24 Sep (NucNet): TerraPower, the company founded in 2008 to develop advanced nuclear technology and backed by Microsoft founder Bill Gates, has signed a memorandum of understanding with China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) for cooperative work on development of a travelling wave reactor (TWR), the company said in a statement on 23 September.
The statement gave few details of the agreement, but said that the two companies plan to work together to complete the TWR design and commercialise TWR technology.
TerraPower chief executive officer Lee McIntire said the TerraPower-CNNC collaboration aims to pioneer new options in civilian nuclear energy that address safety, environmental and cost concerns.
He said: “Additional work must be done to define what a possible joint venture may look like, but this MOU signals that we are well on track."
Founded in 2008, TerraPower is backed by Microsoft founder Bill Gates.
The company says it is trying to develop the 1,000-megawatt TWR to operate for up to 100 years without refuelling or removing any used fuel from the unit.
TerraPower says that by greatly simplifying the nuclear fuel cycle, TWRs could improve the cost, safety, social acceptability, and long-term sustainability of nuclear energy as a source of emissions-free electricity.
The TWR would be designed to operate indefinitely using natural uranium, depleted uranium, spent light water reactor fuel, or thorium as reload fuel after start-up, and in which waves that breed and then burn would travel relative to the fuel.
According to TerraPower, the TWR provides up to a 50-fold gain in fuel efficiency, eliminates the need for reprocessing, and directly converts depleted uranium to usable fuel as it operates. As a result, this “inexpensive but energy-rich fuel source could provide a global electricity supply that is, for all practical purposes, inexhaustible”, TerraPower said.
TerraPower is restarting US-based development of fast reactor fuel in preparation for construction of a prototype TWR. Working with Idaho National Laboratory, TerraPower commissioned a lab-scale fuel fabrication facility, which is on track to produce the first extrusions of metallic nuclear fuel in the US since the 1980s. Fuels are also being tested in the advanced test reactor at Idaho National Laboratory.
In partnership with Areva Federal Services, TerraPower manufactured the first full-size test assembly for the TWR.
