Interesting. Bill Gates funding traveling wave reactor.

[Confusious]

A traveling-wave reactor, or TWR, is a kind of nuclear reactor that can convert fertile material into fissile fuel as it runs using the process of nuclear transmutation. TWRs differ from other kinds of fast-neutron and breeder reactors in their ability to use little or no enriched uranium, instead burning fuel made from depleted uranium, natural uranium, thorium, spent fuel removed from light-water reactors, or some combination of these materials. The name refers to the design characteristic that fission does not happen in the entire TWR core, but takes place in a fairly localized zone that advances through the core over time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traveling_wave_reactor

TerraPower is a technology company headquartered in Washington, United States that does research on traveling wave reactors (TWRs). Its principal owner is Bill Gates.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TerraPower,_LLC

http://www.intellectualventures.com/TerraPower.aspx

[ChairmanAgnostic]

1. talk about a blue screen of death crash . . . . yikes.

but, then, I've been a mac person for years.

[hunter]

2. I don't have to buy computers because of Bill Gates.

When peoples' Windows machines get old and cranky and full of software cruft and viruses, and are unable to handle the latest Windows release, people give their computers away.

I wipe these machines and install Linux on them and they're better than when they were new. And free.

Bill Gates is a business shark, but I respect him. If he pulls this off, good for him. It'll give us something to do with all the old used nuclear fuel, old weapons material, and depleted uranium that's just sitting around waiting to get lost or abused.

There are probably leaner more elegant ways to approach the same problem (molten salt reactors and the like...) just as there are quicker leaner operating systems than Windows for computers, but I'll say: Go Bill!

[Confusious]

3. Not a big fan of gates myself.

But he's got the money to push it.

[joshcryer]

I dunno, I think the design is quite elegant. However, I doubt it will be easy to get working.

One must give Gates props for his TED speech about AGW. The TED crowd is full of deniers, you could even hear some of the groaning.

[joshcryer]

4. doh, dupe

accidentally double clicked post