Not sure if that's all China is doing, they recently announced they want the first thorium reactor online within 10 years instead of 25. If it wasn't for Nixon cutting funding for thorium in the 60s in favour of plutonium for research into nuclear bombs, most American reactors these days could very well have been using thorium. My guess is if China get's their first thorium reactor online, fully functioning, they are going to multiply them balls to the walls much like they did their coal plants.
Hadn't heard that. I remain skeptical. Bill McKibben does a pretty nice breakdown on the economics of nuclear power in Eaarth where he argues that once you get rid of the externalities, nuclear isn't much of a saver economically or environmentally. China, on the other hand, is all about externalities so that would be a reason for them to pursue it, particularly for export. Dunno. Got a link? I'm curious.
Here is the original article about the information: link Who knows what could happen. I have been following Lightbridge Corporation for a while now. They say the hard part is not the technology, just convincing governments to get on board. Edit: Also, I don't know about them exporting this if they do get it working. I think China is starting to clean up it's act, the air pollution problem is beyond critical.
Interesting. This gives me pause, though: Of course, living in California I see their coal pollution, so what the hell. Learned something new today. Thanks!Researchers working on the project said they were under unprecedented "war-like" pressure to succeed and some of the technical challenges they faced were difficult, if not impossible to solve in such a short period.