Sodiumcooled fast reactors have a checkered history. Nuclear experts head to china to test experimental reactors. In 2006, terrapower launched an effort to develop the first practical engineering embodiment of a breedand burn fast reactor, producing a design concept known as a travelingwave reactor twr. Bill gates stops chasing nuclear wave, pursues variety. The purpose of this book is to explain the most important physical concepts and mathematical methods commonly used in predicting the behavior of neutrons in nuclear reactors an effort has been made to avoid mathematical complexity that does not lead to a significant increase in physical understanding or is not used in actual reactor design studies in a few. The traveling wave reactor, first conceived in 1958, has been intensively investigated only since about 2006.
Power reactor may be developed overseas tells that terrapower, the company advancing the design, is not considering the u. Terrapowers traveling wave reactor twr will help meet growing energy needs globally while protecting the planet from increased greenhouse gases and radioactive waste. Rather than relying exclusively on enriched uranium, traveling wave reactors are designed to make use of. The twr has been studied since the late 1950s and there are several articles in the literature that describe the theory of the units. Bill gates to help china build traveling wave nuclear reactor.
A spinoff from a bill gates backed company called terrapower is working with the design, but its really nothing new. But liquid sodium designs have been plagued by cooling leaks, and travelingwave designs have failed to meet their promised efficiency goals, according to makhijani. The traveling wave reactor currently exists only in terrapowers computers, but plans are underway to build a real world test version of the reactor. The travelingwave reactor produces plutonium and uses it at once, eliminating the possibility of its being diverted for weapons. The concept works on the basis that breedburn waves and the fuel move relative to one another. No traveling wave reactor has ever been built, so no, there are none ready to sent into space. Gates invested in terrapower in 2011 with the hope of helping to prove the companys core concept. Bill gatess experimental nuclear power plant halts. Terrapower is a nuclear reactor design company headquartered in bellevue, washington, united states. One of those technologies is known as twr, which stands for traveling wave reactors. Terrapowers conceptual and engineering design and associated technology. Terrapower is developing a class of nuclear fast reactors called the traveling wave reactor twr the twr concept places a small core of enriched fuel in the center of a much larger mass of nonfissile material, in this case depleted uranium.
To create the traveling wave reactor twr design, terrapower has put together a team that boasts unparalleled expertise in nuclear engineering, simulation. The design underwent several iterations 1, 18, 19, 20 between 2008 and 2012. An active region less than a meter thick moves along the reactor core, breeding new plutonium in front of it. Unlike todays reactors, a travelingwave reactor requires very little enriched uranium, reducing the risk of weapons proliferation. Proponents of sodiumcooled reactors, including traveling wave reactors, tend not to focus on how they plan to overcome the problematic parts of the sodiumcooled design history, centered in large. The wave doesnt actually move at all, but this is the easiest way. Is there currently a traveling wave reactor which is ready. In this paper, based on the twr core design scheme, considered the design of fuel assembly, neutronics and thermalhydraulic, analyzed the unprotected loss of flow ulof accident in the twr core with the sas4a code, through which research about the transient safety characteristics of a million kilowatt travelling wave reactor core has been done. The twr fuel assemblies use a novel duct geometry and advanced. Although uranium is possible as a fissionable material, thorium is better. A travelingwave reactor twr is a proposed type of nuclear fission reactor that can convert. With the traditional nuclear reactor design, spent uranium rods must be removed. Terrapowers nuclear reactor could power the 21st century.
Some of the new designs, including terrapowers traveling wave unit, are breeder reactors that produce more atomic fuel than they consume, reducing the need to add costly processed nuclear elements. Whitenationalist books on a conveyer belt with amazon package. However, the main problem hindering the implementation of a traveling wave reactor the problem of the radiation damaging dose for the fuel claddings is also not solved in those studies. A private company called terrapower which is funded by bill gates among others has supposedly completed a design and is looking to actually build the first reactor. Their travelingwave reactor design uses depleted uranium to operate, rather than uranium235 like in current reactors, and is built so that if left. Twrs differ from other kinds of fastneutron and breeder reactors in their ability to use fuel efficiently without uranium enrichment or reprocessing, instead directly using depleted uranium.
We are sharing information on the traveling wave reactor with a variety of research, supply and manufacturing organizations, but there are no deals to speak to at this time, john gilleland. China isnt building a traveling wave nuclear plant yet. The traveling wave reactor concept championed by terrapower, in which bill gates, of microsoft fame, is a key investor, is likely to be a commercial failure, according to a report by the nonprofit advocacy group the institute for energy and environmental research the traveling wave reactor twr, first conceived in 1958, has been intensively investigated only since about. Terrapowers travelling wave reactor why not use an ifr. Pdf the traveling wave reactor twr is a oncethrough reactor that uses in. Why arent we building a traveling wave reactor in the u. These reactors reach sustainability levels attainable by typical fast reactors, but do so without requiring the reprocessing plants that were the main concern when politicians effectively abandoned the us fast reactor. After exploring various design options and core geometries, terrapower core designers identified a standing wave cylindrical geometry variant of the twr as the most promising practical design. The reactor head sits above ground and is designed to contain nuclear reactions. Current issue copyright 2015 china engineering science press. The test reactor will reveal whether the traveling wave reactor design as developed by bill gates terrapower has a future as a reliable, economically viable alternative to coal, gas, and.
The sodium coolant is also standard for this type of reactor. This book focuses on core design and methods for design and analysis. Lately there has been some press on the traveling wave reactor twr. Bill gates has become one of the most powerful philanthropists in the world through the bill and melinda gates foundation, and one of the projects hes supported is a company called terrapower. Unprotected loss of flow analysis of a million kilowatt.
A press release sent to power said that the two companies plan to work together to complete the traveling wave reactor twr design and commercialize twr. In a wave that moves through the core at only a centimeter per year, this. In purely nuclear terms, it is a fastneutron breeder reactor using the u238 to plutonium fuel cycle, which dates back to the 1950s and was used in many experimental reactors. Bill gates terrapower project and the traveling wave. Bill gates has joined a field of inventors and investors in the future of nuclear energy. The traveling wave reactor twr is a oncethrough reactor that uses in situ breeding to greatly reduce the need for enrichment and reprocessing. The traveling wave that the reactors name references moves through the units core at a rate of only one centimeter per year. Breeding converts incoming subcritical reload fuel into new critical fuel, allowing a breedburn wave to propagate. The traveling wave advances less than 1 cm a month. Intellectual ventures reactor model is known as a travelingwave reactor, a concept that originated in the 1990s with edward teller, an. Travelingwave reactors only need one batch of matches before they can run on wax depleted uranium for a very long time. Gates is the chairman of terrapower, a startup whose design for a travelingwave reactor could make. The companys flagship advanced nuclear reactor concept, the traveling wave reactor twr design, represents incredible progress in nuclear technology thanks to the power of advanced computer modeling and our dedicated team of scientists and engineers.
Nuclear reactor design an advanced course in nuclear. It is based on advances made in nuclear power utilization and computational methods over the past 40 years, covering core design of boiling water reactors and pressurized water reactors, as well as fast reactors and hightemperature gascooled reactors. Covers the terrapower traveling wave reactor, the first ever fda approved drug for the treatment of acute radiation injury, and more. The traveling wave reactor twr is a proposed reactor design that belongs to a set known as generation iv designs that are different in a number of respects than the current commercial designs which use water to cool the reactor and slow down moderate the neutrons that sustain the chain reaction. A travelingwave reactor twr is a type of nuclear fission reactor that can convert fertile material into usable fuel through nuclear transmutation, in tandem with the burnup of fissile material. It is a sodiumcooled fast reactor design in which neutrons are not slowed down and the heat created by fission is carried away by liquid sodium, which is used to boil water. The reactor uses depleteduranium fuel packed inside hundreds of hexagonal pillars shown in black and green. Terrapower is a nuclear innovation company dedicated to developing advanced nuclear reactors that will provide carbonfree energy to billions. The traveling wave reactor twr is a oncethrough reactor that uses in situ breeding to. Breeding converts incoming subcritical reload fuel. The twr fuel assemblies use a novel duct geometry and ad. The terrapower reactor is a new variation on a design that was conceived some 60 years ago by a nowforgotten russian physicist, saveli feinberg. Sekimoto 2965 a design of fast nuclear reactors capable of the traveling wave nuclear burning is studied. Some have operated well, while others have done poorly.
Traveling wave reactor wikipedia republished wiki 2. Proponents of sodiumcooled reactors, including traveling wave reactors, tend not to focus on how they plan to overcome the problematic parts of. A travelingwave reactor twr is a proposed type of nuclear fission reactor that can convert fertile material into usable fuel through nuclear transmutation, in tandem with the burnup of fissile material. The traveling wave that the reactors name references moves through. Terrapower, the bill gateschaired nuclear company, has altered the design of its socalled traveling wave reactor and has begun exploring other fission technologies as well, including thorium fuel. Everything that can be said about them is based on simulation models and speculation. And afaik correct me if you know better or have access to specifications, the neutron economy of the travelling wave reactor is rather tight and might well be possible, that the wave leaves ever more transuranics in its wake as it moves, without ever. He said that such a new reactor design or a practical modular design is still 15 to 20 years away, which again, is far too late to start drawing down emissions.