Bill Gates: Nuclear waste is not a reason avoid nuclear energy
Bill Gates, co-chairman of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, speaks during the Earthshot Prize Innovation Summit in New York, US, on Wednesday, Sept. 21, 2022. The first-ever Earthshot Prize Innovation Summit brings together climate leaders to showcase transformative solutions that repair and regenerate the planet.
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Nuclear waste is not a reason to avoid using nuclear energy, according to Bill Gates, the Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist who more recently founded a next-generation nuclear energy startup, TerraPower.
One common criticism of nuclear power is that nuclear reactors generate waste that stays radioactive for thousands of years.
“The waste problems should not be a reason to not do nuclear,” Gates said in an interview with the German business publication, Handelsblatt, published on Thursday. “The amount of waste involved, the ability to do geological sequestration — that’s not a reason not to do nuclear.”
The volume of nuclear waste is very small, especially when compared to the energy generated, Gates said.
“Say the US was completely nuclear-powered, it’s a few rooms worth of total waste. So not, it’s not a gigantic thing,” Gates said. The cost of storing and sequestering nuclear waste underground is “not a huge problem,” as it can be put into deep boreholes underground “where it stays geologically for hundreds of millions of years,” he said.
In contrast, the amount of carbon dioxide emissions generated from burning fossil fuels for energy is “something gigantic” and sequestering that underground is a very hard problem, which Gates said “may not be possible.”
Nuclear power is classified as a “zero-emission clean energy source” by the U.S. Department of Energy, because generating electricity with nuclear fission does not release any greenhouse gas emissions.
Currently, 19 percent of electricity generated in the United States comes from nuclear power plants, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. That represents about half of the carbon-free electricity generation in the U.S., according to the U.S. Department of Energy.
But after a boom of nuclear power reactor construction in the 1970’s and 1980’s, the construction of new nuclear power generation came to a virtual standstill.
“The best hope for nuclear is if we could get a completely new generation — and I’m biased, because I’m involved in that — where the countries that are committed to nuclear prove it out and show that the economic safety, waste management is handled,” Gates said.
“And then the other countries who are less engaged can look at that and see what they think, give it a fresh evaluation. And you know, that data on that won’t be in for almost another eight years or so,” Gates said.
No permanent nuclear waste repository in the US
After decades of nuclear power generation, there is still no permanent repository for nuclear waste in the US. The closest the US nuclear industry got to a permanent nuclear waste repository was at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, but that effort has been stalled because of political impasses.
This undated image obtained 22 February, 2004 shows the entrance to the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository located in Nye County, Nevada, about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
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Currently, nuclear waste is stored in dry casks, which are stainless steel canisters surrounded by concrete. The top nuclear watchdog in the US, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, considers these dry casks to be safe. The world’s first permeant underground geological storage is being constructed in Olkiluoto, Finland.
Also, not all nuclear waste is the same level of radioactivity. Most of the radioactivity is in a very small percentage of the waste generated.
“The vast majority of the volume of nuclear waste there is is Low Level Waste,” Jonathan Cobb, spokesperson for the World Nuclear Association, told CNBC. “Around 90 percent of the volume of nuclear waste produced is LLW, but it contains only 1 percent of the radioactivity. This can include things like protective clothing, mops, filters, equipment and tools that have become contaminated with radioactive material at a low level. One common category of LLW comes from nuclear medicine use and can include swabs, injection needles and syringes.”
Meanwhile the high level nuclear waste, which includes like used nuclear fuel, or higher activity wastes from reprocessing, is “about 3 percent of the volume of radioactive wastes produced, but contains 95 percent of the radioactivity,” Cobb told CNBC.
An attendee wearing a Super Mario costume uses a Nintendo Switch 2 game console while playing a video game during the Nintendo Switch 2 Experience at the ExCeL London international exhibition and convention centre in London, Britain, April 11, 2025.
Isabel Infantes | Reuters
Nintendo on Friday announced that retail preorder for its Nintendo Switch 2 gaming system will begin on April 24 starting at $449.99.
Preorders for the hotly anticipated console were initially slated for April 9, but Nintendo delayed the date to assess the impact of the far-reaching, aggressive “reciprocal” tariffs that President Donald Trump announced earlier this month.
Most electronics companies, including Nintendo, manufacture their products in Asia. Nintendo’s Switch 1 consoles were made in China and Vietnam, Reuters reported in 2019. Trump has imposed a 145% tariff rate on China and a 10% rate on Vietnam. The latter is down from 46%, after he instituted a 90-day pause to allow for negotiations.
Nintendo said Friday that the Switch 2 will cost $449.99 in the U.S., which is the same price the company first announced on April 2.
“We apologize for the retail pre-order delay, and hope this reduces some of the uncertainty our consumers may be experiencing,” Nintendo said in a statement. “We thank our customers for their patience, and we share their excitement to experience Nintendo Switch 2 starting June 5, 2025.”
The Nintendo Switch 2 and “Mario Kart World“ bundle will cost $499.99, the digital version “Mario Kart World” will cost $79.99 and the digital version of “Donkey Kong Bananza” will cost $69.99, Nintendo said. All of those prices remain unchanged from the company’s initial announcement.
However, accessories for the Nintendo Switch 2 will “experience price adjustments,” the company said, and other future changes in costs are possible for “any Nintendo product.”
It will cost gamers $10 more to by the dock set, $1 more to buy the controller strap and $5 more to buy most other accessories, for instance.
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An employee walks past a quilt displaying Etsy Inc. signage at the company’s headquarters in the Brooklyn.
Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Etsy is trying to make it easier for shoppers to purchase products from local merchants and avoid the extra cost of imports as President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs raise concerns about soaring prices.
In a post to Etsy’s website on Thursday, CEO Josh Silverman said the company is “surfacing new ways for buyers to discover businesses in their countries” via shopping pages and by featuring local sellers on its website and app.
“While we continue to nurture and enable cross-border trade on Etsy, we understand that people are increasingly interested in shopping domestically,” Silverman said.
Etsy operates an online marketplace that connects buyers and sellers with mostly artisanal and handcrafted goods. The site, which had 5.6 million active sellers as of the end of December, competes with e-commerce juggernaut Amazon, as well as newer entrants that have ties to China like Temu, Shein and TikTok Shop.
By highlighting local sellers, Etsy could relieve some shoppers from having to pay higher prices induced by President Trump’s widespread tariffs on trade partners. Trump has imposed tariffs on most foreign countries, with China facing a rate of 145%, and other nations facing 10% rates after he instituted a 90-day pause to allow for negotiations. Trump also signed an executive order that will end the de minimis provision, a loophole for low-value shipments often used by online businesses, on May 2.
Temu and Shein have already announced they plan to raise prices late next week in response to the tariffs. Sellers on Amazon’s third-party marketplace, many of whom source their products from China, have said they’re considering raising prices.
Silverman said Etsy has provided guidance for its sellers to help them “run their businesses with as little disruption as possible” in the wake of tariffs and changes to the de minimis exemption.
Before Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs took effect, Silverman said on the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call in late February that he expects Etsy to benefit from the tariffs and de minimis restrictions because it “has much less dependence on products coming in from China.”
“We’re doing whatever work we can do to anticipate and prepare for come what may,” Silverman said at the time. “In general, though, I think Etsy will be more resilient than many of our competitors in these situations.”
Still, American shoppers may face higher prices on Etsy as U.S. businesses that source their products or components from China pass some of those costs on to consumers.
Etsy shares are down 17% this year, slightly more than the Nasdaq.
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