ThorCon’s predecessor company was a shipbuilder, building oil tankers. They are applying this construction expertise to building complete nuclear powerplants in ship’s hulls that can be floated to their destination. They can be returned to the factory for servicing if needed. By using existing shipyards for building the reactors, they should be able to reduce build time to one year. Construction costs are a huge part of current reactor economics.
ThorCon is currently building a reactor to be tested and used in Indonesia. One challenge is securing a source for HALEU (High Assay Low Enriched Uranium), the 19.7% enriched uranium their reactor uses for fuel. Most current reactor fuel is 5% enriched and is referred to as LEU. ThorCon’s reactor can use LEU, but the fuel will then need to be replaced every 2 years instead of every 8 years.
Each reactor requires 5.3 Kg of 19.7% enriched uranium, and 9.0 Kg of Thorium per day.
- Molten salt reactor
- Thermal spectrum
- Thorium/Uranium fuel