Bill Gates & the Traveling Wave Reactor at TED

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olivier
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Joined: Thu Feb 14, 2008 5:21 pm
Location: Cherbourg, France

Bill Gates & the Traveling Wave Reactor at TED

Post by olivier »

Bill Gates gave a talk at the TED Conference. His speech is based on avoiding CO2 emissions (which may be flawed or may be not) rather than finding a solution to fuel scarcity. More comments can be found on CNN Tech.
Gates introduces the TWR which he sponsors through Terrapower. This nuclear fission concept was already mentioned on this forum. It is originated by late works of Ed Teller, with whom Gates brainstormed in the late 90s.

Skipjack
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Post by Skipjack »

Yeah, I was quite impressed with his choice as well. I still hope that he will take a look at some of the other things out there, that have potential.
But this reactor type is a good choice, I think.

kurt9
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Location: Portland, Oregon, USA

Post by kurt9 »

This traveling wave reactor concept along with the MSR/LFTR concept represent the long term energy future if fusion proves to be impossible. Both concepts are vastly superior to current nuclear power plants which, in turn, are superior to any other method of power generation. I am happy to see someone like Bill Gates throwing financial support to them.

Giorgio
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Location: China, Italy

Post by Giorgio »

Even if we will have a cheap fusion solution the travelling wave reactor will be a good middle term solution to burn most of the spent nuclear fuel that is available today.

scareduck
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Post by scareduck »

One consequence of this lecture is that we have reason to believe he thinks the money he sunk into Tri Alpha Energy is lost. He mentions fusion at about 8:55, but only as something that can't be relied upon to happen.

Skipjack
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Post by Skipjack »

One consequence of this lecture is that we have reason to believe he thinks the money he sunk into Tri Alpha Energy is lost. He mentions fusion at about 8:55, but only as something that can't be relied upon to happen
I did not know about Bill Gates being involved with Tri Alpha. I only knew about Paul Allen.
IIRC, Bill Gates was always the one to play it more save than Allen. That is why he refused to invest into fusion and Allen did. But maybe I got something wrong and BG did invest in Tri Alpha also?

scareduck
Posts: 552
Joined: Wed Oct 17, 2007 5:03 am

Post by scareduck »

Ah, you're right. Confused my MS founders. :-)

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