Conceptual design of a thorium target for molten salt transmutation systems

A spallation target constructed of thorium metal has been designed for applications using molten‐salt as the target coolant. The design consists of an array of wire‐wrapped, hastelloy‐clad, thorium rods in which a parabolic void region is introduced in the upper regions. Each target rod is approximately 1 m in length, 3.1 cm in diameter, and has a clad thickness of 0.05 cm; 140 rods are arranged in a triangular lattice with a pitch of 3.2 cm, which results in a cylindrical target configuration with a radius of 20 cm and an estimated yield of 17 neutrons/proton for 800 MeV protons.