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Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

reuters.com

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Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#61

Post by Schwan »

yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #50
baybal2 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I remember Bill being involved in nuclear for a long time. Hope something of general use comes to fruition in our lifetime. Yes, for a very long time, and to very little result. He chases too risky, and unrealistic prospects.

This is a pretty horrible attitude to have, but to try to make something positive from this, which problems do you think Gates or someone in his position would be better suited to solving?

I thought about this quite often.

I do think one of the biggest possible changes could be a new religion based on 'working together', sustainability, education etc. but without any god figure.

Build up this religion in form of a hierarchical network. Bring in everyone and give them a chance to do things together.

Make basic rules which do not exclude too many people but make those basic rules clear and do not allow any racist crap, make it clear that its also not here to solve every problem.

I would like to do things and i sometimes clean our park but i'm not religion. I'm not going to a group every week and i will not take part in a social group which is based on religion. But i would love to meet up every week in something like a youth club for adults, etc.

With this network, he would be able to funnel money directly where it could make sense. Like the central club house which also hosts a school, basic internet etc. (more relevant of course in other countries); Add small hostel system to it, people travel around, share and care etc.

One problem Bill Gates has: When he is gone, who really will pursue it like him? I thought its not to relevant who is doing it as someone will do it but it took Bill Gates years to think more like he does now for one thing and on the other side, it needed him to take action when the polio vaccine stagnated.

Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#62

Post by xupybd »

oblio wrote: post #57
switchb4 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Windows is reliable for general public.

People don't want to hear this but Windows in 2020 is probably more reliable than desktop Linux. Windows isn't what it used to be in 1999. And desktop Linux QA standards are nothing to write home about, unfortunately.

Hmmmm.. yes it is probably more reliable as a desktop with equivalent features. When running a simple tiled WM Linux is solid.

If you look at the wider eco system, Windows doesn't look so hot. I've just moved from a Linux based work place to a Windows based work place. The number of times the main file server has to be restarted because it's doing something weird is crazy. This never happened at my old job. The Linux servers were only turned off for hardware changes. They didn't require constant restarts. If something went wrong I was able to trace the problem down and prevent it from happening again. In windows everything is opaque. Some unexplained regedit is suggested for every problem and no one seems to know what those edits actually do.

Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#63

Post by imtringued »

spenrose wrote: post #8

345MW for "$1B", which is presumably the delivered cost. Add another $1B for running, insurance, and decommissioning (or show me real numbers). Walney is a new nameplate 588MW offshore wind farm; it will average close to the same delivered energy and cost $3B.[1] If Terrapower can actually deliver at roughly those costs, they might make a real contribution to our energy future. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotlan…

I'm not sure if this is a valid comparison. It feels to me that the wind farm wins when both cost the same simply because it does not require manned operation and it consumes no fuel. You're unlikely to run out of skilled personnel by deploying too many wind turbines.

Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#64

Post by Mikhail_K »

Lorin wrote: post #10

I remember Bill being involved in nuclear for a long time. Hope something of general use comes to fruition in our lifetime.

Well, his software products do meltdown quite often. The "blue screen of death" is going to take on the whole new meaning once this reactor project comes to fruition.

Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#65

Post by belorn »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #2

> By 2050 “we would see hundreds of these reactors around the world, solving multiple different energy needs,” Levesque said. We can already reach 90% renewables by 2035 without these reactors [1]. If they get built, that’d be great, but they won’t be built in time to avert climate change. TerraPower has existed for 14 years and still hasn’t built a reactor. For comparison, the Kamuthi solar facility in Tamil Nadu, I…

Fossil fueled power capacity and consumption is still rising faster than any other type of energy source, and by a large margin. If we take consumption from 2010 to 2019, fossil fueled energy consumption increased by 15070 TWh, while solar and win combined increased by 1773 TWh. That is almost a 10x in difference in favor of fossil fuels.

There is nothing to even imply that we will reach 90% renewables by 2035. To be fighting over which non-fossil fueled energy source is more economical is just a distraction. There need to be a stop to building new fossil fueled power plants. Expand solar and wind production as if they were tanks and munitions during world war 2. Build as many nuclear reactors we can from the current pool of educated nuclear professionals. Throw in some battery technology from tesla, hydro pumps, compressed air, EV transition, dynamic grid, or what else is left that do not depend on burning fossil fuels. Set the date of 2035 as the day we ban burning fossil fuel in the power grid and let the market decide how to deal with it.

That is how we avert climate change.

Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#66

Post by yakshaving_jgt »

baybal2 wrote: post #59
yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a pretty horrible attitude to have, but to try to make something positive from this, which problems do you think Gates or someone in his position would be better suited to solving?

Let's take his toilet program. For the amount of money he spent, he could've build enough sewage treatment plant for a few African countries. Similarly, the "affordable" nuclear powerplant programs are not suitable for developing countries. It unequivocal that a cheapest fossil fuel station is the best option for places that never had an industrial economy. Once it has been kickstarted, you can think of more exotic o…

Fossil fuels are a finite and dwindling resource, and its use is possibly causing an extinction event. The human race can't really afford to buy the cheaper option here.

Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#67

Post by adventured »

oblio wrote: post #56
andbberger wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would be more believable if you had said that... I don't know.. the US Antarctic embassy was nuclear powered. But in a city with excellent existing energy infrastructure in a country that, rocky start notwithstanding, the US has been allied with for almost 250 years? Get outta here

Small adjustment: a bit more than 200 years. The Brits burned down Washington in 1812.

It's also fascinating what intervened:

"Less than a day after the attack began, a sudden, very heavy thunderstorm—possibly a hurricane—put out the fires. It also spun off a tornado that passed through the center of the capital, setting down on Constitution Avenue and lifting two cannons before dropping them several yards away. Following the storm, the British returned to their ships, many of which required repairs due to the storm. The occupation of Washington lasted for roughly 26 hours and the British plans are still a subject of debate."

The Washington DC area gets only a few tornadoes per century.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burning_of_Washington

Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#68

Post by baybal2 »

yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #66
baybal2 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's take his toilet program. For the amount of money he spent, he could've build enough sewage treatment plant for a few African countries. Similarly, the "affordable" nuclear powerplant programs are not suitable for developing countries. It unequivocal that a cheapest fossil fuel station is the best option for places that never had an industrial economy. Once it has been kickstarted, you can think of more exotic o…

Fossil fuels are a finite and dwindling resource, and its use is possibly causing an extinction event. The human race can't really afford to buy the cheaper option here.

An alternative to that is to sit and do nothing.

Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#69

Post by imtringued »

bob29 wrote: post #20
briffle wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only we could replace these old, baseload reactors quicker, and cheaper, and maybe with an identical, smaller design, with better tech so one control room could monitor multiple reactors. And if refuelling could be done without turning off all power generation at a site. Maybe if we had something modular......oh, wait

Wow its so easy, can't believe all those idiots trying to build nuclear plants the past few decades have never though to simply apply "better tech". Thanks hacker news/silicon valley!

Why is Rolls Royce trying to build small modular reactors then? If you look at what Rolls Royce is doing for example then everything that came before it appears to be a joke in terms of economics. You can't build bespoke power plants like you're an artisan and expect them to be cheap.

The real challenges in nuclear power plant construction are the total lack of economies of scale. Nobody wants a bloody $30 billion plant. People want 10 plants for that price.

Re: Bill Gates' nuclear venture plans reactor to complement solar, wind power boom

#70

Post by yakshaving_jgt »

Schwan wrote: post #61
yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a pretty horrible attitude to have, but to try to make something positive from this, which problems do you think Gates or someone in his position would be better suited to solving?

I thought about this quite often. I do think one of the biggest possible changes could be a new religion based on 'working together', sustainability, education etc. but without any god figure. Build up this religion in form of a hierarchical network. Bring in everyone and give them a chance to do things together. Make basic rules which do not exclude too many people but make those basic rules clear and do not allow a…

I don't mean to be flippant, but what you have described sounds an awful lot like the economy. In the book Sapiens, the author describes organisations, money, Capitalism, Communism and more as religions without a deity. The detail that you included which stopped me from calling this utopian is "form of a hierarchical network". It is of course important to recognise that a classless society is impossible. As for solving racism, I think I'm less optimistic. I mean, I don't think people today can even agree on what "racism" as a term actually means.
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