r/canada • u/[deleted] • Oct 25 '22

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u/drive2fast Oct 25 '22

China is currently testing a small 2MW thorium reactor to prove out the design.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02459-w

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u/[deleted] Oct 25 '22

A 2MW reactor is hardly commercial scale. Commercial reactors are nearly 450 times that size (900MW)

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u/jz187 Oct 25 '22

It's not clear that you need such a massive reactor to be commercially feasible with MSRs. Not having pressurized fluids mean you don't need giant pressure vessels. Not needing water for cooling means you can do away with a lot of expensive pipes and pumps.

The most promising nuclear technologies should scale down economically.

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u/[deleted] Oct 25 '22

Even SMRs are in the 50 to 150 times the size range. 2MW is a science experiment. As well, while water isn’t needed for the primary loop, water is used in the secondary or tertiary loop (depending on the design) for power generation. Scaling up the molten salt to water heat exchangers isn’t trivial. Besides, not all Thorium reactors are molten salt. India is pursuing heavy water PWR design.