[vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″][/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/2″][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″]Innovation is also happening on the grid. Seeking new energy sources, India and China have emerged as world leaders in nuclear energy powered by an element that has been largely overlooked by the rest of the world: thorium. The radioactive heavy metal is believed to be three or four times as abundant as uranium, the element used in conventional nuclear power. If all the world’s electricity needs were met by thorium, we would still have 500 years’ worth of Facebook posts and electric car trips to the grocery store — and energy-poor India could be sitting on a quarter of the world’s supply, making it the Saudi Arabia of a heretofore obscure energy source.
Unlike uranium, thorium is difficult to turn into nuclear weapons, hence its abandonment by other world powers whose research programs leaned toward the bomb-making kind. But for energy production, thorium actually produces less waste. That waste is itself safer than that of uranium-driven nuclear power, and only lasts a few centuries — a hundred times less than uranium.
India and China are both diving into thorium power production. Although neither yet has a full-scale plant online, India has big plans, intending to ramp up nuclear’s share of the energy pie to 30 per cent of the country’s total by 2050, and thorium will be a part of that mix. China, meanwhile, has committed 750 scientists and engineers to developing the country’s thorium program, which is meant to have a prototype reactor running in 2015.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/2″][mk_image src=”https://energy-exchange.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/FCR-433516-copy.jpg” image_width=”800″ image_height=”880″ crop=”false” lightbox=”false” frame_style=”simple” target=”_self” caption_location=”outside-image” align=”left” margin_bottom=”10″ title=”Nepal has the highest gas price of any Asian country, so saving fuel by introducing electric versions of gas jeepneys is a priority.” desc=”PHOTO: THINKSTOCK”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″]Such innovations will be crucial as energy needs in Asia keep soaring. China alone is expected to add 300 million new people to its middle class by 2025, while the consumption habits of this group are growing. That pattern is typical of a region that has hit a surge in prosperity over the past two decades. So far that has manifested in a massive ramping up of coal production (in 2013 coal accounted for 65 per cent of the nation’s overall energy consumption), since it’s a cheap, proven energy source that can be brought online quickly. But the environmental downsides of coal are of increasing concern both locally and globally, leading to a recognized desire for alternatives.
Necessity is, after all, the mother of innovation, and developments such as electric bikes, trikes and cars are saving on urban pollution, but increasing the strain on the system. The solution appears to be found partly in dispersed grids that can supply local markets with clean energy, and partly with entirely new energy sources such as thorium. With Asia’s slice of the global energy pie growing, the region’s energy decisions, compromises and innovations will play no small part in the future of the world’s energy systems.[mk_font_icons icon=”icon-stop” size=”small” padding_horizental=”4″ padding_vertical=”4″ circle=”false” align=”none”][/vc_column_text][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″ el_class=”Story-Author”]By Jimmy Thomson[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][mk_padding_divider size=”40″][mk_button dimension=”three” size=”large” outline_skin=”dark” outline_active_color=”#fff” outline_hover_color=”#333333″ bg_color=”#13bdd2″ text_color=”light” icon=”moon-reading” url=”/resources/energy-exchange-magazine/issue-3/” target=”_self” align=”left” fullwidth=”true” margin_top=”0″ margin_bottom=”15″ animation=”fade-in”]Read more stories from the Winter 2015 issue of Energy Exchange magazine[/mk_button][/vc_column][/vc_row]