Want... Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft and chairman of nuclear startup TerraPower, was in China again earlier this week, Shanghai-based China Business News reports.
In recent years, Gates has visited China at least three times to seek cooperation with the Chinese side on developing a next-generation nuclear reactor.
While in Beijing Feb. 9, Gates met with Nur Bekri, director of China's National Energy Administration and they held in-depth discussion on a US-China traveling wave reactor project.
Unlike conventional reactors, a traveling wave reactor can run on depleted uranium and produce significantly smaller amounts of nuclear waste.
Gates also met with Sun Qin on Feb. 9, president of state-owned China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC), China's largest nuclear energy company and TerraPower's main partner in China.
The last time Gates and Sun met was in 2011.
An important reason why Terrapower has chosen the CNNC as its partner is because the latter has developed an experimental fast-neutron reactor, which is based on a concept similar to a traveling wave reactor.
Fast-neutron reactors and traveling wave reactors are both considered the latest fourth-generation nuclear reactor technologies.
Xu Mi, an expert on the experimental fast-neutron reactor, told the newspaper that a fast-neutron reactor can increase the utilization of uranium from the current 1% to 60% and minimize the production of waste.
China launched a fast-neutron reactor project in 1992, but the experimental reactor did not officially start operations until 20 years later, in 2011.
According to Xu, it will take another 13 years before the reactor can begin commercial operations.
References:
Sun Qin 孫勤
Xu Mi 徐銤