Molten salt reactors are nothing new.

They’ve been around since the 1960s and date back to the days of the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Now, almost 60 years later, several companies are starting to develop them as energy systems of the future—including TerraPower, backed by Bill Gates.

Southern Company, a leading energy company in the United States, is partnering with TerraPower to develop a molten chloride fast reactor (MCFR) that uses liquid salts as both a coolant and fuel.

The U.S. Department of Energy already invested more than $28 million in cost-shared funds for the project to further identify and test materials used in the reactor.

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