>>13745393Exotic allows are only in the core itself, the absolute supermajority of the steel required for a nuclear powerplant are mundande stuff like rebar for the containment building, steel for the boiler and cooling loop etc.
The power densities are just that big between solar and nuclear, and we are not even counting on delivery assurance.
>>13744723There is no meaningful difference between a thorium breeder reactor and a uranium breeder reactor. Both make the same pure fission product waste, which needs storage for 300 years. Both can be used to make nuclear weapons if you really want to, you can separate out the protactinium-233 before it decays into uranium-233 and thus get pure u-233 with no contamination of u-232.
The main difference between thorium and uranium is branding. Uranium and plutonium = bad, while Thorium is fresh, new and exciting. This is in of itself a good enough reason to pursue thorium, as public perception is the only real problem that nuclear power has.
