Using high temperature gas-cooled reactors for greenhouse gas reduction and energy neutral production of phosphate fertilizers

This paper discusses how high temperature gas-cooled reactors (HTGRs) could provide energy for phosphate rock (PR) processing while extracting uranium (U) from the processed PR that can again be used as raw material for nuclear reactor fuel that may power the greenhouse gas lean energy source employed. First estimates using a HTGR presently constructed in China (HTR-PM) conclude that a concentration of approximately 80 mg/kg U in PR is sufficiently high for energy neutral wet acid PR processing with waste treatment and a concentration of approximately 110 mg/kg U is adequate to promote energy intensive high quality thermal phosphoric acid production. In addition, the recovery of U from PRs yields beneficial side-effects in a way that U loads on agricultural soils are reduced and consequently contamination of groundwater with U will be diminished.