuel hauler ship using say ion engines with an ISP of 5,000s, can easily make the trip to Mars' orbit and back with most of the transfer ship's mass being payload.
The questions to your previous video makes me strive to see it!
I love the participation of the smart and challenging audience. Keep it up!