Lord Hutton wants to use all of the tools in the (nuclear power) box!

Lord Hutton, chairman of the Nuclear Industry Association was interviewed by Oliver Wright of The Independant on 06 August 2011 :
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/hutton-fears-nuclear-industry-has-lost-confidence-of-the-public-2332663.html
The report concluded with this statement: "The industry faces a very big challenge in responding to Fukushima and we will have to use all of the tools in the box to do so," Lord Hutton said.

There are a lot of unwieldy cross-cut saws in your tool box, Lord Hutton, which are safe most of the time but can take your finger off, if you don't watch out (PWRs). On the other hand, the spokeshave  so elegant in design and so inherently safe, is utterly absent and not even discussed (LFTRs).

Surely, sometime, somewhere, someone in Government or advising Government has to take this technology to heart and give UK manufacturing a chance at a piece of the action, before it's too late and the imports from China start to roll in.

I can only keep plugging away - anyone who reads this can have a pop at anyone who they think should be listening. This is my letter to Lord Hutton: 

                                                                                     06 August 2011.

     Lord Hutton of Furness

     Westminster,

     House of Lords,

     London,

     SW1A 0PW.

Dear Lord Hutton,

“Fukushima has changed the game”:

Your interview with The Independent, reported by Oliver Wright today has prompted me to write to you regarding my correspondence with Professor Paul Howarth of the NNL. I enclose my original letter and a copy of his reply.

Please note that I am asking no more than an opportunity for Kirk Sorensen, the world’s leading authority on Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTRs), to present the case to you, or the Select Committee on Energy and Climate Change, or your NNL or other nuclear advisors.

You could bury the primary circuit of a 100 MWe LFTR in the middle of Wembley Stadium and you would be hard pushed to design an accident that would expel radiotoxic substances to the endangerment of a capacity crowd. Gravity is the only force acting upon the molten reactor core of a LFTR and nothing short of a direct hit by an asteroid or a ‘bunker-buster’ will move stuff upwards and out.

If you want to get the UK public onside, in respect of promoting the safety of nuclear power generation, find the cheapest way of meeting our carbon targets and kick-start a technology with which UK manufacturing can fully cope, then LFTRs become the unique front-runner for consideration.

I would be most interested to know if you have fully investigated LFTR potential. If you have, would you be kind enough to apprise me of your findings. If you have not, are there any prospects of you inviting Kirk Sorensen over to present the up to date information to you and your colleagues and staff?

Yours sincerely,