1/ A great article from last year.
10 Yrs ago Lux asked
Q: “What Sucks?” with nuclear.
A: waste
Lux tried to find a high-tech venture to fund. Finding none we started one.
We funded it, hired team, set budget for tech R&D, did M&A
And got VERY lucky. cen.acs.org/environment/po…
10 Yrs ago Lux asked
Q: “What Sucks?” with nuclear.
A: waste
Lux tried to find a high-tech venture to fund. Finding none we started one.
We funded it, hired team, set budget for tech R&D, did M&A
And got VERY lucky. cen.acs.org/environment/po…
2/ One tech we had in our portfolio @ our venture (Kurion) pulled radioactive Cesium + Strontium from salt water. Nobody has this as nuclear reactor water is ~100% pure.
When Fukushima disaster struck, hundreds of milllions of gallons SEA WATER were dumped to prevent meltodown…
When Fukushima disaster struck, hundreds of milllions of gallons SEA WATER were dumped to prevent meltodown…
3/ This little US company with a TOTAL of $3M of invested capital ($1.5M from Lux and we owned 35% between common + preferred) funded at $3M pre…
ended up with $40M of EBITDA and sold to Veolia for ~10x.
Lux made 43x on that $1.5M which returned an early fund + then some
ended up with $40M of EBITDA and sold to Veolia for ~10x.
Lux made 43x on that $1.5M which returned an early fund + then some
4/ Any true environmentalist should be demanding nuclear
ONLY thing needed for nuclear is a human meme mindset update.
No startups needed for reactors.
Areva, Toshiba, Westinghouse have decades of operational excellence
Someone else will again make a lot of money in WASTE
ONLY thing needed for nuclear is a human meme mindset update.
No startups needed for reactors.
Areva, Toshiba, Westinghouse have decades of operational excellence
Someone else will again make a lot of money in WASTE
5/
Was very hard
We had a lot of brain damage in process
Frought with slow regulatory oversight
+ industry generational older + rightly-cautious plodding processes
took a crisis-catastrophe
we seized it, got LPs returns,reduced human suffering
took lucky win; unlikely to repeat
Was very hard
We had a lot of brain damage in process
Frought with slow regulatory oversight
+ industry generational older + rightly-cautious plodding processes
took a crisis-catastrophe
we seized it, got LPs returns,reduced human suffering
took lucky win; unlikely to repeat
6/ Some of the crazy high-tech engineered systems combining state of the art physics + material science nuclear material separation, ion-resin exchange, vitrification (turning waste to glass) at Kurion 
7/ Even origins of Kurion (ala Madame Curie who discovered radioactivity)
had roots in SCI-FI vs SCI-FACT
When we started Kurion I saw old movie from 1975 w/ Martin Landau called Space:1999 that had a ‘nuclear waste disposal area’
the design for Fukushima cleanup mirrored it!
had roots in SCI-FI vs SCI-FACT
When we started Kurion I saw old movie from 1975 w/ Martin Landau called Space:1999 that had a ‘nuclear waste disposal area’
the design for Fukushima cleanup mirrored it!
https://twitter.com/wolfejosh/status/711263041959157761
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