Bill Gates, China talking about jointly developing nuclear reactor

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/story/2011/12/07/technology-bill-gates-china-nuclear-reactor.html

by tilt • 15 years ago

89 40 15 years ago

cbc.ca

harrylove• 15 years ago

This is what TerraPower is building: http://www.terrapower.com/Technology/TravelingWaveReactor.as...

Here's Bill Gates' TED talk from February 2010 in which he describes the tech http://www.ted.com/talks/bill_gates.html

cr4zy2• 15 years ago

Gates implies liquid approaches to nuclear are hard compared to TerraPower 23 mins into the TED talk. Liquid as in LFTR (Liquid Flouride Thorium Reactor)?

umarmung2• 15 years ago

Yes, he's trying to wean China off molten salt reactor development, specifically reactors like the LFTR.

China is basically the only market for fission reactors left. They are the only ones purchasing new external nuclear reactor technology as well as aggressively pursuing their own.

Bill Gates realises if China produces anything successfully independent from the West, then even if TWR functioned and functioned well, it would be a dead investment from a market (and personal legacy) perspective.

igravious3• 15 years ago

I am so conflicted :(

I loathe Microsoft but I *love what Bill G is doing philanthropically. Like I saw a great program[1] with Ian Hislop on BBC2 recently partly about this Victorian banker in Britain who was a notorious skinflint all his life, amassed a fortune and then built decent housing for the poor with the lot of his wealth. The mind boggles.

1: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/nov/23/ian-hislop-when-...

edit: Enough with the hate already. This is the reason i stopped coming to this site, you can't say anything outside the party line.

sliverstorm• 15 years ago

You needn't be conflicted. Bill Gates != Microsoft. He left years ago.

Besides, Microsoft has been making some pretty good products recently.

10100110104• 15 years ago

No he didn't.

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/exec/billg/

igravious3• 15 years ago

It doesn't matter. My point was that at one point in his life he was intimately part of a decision making structure that killed some great companies like Borland and Netscape to name but two. And now he seems to be Mr. Awesome. That I find bizarre. It's a bit like the early and late Wittgenstein, something has happened to the man.

10100110104• 15 years ago

It's a bit like the charities founded by the robber barons, isn't it?

politician• 15 years ago

Maybe, but you can't change the past, so why not change the future? The haters (righteous or otherwise) get to take their potshots in the history books.

igravious3• 15 years ago

I should read up on it, maybe it's a pattern? Once your basic needs are totally covered and once the guilt sets in you start to give a little something back? Dunno. Wish more people were like those robber barons and the later Bill Gates in that case. Especially with the way income inequality's been going.

melvinram• 15 years ago

A lot of credit for the transition in priority goes to Melinda Gates, according to Bill on an interview on Charlie Rose Show w/ Bill, Melinda & Warren Buffet if I remember correctly.

Artagra• 15 years ago

Microsoft did some terrible things, and abused their market power. But overall, I would say the world is a significantly better place than it would have been without MS. Looking at it from an economics point of view, every person who bought MS software made a logical transaction where the benefits outweighed the costs, therefore making their life better in some way.

10100110104• 15 years ago

Presumably because one cannot test a nuclear reactor in the US -- at least not as easily as it can be done in China.

neutronicus• 15 years ago

Huh. My TA from my senior design project works for TerraPower now. Small world.

dantheman• 15 years ago

I hope we'll see more and more of this type of development, it's pitiful that nuclear technology has stalled in the US.

andyl• 15 years ago

The TerraPower design is really interesting - hope it is successful. China is also developing Thorium reactors. (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/ambroseevans_prit...) Safe/cheap nuclear would make such an impact - I'm happy to see developments - though I wish they were coming at a faster pace.

MikeCapone• 15 years ago

I wish he would also support LFTR thorium reactors so that if this doesn't work as well as expected, there's a plan B for cheap and safe nuclear power.

drhowarddrfine4• 15 years ago

There is just something wrong about this and I can't articulate it.

drhowarddrfine4• 15 years ago

Then I guess I will articulate it.

While there are so many of us out of work and starving, Gates has no problems pumping millions into Africa and China. Africans have never shown the ability to stand on their own two feet and China is not our friend. THAT is what's wrong with this.

wluu• 15 years ago

Bill Gates talks about energy (including Nuclear), and investments in the sector here (about 20 mins long) - http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Topics/Energy/Nuclear-Energy-Af...

He mentions his investment and interest in Terrapower briefly towards the end.

And another article about Gates' visit to China last year - http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Personal/In-China-Speeding-Towa...

pjscott• 15 years ago

This makes sense. Bill Gates wants cheap, clean, reliable energy. Nuclear fits the bill. China is the place where nuclear energy happens these days.

What's he supposed to do, wrestle with the regulators in the US? The red tape here is horrendous.

drhowarddrfine4• 15 years ago

Yes. China is not our friend and the US owes them billions. Yet Gates is pumping millions into their economic future. China can stand on their own two feet. Let them make their own effort.

marknutter• 15 years ago

A rising tide lifts all ships. He's also pumping millions into eradicating disease in third world countries. Should "let them make their own effort?"

The US is shooting itself in the foot with its attitudes toward nuclear power.

drhowarddrfine4• 15 years ago

That's my point about "eradicating disease". How many decades and billions of dollars have been poured into Africa with no success? How many free notebook computers have been handed out by smiley billionaires? It's a fable people love to tell.

socially-distnt• 15 years ago

Yep, makes perfect sense: develop a cheap, cost-effective nuclear reactor design with someone who is a big competitor to the US, and who our children will most likely have to fight a war against. Yeah, perfect sense.

teyc2• 15 years ago

It is a win-win. China gets to be first (and Thorium reactor products cannot be easily weaponized), US gets to use China as a proving ground, and then the US regulators themselves are pressured to change their attitudes, which then creates a market for TerraPower.

umarmung2• 15 years ago

"China gets to be first (and Thorium reactor products cannot be easily weaponized)"

You do realise that Bill Gates owns and backs an opposing technology?

Hint: it is not thorium based.

teyc2• 15 years ago

I stand corrected.

coob• 15 years ago

Would it matter if they could be weaponised, seeing as China already has nukes?

ypcx2• 15 years ago

Accept no less than Zero-point energy. Everything else is a distraction, and an attempt to sustain the old models with implicit consumer control. Educate yourself, start here: http://www.amazon.com/dp/0525952047/ (seriously, it's a great read, with all references to the original research works)

ypcx2• 15 years ago

Just -2 for such a heresy?

danmaz74• 15 years ago

Interestingly, TerraPower was launched by noted patent troll Intellectual Ventures [1], a company which Microsoft might have a stake in [2].

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traveling_wave_reactor

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_Ventures

denzil_correa• 15 years ago

China's Isn't Building a Traveling Wave Nuclear Plant (Yet) Rumors of a partnership between TerraPower and China aren't true.

http://www.technologyreview.in/blog/energy/27395/

Bill Gates, China talking about jointly developing nuclear reactor

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