China Just Did Something CRAZY with Nuclear Power

This is China’s Gobi Desert and what the Chinese government is building in these sand dunes will absolutely shock you. In the past, the Gobi Desert posed a massive challenge for China, harsh weather conditions created sandstorms that threatened major Chinese cities, destroyed farmlands, buried villages, and forced people to abandon their homes, but now China is planning to use these sand dunes to host China’s latest nuclear project that could completely change the future of China and even our entire planet.

Inside China’s Thorium Reactor

China’s government just announced it will launch its first thorium reactor, marking a significant milestone in the country’s pursuit of advanced nuclear technologies. You might have never heard of thorium but it’s potential is a game changer for the energy industry. Traditional nuclear plants use uranium, but thorium is safer, reduces waste, has better fuel efficiency, and is suitable for use in arid landlocked areas, exactly like the Gobi Desert.

But here is the one stat that makes this announcement truly remarkable for China. China is home to one of the world’s largest supplies of thorium, and by untapping this resource and becoming the first country to commercialize this resource, China will have enough energy to power the country for the next 20,000 years!  Seriously 20,000 years! Our world probably won’t exist 20,000 years from now so the big takeaway here is that China just discovered the tech that will give it unlimited energy for basically eternity.

Now China isn’t the first country to experiment with thorium and in fact it was the United States who first built molten salt reactors in the 1960’s that showed the feasibility of using thorium. However, the US failed to make significant progress due to a lack of government funding. Don’t forget the US was in the middle of the space race with the Soviet Union during this time and resources, time, and most importantly federal budgets were allocated to NASA instead.

Interesting enough, India holds the world’s largest supply of thorium and has been trying to build a thorium-based nuclear power plant since the 1980s. But India lacks the technical expertise and once again the government funding needed to advance this project. And this is where China’s government and long-term planning give it a supreme advantage over other countries. As we all know, the Chinese government is a one-party state and when it comes to investing and building infrastructure projects once the party decides to move forward, there is no red tape, just clear and precise actions to achieve the desired outcome. Let me give you a clear example:

In 2018, India decided to follow in China’s footsteps and build its first high speed rail project. However, the latest report shows that after 5 years of construction, only 30% of the project has been completed. The project is now over budget and not expected to be finished until 2028, a full 10 years after construction began.

For comparison, when China’s government committed to building a high-speed rail. It took China only 3 years to build it and a large part of the success is simple, clear direction from the government. My point in bringing up India’s high-speed rail is not to say India is bad and China is good, but it’s merely to point out one of China’s greatest strengths. Almost no country in the world can compare to China in terms of efficiency and engineering and the country’s ability to get projects done.

Fangchenggang Nuclear Power Plant, Guangxi

Building a molten salt reactor that converts thorium into energy is an EXTREMELY complicated process. China’s reactor was expected to take six years to build but Chinese scientists and engineers completed the work in just three years as the work went more smoothly than expected. China’s government then sent in environmental experts who spent more than two years verifying and testing the reactor to make sure it met the highest safety standards. After confirming the project’s safety, China’s nuclear division issued an operational permit for the nation’s first thorium reactor on June 7^th and now can operate under the permit for the next decade.

So why is China’s new thorium reactor so special? Unlike traditional nuclear power plants that require water, this new thorium reactor doesn’t need any water for cooling and that’s why China can build this new project directly in dry, arid places like the Gobi Desert. Also, for those worrying about China’s nuclear intentions, this technology is extremely safe to use, because unlike uranium, thorium cannot be used to make nuclear weapons.

Of course, all of this is part of China’s plan to becoming carbon neutral by 2060. China is already the world leader in renewable energy and the Chinese government is looking at combining these new molten salt reactors with its existing wind and solar plants to provide stable electricity supply for its large population for the foreseeable future.

But there is also something special about this new reactor. Beyond Thorium, a molten salt reactor can also burn U-238, which is the waste product of existing nuclear water reactors. Without getting super technical, this simple means China can use its new thorium reactor to convert existing nuclear waste into clean, carbon-neutral energy. Again, the potential for this new reactor is game changing and could revolutionize China’s energy needs for the future.

Simply put, we are just witnessing yet another area that China is quietly and quickly becoming the world leader. China built the world’s most advanced 5G network and is already working on 6G technology. China operates the most advanced and developed high speed rail network. Last year, China produced 97% of the silicon wafers that goes into solar panels. While Western countries want to go green and reduce their carbon footprint, no company in the world can produce an electric vehicle without the battery technology from China. And how about the EV vehicles themselves?

Just last week the Ford Chairman admitted the US can’t yet compete with China on EVs. The main takeaway I want you to learn from today’s video is that China is an integral part of our global economy and if we are smart, we should be looking at ways to partner with China, because it’s China who is inventing the future technology that will change our world.

         I mean here is a fascinating article from the NY Times that was released just last week explaining why the US Electric Grid isn’t ready for the Energy Transition. Much like the politics inside America divides the country, the electrical grid in the US is split into 3 zones, split between the West, East, and finally Texas.

Those grids are then further divided into regional operators who compete against each other for profits.

This fragmented energy grid is now the biggest obstacle the US faces in its efforts to fight climate change. Without an integrated system, the US can’t tap into the wind and solar energy to reduce its carbon footprint.

On the flip side, China operates two grids one in the North and one in the South, but the two grids were synchronized in 2005 and in 2011 every province in China was interconnected on one system. This is a huge advantage for China, which has allowed the country to reap the benefits of becoming the #1 renewable energy producer and fuel it’s energy needs through a combination of wind, solar, nuclear, and now thorium.

So now let’s shift this conversation into why China’s nuclear development is not only important for the future of China, but also the future of our world. The past 16 months have taught us just how important energy is to the global economy. With Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, European countries have been thrust in the middle of the worst energy crisis in over 50 years as European countries struggle to decouple from natural gas giant Russia. In fact, many European countries are still buying Russian gas, they are just paying nearly 3 times as much for it and buying it through the secondary market from countries like India.

China is becoming the world’s leader in nuclear development and in the future should cooperate with both developing nations and developed nations like the UK and France to help them build better nuclear energy solutions. Why the UK and France? Because both countries are committed to increasing its nuclear energy needs to offset its carbon footprint.

The British government aims to triple its nuclear capacity by 2050 to power 25% of the country’s power needs, meanwhile French President Macron, who has been very friendly with China’s government and pushing France into closer partnerships with Beijing, announced last year plans to build another 6 nuclear reactors with an option for an additional eight. Currently France derives about 70% of its electricity from nuclear sources. Despite the need and desire to use nuclear energy, Western countries have fallen behind in nuclear technology, equipment manufacturing, and construction. Of the 31 nuclear reactors that have started construction since 2017 all but four are of Russian or Chinese design.

            China only started producing nuclear power in 1991 but in just 3 short decades China is now one of the most important players in the industry and arguably holds the keys to the future of this industry. The new thorium molten salt reactor in the Gobi Desert is going to be a game changer for China and if Western countries are smart, they’ll put political differences aside, embrace Chinese technology and solve their complex energy needs. Whether Western politicians can make this decision has yet to be seen but one thing is certain. China’s government is fully committed to making this energy production a top priority and when that happens it usually means it gets done.