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Kairos power’s new test facility is on a parched site a few miles south of the Albuquerque, New Mexico, airport. [qh]
卡伊洛斯电力公司的新测试设施位于新墨西哥州阿尔伯克基机场以南几英里的一个炎热之地。[qh]
Around it, desert stretches toward hazy mountains on the horizon. [qh]
四周的沙漠向地平线处若隐若现的山脉延伸着。[qh]
The building looks like a factory or a warehouse; nothing about it betrays the moonshot exercise happening within. [qh]
这座建筑看起来像一座工厂或一所仓库; 建筑外观丝毫没有暴露出内部正在进行的登月计划。[qh]
There, digital readouts count down the minutes, T-minus style, until power begins flowing to a test unit simulating the blistering heat of a new kind of nuclear reactor.[qh]
在那里，数字读数按照分钟倒数计时，直到电力开始流向模拟新型高温核反应堆的测试装置为止。[qh]
In this test run, electricity, not uranium, will furnish the energy; graphite-encased fuel pebbles, each about the size of a golf ball, will be dummies containing no radioactive material. [qh]
在这次试运行中，提供能量的是电，而非铀; 包裹石墨的燃料芯块(每块约为一个高尔夫球大小)会是不含放射性物质的仿制品。[qh]
But everything else will be true to life, including the molten fluoride salt that will flow through the device to cool it. [qh]
但其他的一切设备都是实在物质，包括流经设备进行冷却的氯化物熔盐。[qh]
If all goes according to plan, the system—never tried before—will control and regulate a simulated chain reaction. [qh]
如果一切按计划进行，这个从未试验过的系统将调控模拟链式反应。[qh]
When I glance at a countdown clock behind the receptionist during a visit last May, it says 31 days, 8 hours, 9 minutes, and 22 seconds until the experiment begins.[qh]
去年5月，我前去拜访时，瞥了一眼接待员身后的倒计时钟，上面写着离实验开始还有31天8小时9分22秒。[qh]
The test unit looks surprisingly unimpressive: a shiny cylindrical drum only about 16 feet tall, resembling an oversize water heater. [qh]
测试装置外观出奇地不起眼: 一个闪亮的圆柱形鼓轮，高度约为16英尺，形似一个超大型热水器。[qh]
The scale is unlike that of an existing commercial nuclear plant. [qh]
其规模不同于现有的商业核电站。[qh]
Forget about those airport-scale compounds with their fortresslike containment enclosures and 40-story cooling towers belching steam.[qh]
没有机场规模的建筑群，没有堡垒般的隔离围墙，也没有40层楼高的喷射蒸汽的冷却塔。[qh]
This reactor will sit in an ordinary building the size of, say, a suburban self-storage facility. [qh]
这个反应堆将被安置在一个普通的建筑里，比如一个郊区自助寄存设施里。[qh]
It will be made in factories for easy shipping and rapid assembly. [qh]
为了便于运输与快速组装，将在工厂生产反应堆。[qh]
Customers will be able to buy just one, to power a chemical or steel plant, or a few, linked like batteries, to power a city. [qh]
消费者可以只购买一个反应堆，为一所或几所化工厂或钢铁厂供电，也可以像电池一样将其连接起来，为一座城市供电。[qh]
Most important, even if a local disaster cuts the power to the cooling system and safety systems fail, this reactor will not melt down, spew radioactive material, or become too hot and dangerous to approach. [qh]
最重要的是，即使一场局部灾难切断了冷却系统的电源，安全系统失灵，也不会发生反应堆堆芯熔毁，也不会喷出放射性物质，环境也不会过热、过于危险而无法接近。[qh]
It will remain stable until normal conditions are restored.[qh]
在恢复正常前，反应堆将保持稳定。[qh]
