How a Carbon-Free Gigawatt Power Plant Can Fit on a Cruise Ship

Current fission with uranium power plants are quite large and need to be next to an ocean or river for cooling. What about fission with thorium? Not so much. An entire gigawatt power plant can be roughly the size of your neighborhood CostCo or fit on a cruise ship. Also, it can be air cooled, so it doesn’t need to be next to a large body of water. This makes manufacturing and installation much cheaper and quicker than today’s fission with uranium plants, and these plants can be placed almost anywhere.

Not Your Grandpa’s Fission Reactor

Since a fission with thorium uses liquid fuel instead of solid fuel, the entire reactor system is much smaller. In order to transport energy from the reactor to the turbines, today’s fission with uranium plants use high-pressure water which require large pressure containers and expensive pipes to handle such high pressures. These are the large domes you may see on the plants today. Fission with thorium plants, on the other hand, use low pressure and high temperatures to transport heat and generate electricity. With high heat and low pressures, the plant uses standard pipes and equipment to make manufacturing and installation much easier, especially with the use of modular components.

Turbines That Can Fit in Your Room

The heat from the reactor is sent to turbines to generate electricity. To transport the heat, fission with thorium plants use high temperature and low pressure in liquid (molten salt) form. The heat from the liquid is transferred to other turbine suitable liquids or gases through the heat exchanger. This way, fission with thorium plants can use natural gas, helium, and even supercritical CO2 turbines which are much smaller than today’s fission with uranium plans which are limited to large steam turbines due to their high-pressure water setup. Gigawatt steam turbines require a building the size of a football field while a gigawatt CO2 turbine can fit in your living room, which saves on manufacturing, installation, and operation costs. Fission with thorium can also use natural gas turbines since they are available today and require a smaller footprint than steam turbines.

Fission with Thorium Power Plants can be Placed Almost Anywhere

With a smaller reactor system, standard liquid pipes, and smaller turbines, a fission with thorium plant can be installed almost anywhere. Since it can be air cooled, it can be installed in areas without major sources of water such as inland and in semi-desert areas. Since it is small, it can be safely placed on an offshore platform away from natural disasters. Since it can be built underground, it can be installed next to cities where most of the energy is being used. Since smaller units can fit in a shipping container, it can be transported to temporary locations to provide energy independence and security. Finally, since it can be modular and small, it can be installed close to every major city to provide hundreds of gigawatts low-cost carbon-free power all around the world.

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