Bill Gates, China talking about jointly developing nuclear reactor | Hacker News Reader

Bill Gates, China talking about jointly developing nuclear reactor

cbc.ca

89 pointstilt40 comments

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

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)?

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.

Are you saying there's a conflict of interest between finding the best solution and preserving his investment/legacy?

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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

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...

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.

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.

"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.

I stand corrected.

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

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/

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

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.

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

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

No he didn't.

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

Yes, he is Chairman, but not involved on a day-to-day basis. Note that in the link you posted the most recent article wrt microsoft and bill gates is in June 2008

If he was really running the show I think things would be very different (ie they wouldn't have f'd nearly everything up like ballmer has)

You're right. He's "only" the Chairman.

Kim Il Sung is also the eternal president of North Korea, but I doubt he is having a direct impact on the governance of the country.

It is a ceremonial position; no doubt he has some impact (it was implied that he was one of the reasons Microsoft didn't pursue Courier if I recall correctly) but he probably isn't involved in anything beyond vague larger-scale strategies.

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.

I distinctly remember the 90s and understand where you're coming from. Microsoft was a scary 500 lb gorilla. I started college in '94 and remember there were kids who were super pumped to get internships working there... and at least as many who considered themselves conscientious objectors and would never think of talking to them.

Perhaps another way to look at it, is he was Mr. Awesome in the game of business... pushing the concept of using leverage (partnership agreements, legal might, etc) to gain and hold onto market share and maximize gains for his shareholders. And now his focus is philanthropy he's redirected that same energy to success in that endeavor.

The conundrum comes of course when you apply the filter of judgement, someone in the software industry might see these two activities as being at odds with each other. But if you remove that filter and look at it simply as succeeding at something... let's say his earlier goal was to be the most successful businessman possible, he probably achieved it. Now he's taking the results of that and applying it to his next goal.

Great companies survive -- both Borland and Netscape encountered pressure from Microsoft but that alone wasn't enough to kill them. You can't blame Microsoft for terrible business plans, bad marketing, and poor products.

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

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.

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.

Guilt? Don't think so. I woul bet on something more like "now, let me engineer how I'll be remembered".

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.

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.

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

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.

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)

Just -2 for such a heresy?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com