Bill Gates, a co-founder of Microsoft Corp. and a founder of nuclear venture TerraPower, was forced to abandon an agreement with the China state-run China National Nuclear Corp (CNNC) and is seeking new partners for its early-stage trials because of the two reasons below. First, the US Department of Energy announced new restrictions on nuclear deals with China in October 2018 for the strategic importance of the US's nuclear technology.
The second reason, according to Gates, was that the existing regulations in the United States had been too restrictive to build the new reactor's prototype. After its plan with CNNC is halted, Terra Power is not sure which country will be the next partner.
In 2017, TerraPower LLC reached an agreement with China's CNNC. They planned to build an experimental nuclear reactor south of Beijing. Its lab planned to use depleted uranium as the fuel, in order to improve safety and reduce costs. The firm's CEO Chris Levesque pointed out that the company is regrouping and hope to find another partner.
(Article by TechNews; Photo credit: OnInnovation via Flickr CC BY 2.0)