Yes I have seen the advocacy for Liquid Fluoride Thorium reactors and there are some apparent tantalizing advantages over current Uranium reactor designs like ability to burn plutonium as a starter fuel, less production of transuranics, higher fuel burn efficiencies, etc.
The report says that in the last six months, Tehran enriched 970 kilos of uranium to reactor-grade levels, bringing its publicly known stockpile of low enriched uranium to 4, 105 kilos.
He worked out, among other things, how to separate plutonium from uranium in a reactor after it had been synthesised.
It has suspended plans to ship uranium fuel for the reactor, ostensibly because of late payments by Iran.
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State TV said Iran would prefer to buy uranium for its research reactor, rather than send its own stock abroad for enrichment, as proposed.
Tokyo's ability to both enrich uranium and reprocess spent reactor fuel has allowed it to amass roughly nine tons of weapons-usable plutonium on its soil.
North Korea is thought to have enough nuclear material for around six to 10 bombs and recently said it would restart its only reactor and uranium-enrichment plant to create more.
South Korean negotiators had been seeking a new nuclear-cooperation agreement with the U.S. that would allow it to begin enriching uranium and reprocessing spent reactor fuel, arguing these technologies are crucial for Seoul to expand and secure its civilian nuclear-power program.
For uranium to work in a nuclear reactor it must be enriched to contain 2-3% uranium-235 while weapons-grade uranium must contain 90% or more uranium-235.
Iran's government has said it needs the purer form of enriched uranium to fuel its research reactor in Tehran.
The Iranian government says it requires 20% enriched uranium for its medical research reactor in Tehran, but Western experts say it could be converted to weapons-grade material within six months.
It will be used to store and handle enriched uranium components for nuclear warheads and reactor fuel for nuclear-powered submarines.
Seoul has been pushing for a green light to enrich uranium and reprocess spent nuclear-reactor fuel to develop its nuclear power industry, but Washington has been opposed out of concern it could spur nuclear weapons proliferation.
"If they really reactivate their (plutonium) reactor and expand whatever uranium enrichment capability they have and they go into business of making nuclear weapons by the dozen for their own purposes or for sale, we have a whole different ball game, " O'Hanlon told a seminar in Washington on Monday.
At midweek, Mr Ahmadinejad had yet to unveil long-awaited proposals aimed at unblocking the diplomatic impasse that Iran caused last month when, after two years of interruptions, it resumed work in preparation for enriching uranium for use as reactor fuel, says Iran, though many governments suspect it of having bomb-making ambitions.
The complex offers Pyongyang two ways of making nuclear bombs - a uranium enrichment facility, and a nuclear reactor, from which the spent fuel can be turned into plutonium.
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Iran had enriched uranium to the low grades required for reactor fuel. 10.28.49 President Ahmadinejad Voice over I am officially announcing that Iran has joined the group of those countries which have nuclear technology.
Subsequently, France would convert the uranium into fuel rods for use in a reactor in Tehran that produces medical isotopes.
In return, the countries offered to supply Tehran with fuel for its medical research reactor, which requires 20% uranium, and to ease sanctions.
It has its hands in every part of the nuclear industry, from uranium mining to enrichment to fuel fabrication to reactor design and construction to maintenance and refueling to reprocessing and recycling.
The idea was for Iran to ship 1, 200kg of its low-enriched uranium overseas to produce fuel for a research reactor, thus leaving the country for a while with too small a stockpile with which to make a bomb.
U.S. and United Nations officials have documented what they describe as serious limitations in Iran's ability to quickly and efficiently produce the enriched uranium required to either fuel a nuclear power reactor or to build an atomic weapon.
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However, it does continue to pursue uranium enrichment and the construction of a heavy water reactor, both of which have military potential.
There was a moment when there existed the danger of a nuclear explosion, and they had to get the water out from under the reactor, so that a mixture of uranium and graphite wouldn't get into it with the water they would have formed a critical mass.
Iran, by comparison, is producing near-weapons-grade uranium, but it also has a heavy-water reactor being developed that could produce weapons-usable plutonium.
Iran also began building an actual weapons reactor, a 40 MW heavy water reactor at Arak, that would take natural uranium, and produce plutonium.
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"Israel has responded timely and in good faith to the question addressed to it regarding the possible origin on the uranium particles, traced in the site of the nuclear reactor in Deir al-Zour, " Mr Michaeli said.
It is not yet clear whether the North has restarted the reactor, nor is much known about the secret uranium-enrichment programme that, last October, prompted the start of the present crisis.
At Commons question time on 31 January 2011, Dr Fox said Tehran was continuing to pursue uranium enrichment as well as the construction of a heavy water reactor, both of which had "military potential".
Nuclear reactor fuel is enriched to 3-5% Uranium-235.
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