At a test site in Norway, Thor Energy has successfully created a thorium nuclear reactor -- but not in the sense that most people think of when they hear the word thorium. The Norwegians haven't solved the energy crisis and global warming in one fell swoop -- they haven't created a cold fusion thorium reactor. What they have done, though, which is still very cool, is use thorium instead of uranium in a conventional nuclear reactor. In one fell swoop, thorium fuel, which is safer, less messy to clean up, and not prone to nuclear weapons proliferation, could quench the complaints of nuclear power critics everywhere.