One rather important thing about thorium vs. uranium that is never spelled out in most texts but is very essential- thorium is what they call a "fertile" materi

One rather important thing about thorium vs. uranium that is never spelled out in most texts but is very essential- thorium is what they call a "fertile" material, whereas uranium is a "fissile" material. Fertile materials can produce nuclear energy, but they require fissile material to get the reaction started. In theory Thorium's economics are far better than those of Uranium, but the above factoid makes a full switchover complicated.