Lars Jorgensen of ThorConPower.com gives an in-depth look at their THORium CONverter reactor in Bali.
ThorCon is a molten-salt fission reactor. Unlike all current nuclear reactors, the fuel is in liquid form. It can be moved around with a pump and passively drained. This 500 MW fission power plant is encapsulated in a hull, built in a shipyard, towed to a shallow water site, ballasted to the seabed. ThorCon is a straightforward scale-up of the successful United States Oak Ridge National Laboratory Molten Salt Reactor Experiment (MSRE).
The complete ThorCon is manufactured in 150 to 500 ton blocks in a shipyard, assembled, then towed to the site. This produces order of magnitude improvements in productivity, quality control, and build time. A single large reactor yard can turn out twenty gigawatts of ThorCon power plants per year. ThorCon is a system for building power plants.
ThorCon has been working with the Indonesian government to add reliable electric power to the grid. In 2019 the Ministry of Energy completed a successful study of the safety, economics, and grid impact of the 500 MW prototype ThorConIsle. Phase 1 is to build and test it with step by step commissioning, ending in a type license for future power plants. Phase 2 is shipyard production of ThorCon plants to provide an additional 3 GW of cheap, reliable electric power.
Scientists attending the International Conference on Emerging Nuclear Energy Systems in Bali, Indonesia, were excited by ThorCon CEO Lars Jorgensen’s presentation of the design of the TMSR-500 liquid fission power plant. Nuclear engineering professors termed the design brilliant and clever. The conference added a second session to answer questions in detail. Nuclear professionals from Malaysia, Brazil, Japan, and South Africa engaged in subsequent discussions. Indonesia’s former Minister of Energy came specifically to hear about ThorCon.
The ThorCon team then returned to state-owned shipyard PT PAL Indonesia, which had begun reviewing ThorCon specifications in July. Potentially PAL can manufacture the exchangeable Cans which contain the liquid fuel, pump, and reactor vessel. Teams from PAL and ThorCon spent two days discussing specifications. ThorCon is revising them, and PAL will verify its capability and provide a budgetary cost estimate. PAL is seeking to diversify its shipbuilding business to include the energy sector. “The thorium molten salt power plant can produce clean energy cheaper than coal, and could be a reliable energy system in a low-carbon economy” -PAL.
This video was captured by Bob Effendi on 2019-10-16. Bob posted his original edit here:
https://youtu.be/EyApF90-GEI
...Bob also shared his raw footage with me, as I was interested in applying iZotope RX 7 noise reduction (and echo-removal) audio processing to make Lars easier to hear. I don't think my edit nor Bob's original have great audio, but perhaps you'll find one easier to listen to than the other.
Thanks to Bob for access to his footage. Hopefully this alternate edit will help ThorCon tell their story.
I've also included brief audio snippets from Rod Adam's podcast "Atomic Show", as Lars made some clarifying (audio) remarks after this video was shot:
https://atomicinsights.com/atomic-sho...
ThorCon Power: https://thorconpower.com
My nuclear-power video projects (MSR, Thorium, etc.) can be monitored here:
http://patreon.com/thorium
-Gord
original
gordonmcdowell channel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oB1IrzDDI9g
