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Thorium
Thorium’s advantages are real, but they pay off only for a country with a particular need or a reactor built to use them, and that explains who is pursuing it today.
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Beyond Five Percent
This article argues that the 5% U-235 limit on commercial reactor fuel reflects history rather than physics, and that the enrichment optimization should be rerun with today’s numbers.
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The Path Forward
Chapters 26–27 set out documented commitments in today’s reactor pipeline, then the book’s four-stage roadmap toward a materially closed fuel cycle fed by material already above ground.
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The Back End
Chapters 13–16 follow spent fuel out of the reactor: what it contains, how reprocessing separates it, which fast reactors could burn it and what must still be isolated.
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History and Policy
Chapters 22–25 trace the decisions behind today’s US nuclear industry, from the 1977 reprocessing deferral and Vogtle to new licensing rules, the scale arithmetic and AI-driven demand.
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Adjacent Supply Chains
Chapters 17–21 examine five supply chains the standard fuel-cycle diagram leaves out: helium, medical and industrial isotopes, critical materials, the nuclear industrial base and the maritime frontier.
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The Reactor
Chapters 8–12 explain how a chain reaction is sustained and controlled, how reactor designs evolved, what makes them safe and where the world’s roughly 440-reactor fleet stands.
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The Front End
Chapters 4–7 follow uranium from ore to finished fuel assembly through mining and milling, conversion to UF₆, enrichment and fabrication, each a distinct industrial step.
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Foundations
Chapters 1–3 cover what nuclear energy is physically, where uranium comes from and why the industry runs on 0.7% U-235 fuel inherited from weapons programs.
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