that sickening feeling., page-14

Further research into PNG's power issues,I looked at geothermal power and found that the heavy oil and diesel fueled generators are supposed to be retired in PNG in 2015,and are only to be used in emergencies.

Putting further pressure on PNG's seriously low electricity generating capacity.

With thanks to tobyjack on the commodities thread,what about Thorium power?

Thorium reactors could soon power Indonesia, Chile

Thorium offers many advantages over the uranium that powers all of the world’s 435 commercial nuclear reactors. Among them: it’s safer, there’s about four times more of it on Earth, it leaves less long-lived waste, and it’s comparatively difficult to fashion a bomb from its waste.

Thorium Power Canada (TPC), based in Toronto, is in “advanced discussions” with Indonesian and Chilean authorities to supply a small thorium reactor to each country, said CEO David Kerr, who I spoke with via Skype recently.

Indonesia could install a reactor on the island of Kalimantan in as soon as two years, Kerr said. The reactor would either connect to the grid in the rapidly expanding country, or power a water desalination plant, he noted.

The reactor in Chile would power water desalination for Copiapo, a dry northern city about 40 miles inland from the Pacific ocean.

Kerr said the Indonesian project would likely go ahead before the Chilean one. “Our only constraint there (in Indonesia) is the financing,” he said, noting that TPC needs to raise $50 million before building proceeds for Kalimantan.

The TPC reactors will have generating capacities of between 10 megawatts and 100 megawatts, fitting them into the “small modular” category that offers cost and manufacturing benefits, and that lends itself to deployment in remote off-grid areas like mining operations. Kerr said Chilean and Argentine mining companies are interested in the TPC Thorium Reactor (Copiapo is near Chile’s San Jose mine where 33 miners spent 69 days trapped underground in 2010).

http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/bulletin/thorium-reactors-could-soon-power-indonesia-chile/20588

Thorium stacks up against gas prices

http://www.dauvergne.com/cost-comparison/

Raider