It marks the first long-term, stable operation of the technology, putting China at the forefront of a global race to harness thorium – considered a safer and more abundant alternative to uranium – for nuclear power.
The experimental reactor, located in the Gobi Desert in China’s west, uses molten salt as the fuel carrier and coolant, and thorium – a radioactive element abundant in the Earth’s crust – as the fuel source. The reactor is reportedly designed to sustainably generate 2 megawatts of thermal power.
Yeah, thorium reactors can’t meltdown because they need to constantly being powered by thorium, sick you can find anywhere. There’s a 2008 or so bill gates Ted talk on nuclear power that talks about it. For better or worse, china is going to lead the world regarding energy (and economy, seeing all those trump tariffs)
i did see that TED talk… i saw someone say that’s just the reactor design that’s safe, and uranium couldn’t melt down in that type of reactor either….
but that was just some comment and i’m not qualified to speculate on it… but meltdowns are the biggest problem with nuclear, imo….
i think we should just dump all of our nuclear waste off the coast of japan… and hopefully generate some kaijū