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Bill Gates thinks he has a key part of the answer for combating climate change: a return to nuclear power. The Microsoft co-founder is making the rounds on Capitol Hill to persuade Congress to spend billions of dollars over the next decade for pilot projects to test new designs for nuclear power reactors.
Gates, who founded TerraPower in 2006, is telling lawmakers that he personally would invest $1 billion and raise $1 billion more in private capital to go along with federal funds for a pilot of his company’s never-before-used technology, according to congressional staffers.
“Nuclear is ideal for dealing with climate change, because it is the only carbon-free, scalable energy source that’s available 24 hours a day,” Gates said in his year-end public letter. “The problems with today’s reactors, such as the risk of accidents, can be solved through innovation.”
(Score: 5, Informative) by bzipitidoo on Monday January 28 2019, @02:43AM (9 children)
> the political reaction to Three Mile Island
No, that didn't kill the nuclear power industry. Not even Chernobyl did that. It was Fukushima.
Fukushima's failure was entirely predictable and preventable. They cut corners all over the place. They knew the wall needed to be higher, but they didn't want to spend the money. They were idiots who had no idea the magnitude of the risks they were taking, nor did they appreciate the size of the stakes. If you want to have a chance of winning, you don't sit down at a poker game not knowing crucial basics such as whether a straight or a flush is the higher ranking hand, and thinking that the stakes are penny ante when each chip actually represents such a large amount of money that Wall Street noticed and wants to play too. But that's exactly how they played Nuclear Power Poker, so to speak. It is little wonder that they lost everything.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday January 28 2019, @04:52AM (4 children)
Like running a reactor past the intended end of life of the reactor because the next generation didn't come on line?
You know this because? Which of those "corners" happened to be relevant to the accident?
When did they "know" this? Last I heard, it was within a few years of the Fukushima accident. Such modifications don't happen overnight. Hindsight is always so much more amazing than foresight especially when one conveniently forgets that nuclear regulation doesn't turn on a dime.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 28 2019, @04:57AM (1 child)
shut the fuck up, khallow, you're out of your depth.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday January 28 2019, @05:12AM
(Score: 3, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 28 2019, @06:20AM (1 child)
It's like the giant pot hole on a main road on the way to work, lasting two years before they finally fixed it properly. Took a big multi car pileup and associated lawsuits that paid out at least fifty times what the hole would have cost to fix in the first place. Prior to that, instead of fixing it, they just kept re-pouring asphalt to fill it in. Naturally, the hole was back two months later, wider and deeper than before.
So, they somehow had the money when the shit hit the fan, but nothing before that. I call bullshit on this, and heads should have rolled.
Same goes for taking years to increase the size of a wall. If they wanted it done, it could have been up in under 6 months. But, instead, they sat on the information and did nothing. Maybe they could have been lucky and avoided any disasters for another 10 years before they finally (if ever) got around to doing it. Might have even been excusable if they were in the middle of building it up.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday January 28 2019, @03:34PM
What would have been the reason to do it in under 6 months? Remember, they couldn't know that the earthquake would have happened before their reactors would have been decommissioned.
That's what reinsurers are for.
They were in the middle of building it up. Still had to decide whether to build the thing. That's part of building it up.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 28 2019, @04:42PM
no no no, the wall was actually there, but it got delete in the windows update.
with nuclear being "to big to fail" in soem minds, there will ALWAYS be a FURTHER reason why nuclear is actually SAFE but FAILED because of that darn 3rd screw from the top ... or something.
and some think of nuclear as "no child left behind". nevermind it made whole countries enact laws that each and every new house must have a bomb proof shelter. that whole islands and swats of land where made inliveable. that a whole planet was ducking for 50 odd years waiting for the end. nuclear can be better and can be SAFE. just like the crocodile or the bear or the tiger in the zoo ...
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Monday January 28 2019, @06:42PM
I interviewed with the NRC in 1990, for the position of nuclear power plant inspector. One of my questions to them (nearly 30 years ago now) was: what will nuclear power plant inspectors be doing when there are no more nuclear power plants - they haven't built a new one since Three Mile Island, and none are approved much less under construction?
The NRC manager's answer, in 1990, was "oh, there will be new nuclear power plants, don't you worry about that, there are plenty of new designs, safer designs, improved technology - those will be starting construction, real soon now."
I declined their offer of employment, 30 years ago. Today, I believe there is one new nuclear power generation facility in the US under construction, a total of 1 in the past 30 years, and it's still struggling - uncertain if it will ever open. There is still plenty for the plant inspectors to do, I don't believe a single nuclear power generation plant in the US has been de-commissioned since 1990. Fact check me on that - I don't keep current, but if any have shut down permanently, it's a small percentage of the total, nothing like Germany.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by corey on Tuesday January 29 2019, @01:23AM (1 child)
Building nuclear power plants on islands that sit on, and were created by, the Ring Of Fire? What could possibly go wrong?
Then here in Australia, there's so much back pressure against nuclear generation. But it's the most geologically and politically stable place on Earth.
(Score: 2) by arslan on Tuesday January 29 2019, @06:19AM
So what? I still propose we built all our plants in NZ and send the energy over.... oh yesss