While i was reading Dr Arindam Chaudhuri's blog "Passionate About India", i found a very interesting fact on alternative energy for India and or may be for the whole world.
In a Japan like crisis, we should step forward to understand and learn why such powerful nuclear waste and nuclear reactors affect to many of our lives. The fact is Indian government bodies and political parties are busy making scams and are less bothered about consequences that may arise if we continue neglecting the usage of nuclear reactors. Radioactive waste from Uranium and Plutonium when not disposed safe can pollute the environment and when inhaled can cause mutation in our genome and finally lead to all kinds of cancer and other diseases. Instead the government should opt for an alternative fuel without producing radioactive waste. The alternative fuel that we can opt according to top scientist are - Solar energy, wind energy and Thorium.
According to Australian science writer Tim Dean, "thorium promises what uranium never delivered: abundant, safe and clean energy - and a way to burn up old radioactive waste." With a thorium nuclear reactor, Dean stresses a number of added benefits: there is no possibility of a meltdown, it generates power inexpensively, it does not produce weapons-grade by-products, and will burn up existing high-level waste as well as nuclear weapon stockpiles. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, of the British Daily Telegraph, suggests that "Obama could kill fossil fuels overnight with a nuclear dash for thorium," and could put "an end to our dependence on fossil fuels within three to five years." read more Wikipedia)
If the Indian government take a few more initiatives to make the country self sufficient in power and electricity then young and talented Indian will raise tomorrow. Thorium can be an alternative energy for India where there are more than 20 nuclear reactors producing tons of nuclear waste at the cost of million lives in near future. And God forbid if Tsunami come back again in India, where almost all the nuclear reactor are on the coastal regions then we would be shattered completely.
Second largest reserves of thorium.
Given India's vast reserves of thorium, harnessing technologies that would use thorium-based nuclear fuels would give India an edge. The country could emerge as an exporter of thorium material or fuels made out of thorium. Also, given India's massive power generating capacity expansion programme, opting for a thorium fuel cycle would make sense.
There are two types of thorium-based nuclear fuels — thorium and uranium and the other, thorium and plutonium. With the first, uranium, will come at a cost while plutonium comes free as it is a by-product of the process. The most dramatic savings happen if you use plutonium. However, fuel accounts for only 6% of costs of a nuclear plant. Indian scientists have already done work on thorium, that puts India in a favourable position.
Given thorium's obvious advantages what accounts for its lack of popularity as a nuclear fuel?
The fact is that there has been little research and development in the nuclear fuel field. R&D in this area has been somewhere between flat and dead in the past 25 years. Thorium Power has an advantage as developing anything in the nuclear sector requires a long-time. Thorium Power's work in the past will give it an edge over companies that are just about starting to explore this field.
Global deposits of thorium:
• 360,000 India
• 300,000 Australia
• 170,000 Norway
• 160,000 United States
• 100,000 Canada
• 35,000 South Africa
• 16,000 Brazil
• 95,000 Others
Thorium could cost a lot less than uranium fuel because it doesn’t need to be enriched to be used as fuel. As stated before, enriched uranium oxide gas costs $1633/kg, and 1-gigawatt nuclear power plants buy about $30 million in fuel annually, which works out to about 20,000 kg. You can read more at the wikipedia entry for the uranium market.
Even if the price of thorium never goes below $50/kg, it still represents a factor-of-32 economy improvement over uranium oxide. If a 1-gigawatt thorium reactor consumes amounts of thorium similar to the amount of uranium consumed by nuclear reactors today, fueling it for a year would only cost $1 milion, using the $50/kg price point, or $200,000, using the $10/kg price point.
For a $40,000 reactor, and $1,000/year in operating costs, we can get enough electricity for 100 people, which is enough to accomplish all sorts of antics, like running thousands of desktop nanofactories non-stop.
For a country like India, it would be wise if we switch to more safer and clean energy. If private equities start spending for techno entrepreneurs country like India, then the one major problem of the country can be solved by generating Power (electricity) and employment.
In a Japan like crisis, we should step forward to understand and learn why such powerful nuclear waste and nuclear reactors affect to many of our lives. The fact is Indian government bodies and political parties are busy making scams and are less bothered about consequences that may arise if we continue neglecting the usage of nuclear reactors. Radioactive waste from Uranium and Plutonium when not disposed safe can pollute the environment and when inhaled can cause mutation in our genome and finally lead to all kinds of cancer and other diseases. Instead the government should opt for an alternative fuel without producing radioactive waste. The alternative fuel that we can opt according to top scientist are - Solar energy, wind energy and Thorium.
According to Australian science writer Tim Dean, "thorium promises what uranium never delivered: abundant, safe and clean energy - and a way to burn up old radioactive waste." With a thorium nuclear reactor, Dean stresses a number of added benefits: there is no possibility of a meltdown, it generates power inexpensively, it does not produce weapons-grade by-products, and will burn up existing high-level waste as well as nuclear weapon stockpiles. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, of the British Daily Telegraph, suggests that "Obama could kill fossil fuels overnight with a nuclear dash for thorium," and could put "an end to our dependence on fossil fuels within three to five years." read more Wikipedia)
If the Indian government take a few more initiatives to make the country self sufficient in power and electricity then young and talented Indian will raise tomorrow. Thorium can be an alternative energy for India where there are more than 20 nuclear reactors producing tons of nuclear waste at the cost of million lives in near future. And God forbid if Tsunami come back again in India, where almost all the nuclear reactor are on the coastal regions then we would be shattered completely.
Second largest reserves of thorium.
Given India's vast reserves of thorium, harnessing technologies that would use thorium-based nuclear fuels would give India an edge. The country could emerge as an exporter of thorium material or fuels made out of thorium. Also, given India's massive power generating capacity expansion programme, opting for a thorium fuel cycle would make sense.
There are two types of thorium-based nuclear fuels — thorium and uranium and the other, thorium and plutonium. With the first, uranium, will come at a cost while plutonium comes free as it is a by-product of the process. The most dramatic savings happen if you use plutonium. However, fuel accounts for only 6% of costs of a nuclear plant. Indian scientists have already done work on thorium, that puts India in a favourable position.
Given thorium's obvious advantages what accounts for its lack of popularity as a nuclear fuel?
The fact is that there has been little research and development in the nuclear fuel field. R&D in this area has been somewhere between flat and dead in the past 25 years. Thorium Power has an advantage as developing anything in the nuclear sector requires a long-time. Thorium Power's work in the past will give it an edge over companies that are just about starting to explore this field.
Global deposits of thorium:
• 360,000 India
• 300,000 Australia
• 170,000 Norway
• 160,000 United States
• 100,000 Canada
• 35,000 South Africa
• 16,000 Brazil
• 95,000 Others
Thorium could cost a lot less than uranium fuel because it doesn’t need to be enriched to be used as fuel. As stated before, enriched uranium oxide gas costs $1633/kg, and 1-gigawatt nuclear power plants buy about $30 million in fuel annually, which works out to about 20,000 kg. You can read more at the wikipedia entry for the uranium market.
Even if the price of thorium never goes below $50/kg, it still represents a factor-of-32 economy improvement over uranium oxide. If a 1-gigawatt thorium reactor consumes amounts of thorium similar to the amount of uranium consumed by nuclear reactors today, fueling it for a year would only cost $1 milion, using the $50/kg price point, or $200,000, using the $10/kg price point.
For a $40,000 reactor, and $1,000/year in operating costs, we can get enough electricity for 100 people, which is enough to accomplish all sorts of antics, like running thousands of desktop nanofactories non-stop.
For a country like India, it would be wise if we switch to more safer and clean energy. If private equities start spending for techno entrepreneurs country like India, then the one major problem of the country can be solved by generating Power (electricity) and employment.
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