LLC

Advanced Traveling-Wave Reactors

A Path to Carbon-Free, Proliferation-Resistant, Energy Security American Association for the Advancement of Science 21 February 2010

Renewables are Great, But They Face Interesting Challenges

Capacity Factors • • • • Low capacity factors for wind and solar Need for spinning reserve increases cost, complexity Little prospect for large increases to hydropower Large increases to biomass-fueled electricity will compete for cropland with biofuels, human food, and animal feed 100% 80% 60% 40% 20% 0%

Source: EIA 2009 Annual Outlook

2

Goal: 25% Electricity from Renewables by 2025

2008 Renewable sources Biomass: 60 Solar: 2 394 TWh (9.5%) Geothermal: 17 Wind: 53 Hydro: 262 Required growth in nameplate capacity: 2025 Renewable sources Electricity generation from renewables: 1,219 TWh (25%) 410% 616% Geothermal: 122 9,462% Solar: 195 Wind: 366 Hydro: 300 285% Biomass: 232

Sources: EIA 2009 Annual Outlook, TerraPower

3

Major Grid and Siting Challenges

2025 Renewable sources Electricity generation from renewables: 1,219 TWh (25%) Hydro: 300 Wind: 366 Geothermal: 122 Solar: 195 Biomass: 232 10,085 km 2 new wind farms 18,586 km 2 new solar farms 4

Major Grid and Siting Challenges

10,085 km 2 new wind farms OHIO 18,586 km2 new solar farms 5 MINNESOTA

Nuclear Faces Challenges As Well

Nuclear Infrastructure Today is Complex and Expensive Uranium mining and milling Long-term geologic repository Conversion to uranium hexafluoride Uranium enrichment Depleted uranium storage Fuel fabrication Actinide fuel fabrication Reprocessing Spent fuel storage Nuclear power generation

Use Unenriched Uranium as Fuel

Many Steps Then Become Unnecessary Uranium mining and milling Long-term geologic repository Conversion to uranium hexafluoride Uranium enrichment Depleted uranium storage Fuel fabrication Actinide fuel fabrication Reprocessing Spent fuel storage Nuclear power generation

A Simpler, More Secure and Economical Nuclear Energy System

Depleted uranium storage Fuel fabrication Nuclear power generation (with half-century refueling) Long-term geologic repository (with greatly reduced waste volumes) Spent fuel storage (with greatly reduced waste volumes)

Each 14-ton canister of depleted uranium can generate 60 million megawatt-hours of electricity… …enough to power six million households at current U.S. rates of consumption for a year.

The existing U.S. stockpile of 700,000 metric tons represents a national energy reserve that could last for many centuries.

TWRs can convert these 38,000 cylinders of “waste” to about $100 trillion worth of electricity.

(former affiliation)

The TerraPower Team

Distinguished and Growing

Physics Modeling Chuck Whitmer (Microsoft) Ehud Greenspan, UC Berkeley Pavel Hejzlar (MIT) Rod Hyde (LLNL) *John Nuckolls, Director Emeritus of LLNL Robert Petroski, MIT Nick Touran, (UM) *Thomas Weaver, LLNL *Lowell Wood (LLNL) *George Zimmerman, LLNL * Winners of DOE’s E.O. Lawrence Award Engineering and Design Charles Ahlfeld (Savannah River Site) Tom Burke (FFTF) Bill Bowen, CBCG (FFTF) Tyler Ellis (MIT) Mike Grygiel, CBCG (FFTF) David Lucoff (FFTF, Texas A&M, INEEL) Jon McWhirter, (U.S.N., UT) Ash Odedra (ITER) William Stokes, President of CBCG Alan Waltar (TAMU, FFTF, PNNL) Josh Walter (Purdue) James Waldo, CBCG (EBR-II, FFTF) and 20+ other collaborators Materials/Fuels Development Kevan Weaver (INL) Ken Czerwinski, UNLV Sean McDeavitt, TAMU Ron Klueh (ORNL) Ning Li (LANL) Jacopo Buongiorno, MIT and other collaborators

11

The TerraPower Team

• • • • •

Business and Technology

Bill Gates Nathan Myhrvold Founder and CEO of Intellectual Ventures, former CTO of Microsoft John Gilleland Formerly VP at Bechtel, Director of ITER, and Sr. VP at General Atomics David McAlees Former co-chair of Siemens Nuclear Division Roger Reynolds Former CTO of Framatome ANP/AREVA 12

The First TerraPower Reactors

• • • • • • Fueled mainly by depleted uranium, a byproduct of uranium enrichment Small amount of enriched uranium is used to start the reaction Just one fuel load lasts for decades No reprocessing Reactor is sealed and below grade Near zero proliferation risk 13

Advanced Traveling-Wave Reactors

Making Fuel and Burning It in One Pass, in One Place 14

The Traveling-Wave Reactor (TWR)

• Waves make, and then burn, fissionable material as they travel across the core.

• Waves are launched with a kernel of enriched uranium, but sustained solely by fuel made from depleted uranium or natural uranium • Operates with well-developed technologies 15

Familiar Breeder Reactor Physics, With a Twist

16

Prismatic Core

Wave Moves Through the Fuel

Fission begins

Burning wave Breeding wave

At steady state, the power density is similar to that in a conventional fast-neutron reactor

Cylindrical Standing-Wave Reactor

• Fuel is moved to the wave, instead of the wave moving through the fuel • After startup, the power density is typical of a conventional fast reactor 26

• • • • •

TWRs can also run on Spent Fuel from Light Water Reactors

Existing nuclear plants in the U.S. are now storing about 60,000 metric tons of “spent” fuel Enough fuel to power 100 TWRs—each generating 1.2 GW e —for a century No separation of uranium or plutonium required China plans to have ~100 GW e by 2020 of nuclear power These new reactors will expel similar amounts of “spent” fuel by mid-century 27

TWRs Large and Small

Different designs for

• •

different markets:

Small, modular reactors for factory production, flexible for applications and markets Gigawatt-scale TWR that fits well within existing plant designs e f MW s o red nd WR r T ula Mod 100s of MW e Modular TWR Hu e 1,150 MW 1 12 e R 28

One-Gigawatt TWR

• • • • High temperature, so high efficiency • 1.2 Gw e net from 3 GW t No spent fuel pool Physics forces a shutdown if the temperature gets too high Most components will be familiar to the NRC

Next Step: Build a Demo Reactor

• • • Traveling waves are feasible and stable • Confirmed by high-fidelity computer simulations of the nuclear physics Nearly all pieces of the candidate design have been validated by previous fast reactors • EBR-II, Phénix, JOYO, FFTF, BN series and others But we need a full-core demonstration • Demo will verify traveling-wave behavior and demonstrate fuel limits 30

The First TWR: TP-1

• • • • • • • • To begin operations in 2020, producing electricity for the grid 350–500 MW e capacity (900–1,250 MW t ) No refueling needed for 40 years Mainly fueled with depleted uranium, with U 235 as starter fuel Designed to accommodate advances in fuels or materials Also could be operated as a “standard” fast reactor TP-1 core may be compatible with existing or planned sodium-cooled fast reactors International cooperation will be needed to construct and operate TP-1 31

TerraPower Reactors Approach The Ideal

• • • Sustainable • Minimizes its environmental footprint • • Burns waste Meets global energy needs indefinitely Safe • Meets the highest safety standards Affordable • Competes with—or beats— existing nuclear systems • • • Sustainable  Phases out mining  Burns existing and future DU and other waste as fuel  Known fuel supplies are sufficient for many centuries Safe  Uses latest safety features Affordable  Needs no reprocessing, and eventually no enrichment 32

The design provides “ the simplest possible fuel cycle,” says Charles W. Forsberg, executive director of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle Project at MIT, “the and it requires only one uranium enrichment plant per planet.” T ECHNOLOGY R EVIEW , MARCH / APRIL 2009

33

For More Details

• • • • • • • “Novel Reactor Designs to Burn Non-Fissile Fuels,” International Congress on Advances in Nuclear Power Plants 2008 (ICAPP ‘08), paper 8319 “A First Generation Traveling Wave Reactor,” ANS Transactions 2008, Vol. 98, p. 738 “High Burn-Up Fuels for Fast Reactors: Past Experience and Novel Applications,” International Congress on Advances in Nuclear Power Plants 2009 (ICAPP ‘09), paper 9178 “A Once-Through Fuel Cycle for Fast Reactors,” 17th International Conference on Nuclear Engineering (ICONE-17), paper ICONE17-75381 “Extending the Nuclear Fuel Cycle with Traveling-Wave Reactors,” GLOBAL 2009, paper 9294 Article in press at the Journal of Engineering for Gas Turbines and Power http://intellectualventureslab.com

and [email protected]

34