Bill Gates May Build Small Nuclear Reactor

Hugh Pickens writes "TerraPower, an energy start-up backed by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, is in discussions with Toshiba Corp. to develop a small-scale nuclear reactor that would represent a long-term bet to make nuclear power safer and cheaper. Toshiba confirmed it is in preliminary discussions with TerraPower, a unit of Intellectual Ventures, a patent-holding concern partially funded by Gates. Toshiba spokesman Keisuke Ohmori says the two sides are talking about how they could collaborate on nuclear technology, although discussions are still in early stages and that nothing has been decided on investment or development. TerraPower has publicly said its Traveling Wave Reactor could run for decades on depleted uranium without refueling (PDF) or removing spent fuel from the device. The reactor, the company has said, could be safer, cheaper and more socially acceptable than today's reactors. Gates's recent focus on nuclear power has been fueled by an interest in developing new power systems for developing countries where he says that new energy solutions are needed to combat climate change. Terrapower faces a lengthy, multi-year process to get its "traveling wave" reactor concept reviewed by regulators but if TerraPower succeeds in advancing its plans, it could provide an alternative blueprint for the nuclear industry at a time when new reactors may be coming online."

Comments

Non story

[Nuskrad]

Bill Gates invests in a company. He's not personally building a reactor like some kind of comic book super villain.

Re:Non story

[AndrewNeo]

No, but you think Slashdot is going to portray Gates as the hero?

Re:Non story

[Idarubicin]

Troll much?

Gates' actual quote:

“if we do a really great job on vaccines, health care, reproductive health services, we could lower that [his initial 2050 global population projection of 9-billion] by perhaps about 10 to 15 percent.”

Sure, I suppose that could mean that he advocates surreptitiously sterilizing Third-World women under the guise of providing health services.

But what it probably means is that he believes societies with better access to health care have a greater fraction of children survive to adulthood and see far, far, far fewer of their women die in childbirth. Access to birth control permits women to space out their children more, with benefits to the health of mother and child. Those societies (like, say, the villianous dystopias of Canada and Switzerland) tend to have lower overall birth rates and stable populations.

Re:Not what we need

[Vectormatic]

I'm right on it, just give me oh... say.. 20 years?

anyway, old school 1960s fission isnt all that interessting, these newer reactors which burn spent fuel from the old school reactors, is very very interesting. It reduces the amount of radioactive waste we have to store, and extracts energy in the process. Fusion, is off course the ultimate goal in nuclear technology, but optimising fission to the point where waste is kept to a minimum, and fuel cycles/reactor designs are far more efficient and safe is definitely a good thing

Re:Not what we need

[Talderas]

I still be the greens will oppose this tech under the grounds that it doesn't reduce waste ENOUGH.

It will encourage growth, the very last thing the greens want. Expect to see opposition to it.

Re:Oblig Windows Ref

[Mindcontrolled]

To be fair - this is a hard day for the poor average slashbot. Should he praise nukular power or damn Bill Gates to hell? Decisions, decisions...

Re:Gates is boring

[TubeSteak]

He is one of the few people in the world who have access to enormous resources and yet, he just does not do anything with it that I would qualify as fun.

Springer has his cars or maybe he used to, Woz flew airplanes, right? The Virgin guy, this dude Branson, he sounds like a kind of fella who knows how to have fun with the money he made. Airplanes, submarines, space craft! Now that's the kind of stuff I am talking about.

IIRC, Bill Gates has a 30 car collection, it's just that he doesn't really talk about his toys. His (and Paul Allen co-founder of MS) most famous car is the imported Porsche 959 which spent over a decade impounded by customs until they helped get a Federal law passed allowing for "show and display" of cars that hadn't been crash certified in the USA.

There are a lot of Bill Gates stories, they just don't get brought up when talking about his charity work.
Your UID is low enough that you should already know some of them.