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Also, unless I completely missed the point somewhere and Japan is equally dumb, we're looking at a worst-case scenario of another Three Mile Island. *Not* a Chernobyl.
I mean, that's pretty bad, don't get me wrong, and I doubt Japan can afford to have the mess hit what little groundwater they possess, but it's containable.
What really baffles me is why the emergency shutdown systems failed. Yes, lack of power, I get that, but nuclear power plant designs these days are supposed to be fail-safe, not fail-bad.
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Sofaspud Wrote:What really baffles me is why the emergency shutdown systems failed. Yes, lack of power, I get that, but nuclear power plant designs these days are supposed to be fail-safe, not fail-bad. Because the reactor is 40 years old and never updated to newer designs. The newest types of reactors literally can not fail in this manner.
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Craaaap. I knew last night that they were talking about possibly having to vent some of the 'hot' air in an attempt to keep something like this from happening. Had evacuated residents JIC. Has there been any REPUTABLE reporting on just what happened with the cooling system to cause it to fail like this?
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Well, the reactors *did* shut down, which was part of the problem. Just because you stop the plant, that doesn't mean all the heat built up just goes away. When the plants cut off the primary coolant circulation was also stopped. They had diesel generators to provide backup power, but for some cover-your-ass-unknown reason, they also died after about an hour. While newer plants have coolant systems that don't need electricity (however that works) the reactors in the plant in question began operation in 1970-79.
Good succinct display of the facts at the BBC Timeline. From what I've seen on their live reports, PM Kan says the reaction vessel was unharmed in the explosion.
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On the upshot, this reactor cannot fail in the same crazy way that Chernobyl did. Sure, they're having to use seawater to wet grave the whole thing (seawater ought to stop this thing dead, its one of the best insulators we've got), but from what I've heard, the design is simply nowhere nearly as primitive as the 1950's era reactor that blew its lid in Russia.
The situation is more like Three Mile Island than Chernobyl.
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So far the assessment is that the situation is less severe than three mile island, the backup generators where apparently damaged by the tsunami, and the reactor was supposed to be shut down permanently on the 26'th, so it was definitely at the end of it's life-cycle. if the quake had happened three weeks later it wouldn't even have been an issue.
Talk about rotten luck.
E: "Did they... did they just endorse the combination of the JSDF and US Army by showing them as two lesbian lolicons moving in together and holding hands and talking about how 'intimate' they were?"
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Of course, this isn't going to stop people from using this to soapbox about 'evil' nuclear fission radiation and nonsense like that.
Of far greater concern are the homes that were completely erased by this, to say nothing of the people who have simply vanished. There's an initial concern out that there are entire small cities which are simply Gone. Swept out to sea. I'm aghast at the whole situation, really.
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I think the situation is worse. Read about how little actual assistance these people are getting from the central government.
http://online.wsj.com/art...4576196164211959394.html
I smell a rat.
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In fairness... there's quite a lot of people who need assistance, and not a lot of it to go around. Considering that a few kilometres up and down the coast there are entire towns which have been wiped clean off the map.
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Yes indeed... but that pales in comparison to having a reactor that is 100-fold more powerful than the ones at Chernobyl blow its stack. That will have far more lasting consequences.
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Well, it just been reported that the reactor core partially melted. They will be pumping seawater to cool it and boric acid to slow down any nuclear fission still ongoing. Okay, it's TMI stage now. If they don't contain this, then we're looking Chernoble. And in about 50 more years, you'll see Gojira coming out of the bay
The new dreactor esigns use air rather than water as the cooling medium. Instead of fuel rods, they use "bucky balls" (fullerenes for the technical term) of ceramic embedded with nuclear fuel. If the air pumps shut down, all you have to is to vent the the air thru a scrubber system to remove any alpha particles. All you'll be releasing at that point is just hot air. No worries about the water turning to steam, then hydrogen and oxygen.
I wouldn't call the design new either. IIRC, the reactor design was a DOE project in the early 90's. New it's not.
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Ord, you're talking about Pebble Bed Reactors, right? I'm pretty sure that the Fukushima reactors are all Boiling Water Reactors (a more advanced type of Light Water Reactor). Unless you mean they should using Pebble Beds instead, with which I whole-heartedly agree.
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blackaeronaut Wrote:Yes indeed... but that pales in comparison to having a reactor that is 100-fold more powerful than the ones at Chernobyl blow its stack. That will have far more lasting consequences.
Where are you getting you information?
This reactor is half as powerful as the 1Gw Chernobyl 4 reactor. Also, it is contained within a heavy steel containment structure, which is intact, and wasn't present at Chernobyl. What actually exploded was just a lightweight outer building from the appearance of things. There isn't a chance in hell of this thing going Chernobyl.
The worst that could happen is that it TMI's.
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Okay, I just double-checked the figures and you're right about the production capacity. I don't know about the fuel itself, yet, and I'm pretty sure that it makes a big difference, production capacity not withstanding.
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From bad to very bad
03-13-2011, 02:47 AM
Just came in over the news..the other 2 reactors in the same facility lost their cooling ability...the Japanese Atomic Energy Agency rates it right now now a 4 on a scale of 7. That was before the other two lost their cooling capacity. FYI...5 is TMI...7 is Chernobyl.
Edit: BTW, You folks realize that Sendai is the hometown of an anime character right?
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blackaeronaut Wrote:Ord, you're talking about Pebble Bed Reactors, right? I'm pretty sure that the Fukushima reactors are all Boiling Water Reactors (a more advanced type of Light Water Reactor). Unless you mean they should using Pebble Beds instead, with which I whole-heartedly agree. Is that what they're calling them the 3rd-4rth generation designs ? I remember it being discussed in the Chemical Engineering periodicals I read in college (20 years ago!), but I don't recall any reactors in the U.S built on that design. The Boiling water reactors, I'd consider more of a late 50's-60's design. 2nd generation based on the Navy's reactor designs push by Hyman Rickover.
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Dartz Wrote:blackaeronaut Wrote:Yes indeed... but that pales in comparison to having a reactor that is 100-fold more powerful than the ones at Chernobyl blow its stack. That will have far more lasting consequences.
Where are you getting you information?
This reactor is half as powerful as the 1Gw Chernobyl 4 reactor. Also, it is contained within a heavy steel containment structure, which is intact, and wasn't present at Chernobyl. What actually exploded was just a lightweight outer building from the appearance of things. There isn't a chance in hell of this thing going Chernobyl.
The worst that could happen is that it TMI's. Right, and what caused the explosion?.the most likely suspect is hydrogen venting from the containment vessel. Which happens when the water inside the reactor turned to steam...and the steam disassociated into hydrogen and oxygen. That means you're looking typically at 2% disassociation at 2000C. If they have a hydrogen vent release, at least 1 part of the reactor is that hot. I'm not sure what the fuel rod linings are made of, but melting at that point is not that far off unless they do something. Which is why I think they're willing to destroy this reactor by pumping sea water into the containment vessel. And there's 2 more reactors in the same situation. If they can't get a handle on this and it runs away from them....it will be a lot worse than TMI. I'm praying already.
This kinda reminds me of a joke.
There was this passenger jet taking off from the runway when stewardess noticed a guy sweating while looking at his watch during takeoff. He finally relaxed when they leveled off. She went to him and assured him everything is fine. He shot her a look and said "Lady, I was on the team that designed the engines on this plane. You don't know the number of things that can go wrong in the first 2 minutes."
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I'll add my prayers as well.
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Just heard from tangential relatives (biological sister of an adopted cousin and her family) over there who made it through okay.
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Okay. Okay. Please settle down on the reactors, folks.
There were several reasons that the Chernobyl reactor touched off, many of which simply do not apply to this reactor design at all. Many more of which do not apply because the people operating these reactors are not trying to conduct crazy experiments. Two of the MAJOR contributing factors, as best as anyone has been able to tell, in Chernobyl was a fault in the design of the reactor which caused the fuel rods to displace coolant as they were inserted with a material that did not serve as a neutron absorber. (In effect, inserting the control rods partially would actually cause the reaction to get WORSE.) The second major fault in the Chernobyl reactor design was the use of graphite in its construction, a material nobody sane has used in decades.
The potential exists for the contents of the reactors to melt. Yes. This does not mean that we are going to see Prypiat II: Electric Boogaloo.
If worst comes to worst they can easily dump seawater into the reactor vessels and immediately arrest the problem. Sea water is one of the best insulators around for free neutrons because of the minerals in it. Of course, the minerals in it will destroy the ability of the reactor to ever be used again, but such is life.
This really is a Three Mile Island level problem, not Chernobyl.
Instead of worrying so much about the reactors, instead worry about places like Minamisanriku, where 9500 people have vanished without a trace and the entire city is simply gone. Erased from the map. This is where the real disasters are. Worry about an oil refinery which has been burning for two days now, and the rain is sending sulfuric acid to earth for 100km around the facility.
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On the general subject of the quake itself:
Japan earthquake shifted Earth on its axisQuote:Already, just over 36 hours after the quake, data-crunchers had
determined that the temblor's force moved parts of eastern Japan as much
as 12 feet closer to North America, scientists said -- and that Japan
has shifted downward about two feet.
Jones said that USGS had determined that the entire earthquake sequence --
including associated foreshocks and aftershocks -- had so far included
200 temblors of magnitude 5 or larger, 20 of which occurred before the
big quake hit. She said the aftershocks were continuing at a rapid pace
and decreasing in frequency although not in magnitude, all of which is
to be expected.
Japan Earthquake Shifted Coastline Maximum Of 8 Feet, Scientists Say
Quote:NEW YORK -- The massive 8.9-magnitude earthquake
that shook Japan and triggered a powerful tsunami on Friday has had a
profound effect on both the surrounding terrain and the planet as a
whole.
Dr. Daniel McNamara, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey,
told The Huffington Post that the disaster left a gigantic rupture in
the sea floor, 217-miles long and 50 miles wide. It also shifted Japan's
coast by eight feet in some parts, though McNamara was quick to explain
much of the coast likely didn't move as far.
McNamara found the way in which the quake actually sunk the elevation
of the country's terrain to be more troublesome than coastal shifting.
"You see cities still underwater; the reason is subsidence," he said.
"The land actually dropped, so when the tsunami came in, it's just
staying."
Quote:According to CNN, the earthquake moved the planet's axis approximately 4 inches, though other sources, like The Vancouver Sun and The Montreal Gazette, report the estimate even higher -- around 10 inches.
"I don't know about that. That sounds extreme," McNamara said,
claiming the smaller estimate was likely more accurate. "There are all
kinds of different numbers floating around," he added.
Quote:Already, just over 36 hours after the quake, data-crunchers had determined that the temblor's force moved parts of eastern Japan as much as 12 feet closer to North America, scientists said — and that Japan has shifted downward about two feet.
Sweet Zombie bejesus.
Also Berk is right, some of the other stuff thats happend is a bigger worry than the reactors, like that city that vanished off the map.
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dark seraph Wrote:Also Berk is right, some of the other stuff thats happend is a bigger worry than the reactors, like that city that vanished off the map. When a city vanishes off the map, there isn't much you can do except to look for survivors. The city is already gone and if what's been said about Japan sinking is true, then there's absolutely nothing that can be done to fix that anytime soon.
Right now there are reactors that are threatening to blow their stacks - one has even partially melted down. This is not an issue that goes away if you ignore it (in fact, it only gets worse if you do). The worst can be mitigated, or even outright avoided, but only if you start throwing the right sort of resources at the issue. Portable industrial generators or pumps would have done wonders after the first eight hours. The instant the word got out that the cooling system failed, someone, anyone, should have done something. I know that there are companies in Japan that lease these things out - that would have been a huge boon to their advertising campaign: "The generator that saved Fukushima can be yours!"
Honestly, there is something wrong here. Had something similar happened off the coast of California you can bet that FEMA would be all over it like flies on shit. But apparently, despite all the preparedness and drills they have, they are lacking in something that resembles FEMA.
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Japan is not sinking. It's just lowered in places a couple of feet. The process is not continuing. Perhaps another earthquake or eruption could raise it. Who knows?
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Furthermore, with things like an entire city missing. How do you know if they could even get the equipment -to- the reactors to save them? Infrastructure and roads must be FUBARed beyond recognition in many places.
I'm sure they have the equivalent of FEMA. But FEMA is not the be-all and end-all of rescue and recovery even here in the states.
I consider it entirely possible that there could be some sort of organizational choke point as well, based on bureaucracy and/or jurisdictional confusion as to who is responsible for what.
Hell - here's a nasty idea - and only a wild-ass guess at that. So don't take it as anything else. But -
What if they organizational structure and headquarters that would've made the decisions for mobilization of materials to save the Nuclear Plants -
- was in the city that got wiped out?
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