Let's give Bill Gates some credit: Retiring from Microsoft with all the free time and money in the world, Gates could have launched any number of Montgomery Burns-ian schemes for world domination. Instead, the multi-billionaire went the philanthropist route, becoming one of DISCOVER's 10 most influential people in science through the health work his foundation funds. But a tinkerer is never done tinkering: In the last year Gates has patented an anti-hurricane device, given a few million dollars to fund geoengineering research, and then this week went public with his newest project: small-scale nuclear power. A Gates-backed start-up company called TerraPower in talks with Toshiba
to develop traveling-wave reactors (TWRs), which are designed to use depleted uranium as fuel and thought to hold the promise of running up to 100 years without refueling [FoxNews.com]
. TWRs, which scientists have been playing with on and off for decades, need enriched uranium ...
