[torstesu]

I completely agree, especially since Norway has large reserves of the stuff. One challenge though, is that uranium is also abundantly available and still much cheaper to mine than thorium. Another challenge is that it is not the fuel which drives the cost, as in conventional power plants; it is the capital cost concerned with building the reactors themselves. Therefore, a thorium-fueled reactor has to be considerably cheaper to build than a uranium-fueled reactor and it is easy to pose the question if this will ever be true. There has to be some serious subsidizing to incentivize commercial development, adaption and investment.

[drucken]

1. Thorium is a natural by-product, in fact it is in the waste slurry, from rare earth mineral mining.

2. Tiny amounts are required relative to uranium for electricity production. We have already mined in the West more than we will need for a hundred years, if we had production Molten Salt Reactors today.

3. It is far more electrically efficient than uranium.

So, there is no comparison purely based on which is the better fuel for fission. Thorium wins by multiple factors if not magnitude across many aspects, including fission waste prodcuts.

However, that said, the trust cost of fission is, as you mentioned, the upfront cost of the nuclear reactors. Since this quasi-government industry has seen little innovation in practice for 70+ years, conventional nuclear power plants have remained enormous capital sinks and risky endeavours.

There is now some serious research going into MSRs (including thorium) and other nuclear tech. But it is mainly being led by China, excluding sidetracking efforts like the Travelling Wave Reactors of Bill Gates et. al, who need as much energy as they can get.

[DanBC]

People are scared of "Nuclear" - mention uranium and many people will panic.

There's the problem of allowing some countries to have a Uranium energy programme which gives them access to the beginnings of nuclear weapons technology.