Well, I have a big announcement to make today, and I'm really excited about this. And this may be a little bit of a surprise to many of you who know my research and what I've done well. I've really tried to solve some big problems: counterterrorism, nuclear terrorism, and health care and diagnosing and treating cancer, but I started thinking about all these problems, and I realized that the really biggest problem we face, what all these other problems come down to, is energy, is electricity, the flow of electrons. And I decided that I was going to set out to try to solve this problem.
Imam veliko obaveštenje za danas i zaista sam uzbuđen zbog ovoga. Ovo će vas možda iznenaditi ako znate moje istraživanje i moje uspehe. Pokušao sam da rešim neke velike probleme: antiterorizam, nuklearni terorizam, zdravstvo i dijagnozu i lečenje raka, ali počeo sam da razmišljam o svim ovim problemima i shvatio sam da je najveći problem s kojim se suočavamo, na šta se svode svi ovi drugi problemi, to je energija, struja, tok elektrona. Odlučio sam da krenem i pokušam da rešim ovaj problem.
And this probably is not what you're expecting. You're probably expecting me to come up here and talk about fusion, because that's what I've done most of my life. But this is actually a talk about, okay -- (Laughter) — but this is actually a talk about fission. It's about perfecting something old, and bringing something old into the 21st century.
Ovo verovatno nije ono što očekujete. Verovatno ste očekivali da dođem ovde i pričam o fuziji, jer sam to radio većinu svog života. Ali ovo je zapravo govor o - (Smeh) - ali ovo je zapravo govor o fisiji. O usavršavanju nečeg starog, i vraćanju nečeg starog u 21. vek.
Let's talk a little bit about how nuclear fission works. In a nuclear power plant, you have a big pot of water that's under high pressure, and you have some fuel rods, and these fuel rods are encased in zirconium, and they're little pellets of uranium dioxide fuel, and a fission reaction is controlled and maintained at a proper level, and that reaction heats up water, the water turns to steam, steam turns the turbine, and you produce electricity from it. This is the same way we've been producing electricity, the steam turbine idea, for 100 years, and nuclear was a really big advancement in a way to heat the water, but you still boil water and that turns to steam and turns the turbine.
Hajde da malo pričamo o tome kako funkcioniše nuklearna fisija. U nuklearnoj elektrani imate veliki sud sa vodom koji je pod visokim pritiskom, i imate šipke sa gorivom koje su obložene cirkonijumom, i one su loptice goriva uranijum dioksida. Reakcija fisije se kontroliše i održava na određenom nivou i ta reakcija zagreva vodu, voda se pretvara u paru, para okreće turbinu, i tako dobijate struju. Na isti ovaj način proizvodimo struju već 100 godina, preko parne turbine, i nuklearna energija je bila veliki napredak u načinu zagrevanja vode, ali još uvek morate zagrevati vodu koja se pretvara u paru i okreće turbinu.
And I thought, you know, is this the best way to do it? Is fission kind of played out, or is there something left to innovate here? And I realized that I had hit upon something that I think has this huge potential to change the world. And this is what it is.
A ja sam pomislio, da li je ovo najbolji način da se ovo radi? Da li je fisija istrošena ideja ili još ima prostora za inovaciju? Shvatio sam da sam naišao na nešto za šta mislim da ima veliki potencijal da promeni svet. O ovome pričam.
This is a small modular reactor. So it's not as big as the reactor you see in the diagram here. This is between 50 and 100 megawatts. But that's a ton of power. That's between, say at an average use, that's maybe 25,000 to 100,000 homes could run off that. Now the really interesting thing about these reactors is they're built in a factory. So they're modular reactors that are built essentially on an assembly line, and they're trucked anywhere in the world, you plop them down, and they produce electricity. This region right here is the reactor.
Ovo je mali modularni reaktor. Nije velik kao reaktor kojeg vidite na ovom dijagramu. Ovo je između 50 i 100 megavata. Ali to je puno energije. Ako pričamo o prosečnoj potrošnji, recimo 25 do 100 hiljada domova bi moglo da se snabdeva time. Stvarno zanimljiva stvar u vezi sa ovim reaktorima je to da se prave u fabrikama. To su modularni reaktori koji se u principu prave na pokretnoj traci i otpremaju bilo gde u svetu, samo ih posadite, i stvaraju struju. Ovaj region ovde je reaktor.
And this is buried below ground, which is really important. For someone who's done a lot of counterterrorism work, I can't extol to you how great having something buried below the ground is for proliferation and security concerns.
To je zakopano pod zemljom, što je veoma bitno. Kao neko ko je dosta radio na antiterorizmu, ne mogu vam opisati koliko je sjajno imati nešto zakopano pod zemljom, zbog briga u vezi sa širenjem i bezbednošću.
And inside this reactor is a molten salt, so anybody who's a fan of thorium, they're going to be really excited about this, because these reactors happen to be really good at breeding and burning the thorium fuel cycle, uranium-233.
Unutar reaktora je topljena so, pa ćete biti veoma uzbuđeni zbog ovoga ukoliko volite torijum, jer su ovi reaktori veoma dobri u stvaranju i sagorevanju gorivnog ciklusa torijuma, uranijuma 233.
But I'm not really concerned about the fuel. You can run these off -- they're really hungry, they really like down-blended weapons pits, so that's highly enriched uranium and weapons-grade plutonium that's been down-blended. It's made into a grade where it's not usable for a nuclear weapon, but they love this stuff. And we have a lot of it sitting around, because this is a big problem. You know, in the Cold War, we built up this huge arsenal of nuclear weapons, and that was great, and we don't need them anymore, and what are we doing with all the waste, essentially? What are we doing with all the pits of those nuclear weapons? Well, we're securing them, and it would be great if we could burn them, eat them up, and this reactor loves this stuff.
Ali gorivo me ne brine previše. Ovo možete snabdevati - veoma su gladni, oni su poput razvodnjenih jama za oružje, tako da je to veoma obogaćen uranijum i plutonijum za oružje koji su razvodnjeni. Dovedeni su do stupnja gde se ne mogu koristiti za nuklearna oružja, ali obožavaju ovo. Imamo dosta toga oko nas, jer je ovo veliki problem. Tokom Hladnog rata, stekli smo ogroman arsenal nuklearnog naoružanja, i to je bilo super, ali nam više ne treba. I šta zapravo uraditi sa ovim otpadom? Šta ćemo uraditi sa svim tim jamama s nuklearnim oružjem? Obezbeđujemo ih, i bilo bi sjajno kada bi mogli da ih sagorimo, potrošimo, i ovaj reaktor to obožava.
So it's a molten salt reactor. It has a core, and it has a heat exchanger from the hot salt, the radioactive salt, to a cold salt which isn't radioactive. It's still thermally hot but it's not radioactive. And then that's a heat exchanger to what makes this design really, really interesting, and that's a heat exchanger to a gas. So going back to what I was saying before about all power being produced -- well, other than photovoltaic -- being produced by this boiling of steam and turning a turbine, that's actually not that efficient, and in fact, in a nuclear power plant like this, it's only roughly 30 to 35 percent efficient. That's how much thermal energy the reactor's putting out to how much electricity it's producing. And the reason the efficiencies are so low is these reactors operate at pretty low temperature. They operate anywhere from, you know, maybe 200 to 300 degrees Celsius. And these reactors run at 600 to 700 degrees Celsius, which means the higher the temperature you go to, thermodynamics tells you that you will have higher efficiencies. And this reactor doesn't use water. It uses gas, so supercritical CO2 or helium, and that goes into a turbine, and this is called the Brayton cycle. This is the thermodynamic cycle that produces electricity, and this makes this almost 50 percent efficient, between 45 and 50 percent efficiency. And I'm really excited about this, because it's a very compact core. Molten salt reactors are very compact by nature, but what's also great is you get a lot more electricity out for how much uranium you're fissioning, not to mention the fact that these burn up. Their burn-up is much higher. So for a given amount of fuel you put in the reactor, a lot more of it's being used.
To je reaktor od topljene soli. Ima i jezgro, i deo koji menja toplu, radiokativnu so, u hladnu so koja nije radioaktivna. Još uvek je termički topla ali nije radioaktivna. I tu je deo za razmenu toplote, a ono što zaista čini ovaj dizajn veoma zanimljivim je razmena toplote u gas. Vratimo se na ono što sam pre rekao o tome kako se sva energija koja se proizvodi - osim fotonaponske - proizvodi se pomoću vrele pare i okretanja turbine, a to zapravo nije veoma efikasno i u stvari, u nuklearnoj elektrani poput ove, efikasno je samo otprilike 30 do 35%. Toliko energije stvara toplotni reaktor u odnosu na količinu struje koju proizvodi. Razlog za nisku efikasnost je to što reaktori rade na prilično niskim temperaturama. Rade otprilike negde između možda 200 do 300 stepeni Celzijusove skale. A ovi reaktori rade na 600 do 700 stepeni Celzijusa, što znači da što je veća temperatura, termodinamika kaže da ćete imati i veću efikasnost. Ovaj reaktor ne koristi vodu nego gas, natkritični CO2 ili helijum, i to ide u turbinu, i naziva se Brajtonov ciklus. Ovo je termodinamički ciklus koji stvara struju, i čini proces efikasnim skoro 50%, efikasnost je između 45 i 50%. I zaista sam uzbuđen zbog ovoga, jer je jezgro veoma kompaktno. Reaktori sa topljenom soli su prirodno veoma kompaktni ali sjajno je i to što dobijate puno više struje za količinu uranijuma u procesu fisije, a da ne spominjemo to da se ovo sagoreva. Njihovo sagorevanje je puno veće. Za određenu količinu goriva u reaktoru, puno više toga se koristi.
And the problem with a traditional nuclear power plant like this is, you've got these rods that are clad in zirconium, and inside them are uranium dioxide fuel pellets. Well, uranium dioxide's a ceramic, and ceramic doesn't like releasing what's inside of it. So you have what's called the xenon pit, and so some of these fission products love neutrons. They love the neutrons that are going on and helping this reaction take place. And they eat them up, which means that, combined with the fact that the cladding doesn't last very long, you can only run one of these reactors for roughly, say, 18 months without refueling it. So these reactors run for 30 years without refueling, which is, in my opinion, very, very amazing, because it means it's a sealed system. No refueling means you can seal them up and they're not going to be a proliferation risk, and they're not going to have either nuclear material or radiological material proliferated from their cores.
Problem sa tradicionalnom nuklearnom elektranom poput ove je to što imate ove šipke prekrivene cirkonijumom, i unutar njih su kuglice s gorivom od uranijum dioksida. Uranijum dioksid je keramički, i keramika ne voli da ispušta ono što sadrži. Imate ksenonsku jamu, i neki od proizvoda fisije vole neutrone. Vole neutrone koji se kreću i omogućavaju ovu reakciju. I oni ih jedu, što znači da u kombinaciji sa činjenicom da oblaganje ne traje veoma dugo, možete pokretati jedan od ovih reaktora oko 18 meseci bez dopune goriva. Ovi reaktori funkcionišu 30 godina bez dopune goriva, što je po mom mišljenju neverovatno, jer znači da je to zatvoren sistem. Ako nema dopune goriva znači da ih možete zatvoriti i neće biti rizika od proliferacije, i neće imati ni nuklearnog ni radiološkog materijala koji se širi iz jezgara.
But let's go back to safety, because everybody after Fukushima had to reassess the safety of nuclear, and one of the things when I set out to design a power reactor was it had to be passively and intrinsically safe, and I'm really excited about this reactor for essentially two reasons. One, it doesn't operate at high pressure. So traditional reactors like a pressurized water reactor or boiling water reactor, they're very, very hot water at very high pressures, and this means, essentially, in the event of an accident, if you had any kind of breach of this stainless steel pressure vessel, the coolant would leave the core. These reactors operate at essentially atmospheric pressure, so there's no inclination for the fission products to leave the reactor in the event of an accident. Also, they operate at high temperatures, and the fuel is molten, so they can't melt down, but in the event that the reactor ever went out of tolerances, or you lost off-site power in the case of something like Fukushima, there's a dump tank. Because your fuel is liquid, and it's combined with your coolant, you could actually just drain the core into what's called a sub-critical setting, basically a tank underneath the reactor that has some neutrons absorbers. And this is really important, because the reaction stops. In this kind of reactor, you can't do that. The fuel, like I said, is ceramic inside zirconium fuel rods, and in the event of an accident in one of these type of reactors, Fukushima and Three Mile Island -- looking back at Three Mile Island, we didn't really see this for a while — but these zirconium claddings on these fuel rods, what happens is, when they see high pressure water, steam, in an oxidizing environment, they'll actually produce hydrogen, and that hydrogen has this explosive capability to release fission products. So the core of this reactor, since it's not under pressure and it doesn't have this chemical reactivity, means that there's no inclination for the fission products to leave this reactor. So even in the event of an accident, yeah, the reactor may be toast, which is, you know, sorry for the power company, but we're not going to contaminate large quantities of land. So I really think that in the, say, 20 years it's going to take us to get fusion and make fusion a reality, this could be the source of energy that provides carbon-free electricity. Carbon-free electricity.
Ali vratimo se na bezbednost, jer posle Fukušime svi su morali da ponovo procene bezbednost nuklearne energije i jedna od stvari koju sam imao na umu kada sam krenuo da smislim reaktor, bila je to da mora da bude pasivno i suštinski bezbedan, i zaista sam uzbuđen zbog ovog reaktora iz dva razloga. Prvi je to da ne radi pod velikim pritiskom. Tradicionalni reaktori poput onog sa vodom pod pritiskom ili vrelom vodom, tu se radi o veoma vreloj vodi na jako visokim temperaturama, a to zapravo znači da u slučaju nesreće, ako se desi bilo kakvo probijanje ovog čeličnog suda pod pritiskom, rashladna tečnost bi napustila jezgro. Ovi reaktori rade na atmosferskom pritisku, tako da za proizvode fisije nema sklonosti da napuste jezgro u slučaju nesreće. Takođe rade na visokim temperaturama, i gorivo je istopljeno, tako da ne mogu da se istope, ali u slučaju da reaktor ikada ode od dozvoljenih odstupanja ili izgubite napajanje u slučaju nečeg poput Fukušime, tu je rezervoar za otpad. Zato što je gorivo tečno i meša se sa rastvorom za hlađenje, možete samo izliti jezgro u vankritično okruženje, što je u principu rezervoar ispod reaktora koji apsorbuje neutrone. I ovo je veoma važno jer se zaustavlja reakcija. U ovakvom reaktoru to ne možete uraditi. Kao što sam rekao, gorivo je keramika unutar šipki cirkonijuma, i u slučaju nesreće sa jednim od ovih reaktora, Fukušima i ostrvo Tri Milje - gledajući na ostrvo Tri Milje, ovo zaista dugo nismo videli - ali ove obloge od cirkonijuma na šipkama goriva, kada vide vodu pod visokim pritiskom, paru, u okruženju koje oksidira, zapravo će proizvesti vodonik, i taj vodonik ima ovo eksplozivno svojstvo da ispušta proizvode fisije. Jezgro reaktora, pošto nije pod pritiskom, i nema hemijsku reaktivnost, znači da nema sklonosti da proizvodi fisije napuste ovaj reaktor. Čak i u slučaju nesreće, reaktor može biti spržen, što je, znate, šteta za energetsku kompaniju, ali nećemo kontaminirati velike količine zemljišta. Zaista mislim da ćemo za recimo 20 godina dobiti fuziju i napraviti od nje stvarnost, ovo bi mogao da bude izvor energije koji daje struju bez ugljenika. Struja bez ugljenika.
And it's an amazing technology because not only does it combat climate change, but it's an innovation. It's a way to bring power to the developing world, because it's produced in a factory and it's cheap. You can put them anywhere in the world you want to.
To je neverovatna tehnologija jer se ne samo bori sa promenom klime, nego je i inovativna. To je način da se struja dovede u svet u razvoju, jer se proizvodi u fabrikama i jeftina je. Možete ih staviti gde god želite u celom svetu.
And maybe something else. As a kid, I was obsessed with space. Well, I was obsessed with nuclear science too, to a point, but before that I was obsessed with space, and I was really excited about, you know, being an astronaut and designing rockets, which was something that was always exciting to me. But I think I get to come back to this, because imagine having a compact reactor in a rocket that produces 50 to 100 megawatts. That is the rocket designer's dream. That's someone who is designing a habitat on another planet's dream. Not only do you have 50 to 100 megawatts to power whatever you want to provide propulsion to get you there, but you have power once you get there. You know, rocket designers who use solar panels or fuel cells, I mean a few watts or kilowatts -- wow, that's a lot of power. I mean, now we're talking about 100 megawatts. That's a ton of power. That could power a Martian community. That could power a rocket there. And so I hope that maybe I'll have an opportunity to kind of explore my rocketry passion at the same time that I explore my nuclear passion.
A možda i drugde. Kao dete, bio sam opsednut svemirom. Do neke tačke bio sam opsednut i nuklearnom naukom, ali pre toga sam bio opsednut svemirom, i zaista sam bio uzbuđen u vezi sa tim da budem astronaut i dizajniram rakete, što mi je uvek bilo uzbudljivo. Ali mislim da se vraćam ovome, jer zamislite da imate kompaktan reaktor u raketi koji proizvodi 50 do 100 megavata. To je san dizajnera raketa. To je san nekog ko dizajnira život na drugoj planeti. Ne samo da imate 50 do 100 megavata da snabdete ono š čime želite da vas do tamo dovede, nego imate i energiju kada do tamo dođete. Dizajneri raketa koji koriste solarne ploče ili ćelije goriva, nekoliko vata ili kilovata - vau, to je puno energije. Sada pričamo o 100 megavata. To je hrpa energije. To bi moglo da snabdeva zajednicu na Marsu. To bi moglo da tamo snabde energijom raketu. I nadam se da ću možda imati priliku da istražujem svoju strast za raketarstvom dok istražujem strast za nuklearnom energijom.
And people say, "Oh, well, you've launched this thing, and it's radioactive, into space, and what about accidents?" But we launch plutonium batteries all the time. Everybody was really excited about Curiosity, and that had this big plutonium battery on board that has plutonium-238, which actually has a higher specific activity than the low-enriched uranium fuel of these molten salt reactors, which means that the effects would be negligible, because you launch it cold, and when it gets into space is where you actually activate this reactor.
I ljudi kažu: "Pa lansirao si ovo, i radioaktivno je, u svemiru je, i šta ako se desi nesreća?" Ali stalno lansiramo baterije s plutonijumom. Svi su bili uzbuđeni zbog Kjuriositija, koji je na sebi imao veliku bateriju s plutonijumom koja je imala plutonijum-238, koji ima veću specifičnu aktivnost nego gorivo sa osiromašenim uranijumom kod ovih reaktora sa topljenom solju, što znači da bi efekti bili zanemarivi, jer biste ga mogli lansirati na hladno, i aktivirati reaktor kada dođete u svemir.
So I'm really excited. I think that I've designed this reactor here that can be an innovative source of energy, provide power for all kinds of neat scientific applications, and I'm really prepared to do this. I graduated high school in May, and -- (Laughter) (Applause) — I graduated high school in May, and I decided that I was going to start up a company to commercialize these technologies that I've developed, these revolutionary detectors for scanning cargo containers and these systems to produce medical isotopes, but I want to do this, and I've slowly been building up a team of some of the most incredible people I've ever had the chance to work with, and I'm really prepared to make this a reality. And I think, I think, that looking at the technology, this will be cheaper than or the same price as natural gas, and you don't have to refuel it for 30 years, which is an advantage for the developing world.
Zaista sam uzbuđen. Mislim da sam ovaj reaktor dizajnirao kao inovativan izvor energije, da pruži energiju za svakakve naučne svrhe, i zaista sam spreman da uradim ovo. Maturirao sam iz srednje škole u maju i - (Smeh) (Aplauz) - maturirao sam iz srednje škole u maju i odlučio sam da osnujem kompaniju kako bih komercijalizovao tehnologije koje sam razvio, ove revolucionarne detektore za skeniranje kontejnera sa teretom i ove sisteme za proizvodnju medicinskih izotopa, ali želim da uradim ovo, i polako gradim tim sa nekim od najneverovatnijih ljudi sa kojima sam imao prilike da radim, i zaista sam spreman da ovo sprovedem u delo. Mislim da gledajući tehnologiju, ovo će biti jeftinije od prirodnog gasa ili iste cene, i ne morate da stavljate novo gorivo 30 godina, što je prednost za svet u razvoju.
And I'll just say one more maybe philosophical thing to end with, which is weird for a scientist. But I think there's something really poetic about using nuclear power to propel us to the stars, because the stars are giant fusion reactors. They're giant nuclear cauldrons in the sky. The energy that I'm able to talk to you today, while it was converted to chemical energy in my food, originally came from a nuclear reaction, and so there's something poetic about, in my opinion, perfecting nuclear fission and using it as a future source of innovative energy.
Reći ću još jednu, možda filozofsku misao za kraj, što je neobično za naučnika. Ali mislim da ima nešto zaista poetski u korišćenju nuklearne energije da se dopre do zvezda, jer su zvezde ogromni fuzioni reaktori. Oni su ogromni nuklearni kotlovi na nebu. Energija uz čiju pomoć danas pričam vama, iako je pretvorena iz hrane u hemijsku energiju, zapravo je došla iz nuklearne reakcije, tako da mislim postoji nešto poetski u vezi sa usavršavanjem nuklearne fisije i njenim korišćenjem kao budućeg izvora inovativne energije.
So thank you guys.
Hvala vam.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)