Thorium reactors the future

Monazite, from which Thorium is extracted, is abundant in Kerala state's coastline.

India must introspect on which nuclear fuel it will choose to achieve its goal of generating 20,000 MW of nuclear power by 2020 — uranium, which the whole world uses, or thorium, a fuel India can source locally and has technical capabilities in, but which remains unproven commercially? The choice will determine over Rs 1 lakh crore of immediate orders for equipment and project management services, a lifetime of maintenance services contracts and an opportunity to stamp the future of India’s ambitious civil nuclear energy programme with the technology’s supremacy.

"If anything is to be approved, it should be thorium," says Seth Grae, president and CEO of US-based nuclear power consulting firm thorium Power. "India should use local thorium reserves. Compared to other extractions, thorium extraction is a simple procedure."

The lobby working against thorium is that of the established reactor builders, technology providers and nuclear-plant operators, who would rather milk their investments in uranium fuel technology they are currently using rather than spend millions on learning and ratifying a new technology.

Thorium is back in nuclear debates almost 50 years after it was banished as an unviable technology. Ironically, the world's first nuclear power plant at Pennsylvania in the US was built using thorium fuel. Although thorium is three-four times more abundant in nature than uranium, the West embraced uranium as the programme could double up for nuclear weapons too. Thorium, though, has several advantages:

Unlike uranium, thorium cannot be readily used as weapon-grade fissile material

Thorium reactors produce 70 per cent less nuclear waste compared to uranium reactors

Spent fuel from thorium reactors is 90 per cent less radioactive than uranium spent fuel

Thorium fuel is 5-10 per cent cheaper and less price-volatile than uranium fuel

Thorium is three-four times more abundant on Earth than uranium

The entire Indian nuclear programme is built around the heavy-water technology that is better suited for thorium use. No other nation, except Russia and, to an extent, Germany, has since worked on heavy-water technology development. More than five decades ago when Homi Bhabha conceived the nuclear programme, it was tailored to eventually use thorium because India has 290,000 tonnes of thorium reserves — the world's second largest behind Australia’s 300,000 tonnes.



India is the only country to be setting up a 300-MW plant at Kalpakkam near Chennai that will be a stepping stone to commercial thorium power generation; the plant is being designed for an astonishing 100-year lifetime! It had been conceived after a trial-run in a 30-KW reactor, also at Kalpakkam. As the next step, a thorium reactor is currently being vetted at Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (Barc) in Mumbai for technology and design.

"India is ahead of the curve of almost everybody in thorium-fuel reactors," says D.V. Kapur, director of Reliance Industries and former power secretary. "But, at what stage thorium reactors will be possible is still a question."

Businessworld
Rajeev Dubey