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Bill Gates To Help China Build Traveling Wave Nuclear Reactor
First time accepted submitter BabaChazz writes "Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates says he is in discussions with China to jointly develop a new kind of nuclear reactor. During a talk at China's Ministry of Science & Technology Wednesday, the billionaire said: 'The idea is to be very low cost, very safe and generate very little waste.' Gates backs Washington-based TerraPower, which is developing a nuclear reactor that can run on depleted uranium."
China's government got the brilliant idea that overpopulation would be a great economic boon.
I'm sorry, what?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-child_policy
[Citation needed]
I needed a sig so people would know who I am, but I was too drunk to make something witty, so you get this instead.
Unless you were as thick as two short planks(and many sadly are), you would never ever ever ever run a nuclear plant on windows. Or even linux. Or even siemens hardware in general. You would use a robust PLC from someone like Omron and some dedicated HMIs to backup your SCADA, which will sadly run windows. The PLC program should be properly interlocked and fail safe. The plant runs on the PLC not the SCADA.
I have determined that my sig is indeterminate.
Thorium itself is not a nuclear fuel, it's what is called a fertile material. When bombarded with neutrons it produces Uranium-233 , which is an excellent nuclear fuel, and most certainly usable in a nuclear weapon. The process is very similar to how Plutonium-239 can be made by bombarding Uranium-238 with neutrons.
The main reason people don't use Thorium and U-233 for making bombs is that the U-233 tends to become contaminated with highly radioactive isotopes, making it difficult to handle. In principle you can avoid this by using a more elaborate irradiation and separation technique, but it's just easier to use Uranium-bred Plutonium instead.
To summarise:
Thorium-232 and Uranium-238 are not on their own useful for nuclear fuel or weapons. However, they can be turned into fissile material by bombarding them with neutrons.
In this way Th-232 can be turned into U-233
Whereas U-238 can be turned into Pu-239.
Both U-233 and Pu-239 can be used for weapons, but it is easier to keep the radioactivity of the Pu-239 low.
Hence it is easier ( and cheaper ), to use Uranium fuelled reactors to make a bomb than to use Thorium.