Talk:Thorium-based nuclear power

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Weinberg vs Rickover

One source (the Wired article from 2010) claims that Alvin Weinberg was forced out from ORNL by Hyman Rickover, because Rickover wanted plutonium production from commercial power reactors, while Weinberg advocated for the thorium fuel cycle. This seems like a highly dubious claim, given both the history of thorium power in the US as well as Rickover himself. I can't find any other sources to substantiate this claim. It's also contradicted earlier in the History section by the Teller source claiming that funding for thorium MSRs was largely scrapped due to competition from LMFBRs. I've marked it with a dubious tag. H2so4aq (talk) 04:55, 18 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Upon further investigation, Richard Martin (the writer of the Wired article) writes in his 2012 book Superfuel that this rumor is in fact false. H2so4aq (talk) 01:51, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Needs More Recent Updates

A lot of the references in this article date from 2000 thru 2018. LFTRs are supposed to be a hot new topic, but this article doesn't seem to confirm that. Examples:

In the "Power projects" introduction, all the footnotes are from 2013
In the India section, "Validation of its core reactor physics was underway by late 2017." Well, in 2025, we're all still waiting for results.
China - TMSR-LF1 section: "As of 24 June 2021, China has reported that the Gobi molten salt reactor will be completed on schedule with tests beginning as early as September 2021." Anything happening in the last 4 years?
India: In 2014, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre had a plan for an AHWR reactor. "Validation of its core reactor physics was underway by late 2017." OK, good but that was 8 years ago.

The overall impression is that Thorium energy has a large number of paralyzed or failed projects. But it seems to be active in other places than Wikipedia. Needs work? OsamaBinLogin (talk) 03:29, 6 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

See the China section's update of 26 Jul 2024. See also the Indonesia section.-- Ancheta Wis (talk | contribs) 12:53, 6 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

History addition

I believe there was an incident where American (or allied) scientists found residue of Thorium above Germany, leading to the thought of a German Manhattan Project equivalent

Correct me if I am wrong. BigBoiWikiWhale (talk) 17:50, 20 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]