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![TerraPower Chair Bill Gates](https://content.fortune.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/GettyImages-1719101440-e1701720664103.jpg?w=840)
Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has been chairman of nuclear reactor company TerraPower since 2006. Thierry Monas—Getty Images
The nuclear reactor company co-founded by Bill Gates has signed an agreement with the United Arab Emirates to explore building advanced reactors in the Gulf country.
TerraPower and the UAE’s state-owned nuclear company Emirates Nuclear Energy Company (ENEC) signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding on Monday to collaborate on developing new nuclear power plants to combat climate change. The preliminary deal comes as nuclear power takes center stage at last week’s United Nations COP28 conference in Dubai.
Nuclear power is considered a promising alternative to fossil fuels because it can produce large amounts of energy without emitting carbon. However, it also produces nuclear waste that must be stored properly.
Gates told CBS in a July interview that the amount of waste produced by a single factory every decade is “less than the size of a large room.” “So waste treatment technology — we’ve made advances so that’s no longer a limiting factor.”
Gates has long been a leader in calling for technological innovation to combat climate change. Since leaving Microsoft, the company he co-founded, Gates has worked on a variety of business and philanthropic efforts to combat climate change, including investing in green startups and through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which he co-chaired Billions of dollars will be donated to charity. – wife. His plan has made him the top spokesman for the climate crisis.
Meanwhile, the UAE, which has about 10 million oil resources on the Arabian Peninsula, joined a group of more than 20 countries that pledged at COP28 to triple global nuclear power capacity by 2050. ENEC oversees the UAE’s nuclear power projects Nuclear power plants are a key player in the country’s push for sustainable energy. The company’s commitment to these efforts has been called into question following recent reports that COP28 chairman Sultan Al Jaber claimed “no science” supports the need to phase out fossil fuels to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial temperatures.
ENEC did not respond to a request for comment; TerraPower representatives directed wealth Press release announcing the agreement in the UAE.
The UAE’s partnership with TerraPower will enable the country to “collaborate in a range of areas related to nuclear power, including technical design and commercial feasibility,” according to a press release. The UAE will receive TerraPower’s Natrium technology, which uses sodium instead of water to cool nuclear reactors, thereby increasing their efficiency. The technology will be used to generate clean electricity and accelerate the decarbonization of energy-intensive industries by providing them with carbon-free electricity, according to a press release.
One of the biggest prospects for nuclear power is how it can complement renewable energy sources like solar and wind. It can help replenish these sources of power when the sun or wind isn’t shining, ensuring the green grid has enough power in any weather or time of day.
“Solar and wind are going to play a huge role, and trying to use them alone without the wonders of storage is something we haven’t thought of at all, and it just doesn’t create the solution,” Gates said in an interview. International Atomic Energy Agency 2022 . “So having a form of energy production that’s not dependent on the weather, is completely green, reliable and cheap enough means that there really has to be some nuclear power generation. [energy] In this equation. ”
The new partnership may also mean Emirati engineers will be sent to TerraPower’s US headquarters to learn about its work. ENEC CEO Mohamed Ibrahim Al Hammadi said in a statement: “Our new agreement with TerraPower will accelerate the deployment and use of nuclear energy technology for innovative solutions, including the production of clean molecules and hydrogen, thereby stimulating cooperation and taking nuclear energy technology to the next level. s level. “.
At COP28, nuclear power was the high-profile alternative to fossil fuels. A US-led coalition of countries has pledged to triple the world’s nuclear power capacity by 2050. Other major signatories include France, which has long been a pioneer in nuclear power; Japan, which suffered a devastating nuclear leak following the 2011 earthquake at its Fukushima nuclear power plant; and South Korea’s second-largest company, SK Group, which is an investor in TerraPower. In the United States, TerraPower plans to convert a coal-fired power plant in Wyoming into the first sodium-powered nuclear power plant by 2030.
Gates, chairman of TerraPower and an active participant in COP28, told CNBC that he is “definitely half full” when it comes to combating climate change. His “biggest hope” for the conference is that a host of innovative technologies to help combat climate change will be funded by companies and governments. “Now we need to take technologies that look very promising and scale them up, build pilot plants and prove they work,” Gates said on Friday.
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