Update: Two Japanese Nuclear Reactors in Meltdown... Maybe. Probably. Can't tell because nobody can go in to see...-gcti

[Black]

Chakravartin wrote:
[quote=Lux Interior]
[quote=Chakravartin]
but they won't say how much exposure.

How would they know?
Emergency workers should have radiation badges that would measure their exposure with precision.
As much precision as a mood ring.

[Lux Interior]

Chakravartin wrote:
...Getting closer to Chernobyl with every passing hour.

No. It's not.

At TMI, half the core melted, then melted the reactor vessel then...

...stopped.

TMI was a much more powerful reactor as well and would have had a lot more energy to keep going. The Japanese plants are from 500 to 1000 MWt, whereas TMI was over 2000.

Chernobyl was an explosion of the core itself and lacked adequate containment.


According to experts interviewed by The Associated Press, any melted fuel would eat through the bottom of the reactor vessel. Next, it would eat through the floor of the already-damaged containment building. At that point, the uranium and dangerous byproducts would start escaping into the environment.

Their experts forgot to mention the part where it eats through to the center of the earth and comes out in China*.

These "experts" are probably from the Union of Concerned Scientists and their job is to put nuclear in the worst light possible.


*Yes, I know that this is Japan, and not the USA, but this is a fairy tale anyway and my point is that these experts are being misquoted, or they're idiots, or both.

Don't get me wrong. These are serious problems and we don't have all the information. But the press is doing a terrible job on this IMHO.

[Stephanie]

Thank you lux interior! I know this situation is far from good, but the hysteria is just overwhelming. Again, it's nice to have facts as opposed to "expert opinion". Anyone can call themselves an "expert".

[TheCaber]

anyone has.

[Paul F.]

Also, no one seems to be talking about the "drywell" containment located BELOW the reactor vessel, filled with neutron absorbing, reaction killing, chemicals (halfnium and boron, I think... but I admit my nuclear physics is barely above layman level, and more than a little rusty).

No one has mentioned the difference between "some of the fuel rods have started to melt" and "there is molten puddle of nuclear fuel in the bottom of the reactor vessel".

No one seems to differentiate between a slow 'leak' in the bottom of the reactor vessel vs the idiot-management induced massive steam explosion in Chernobyl. EVEN IF a "worst case" happens in Fukushima, and the nuclear fuel melts ENTIRELY (something that NO ONE has said is happening), and plops through the bottom of the reactor vessel into the drywell containment underneath... it will not be causing the kind of steam explosion and ignited radioactive graphite shielding "rain" around the reactor that happened at Chernobyl.


So far the ONLY "experts" the "news" (and I use both terms lightly) seems to have interviewed are ANTI-nuclear activists, or someone hawking a book.

A decent NEWS program would put together a round table discussion of a physicist to explain the science, a nuclear engineer to explain the mechanics, and a nuclear accident specialist to explain the effects.
Maybe add a Japanese nuclear industry spokesman to round it out.

[OWC Jamie]

Lux Interior wrote:
[quote=Chakravartin]
...Getting closer to Chernobyl with every passing hour.

No. It's not.

. In a sense, yes it is.
On a scale from 0 to 7 with 7 being a Chernobyl event, these reactors are now at about 4.
4 means they are beginning to melt down.
You don't have to "see" the rods melting.
When they get hot enough to "melt" they begin to release Caesium and radioIodide ( just like TMI did)
One only needs to measure the amounts and types of released particles to know what's happening inside.
What no one may know for certain is if either of the containment vessels were damaged in the earthquake and won't contain the melted mess. (China syndrome).

It's ironic that the Japanese are the experts at these generators.
France and the U.S. would be turning to the Japanese for help should an event such as this happen here or there.

Hopefullly they are no longer lying to the public about the danger of proximity and are shoving iodide pills down people' throats and documenting release plumes so they can track where the plumes land on the ground so we don't have kids drink the milk from contaminated cows ( caesium and radioiodide end up lying on the grass like so much invisible snow) again. ( TMI)

[Chakravartin]

Paul F. wrote:
No one seems to differentiate between a slow 'leak' in the bottom of the reactor vessel vs the idiot-management induced massive steam explosion in Chernobyl.

There is an expectation that there will be a second and much larger explosion above one of the plants at any time now due to hydrogen released from the sea water they've been dumping on the reactors.

A massive steam explosion.

[Paul F.]

Yes.. a Hydrogren explosion...
OUTSIDE the reactor vessel. In the building designed to vent explosions without damage to the reactor vessel.

Not trying to minimize the concern over an EXPLOSION at a NUCLEAR POWER PLANT... but when they build these things, they DO take some pretty wild scenarios into account.

[Chakravartin]

Paul F. wrote:
Not trying to minimize the concern over an EXPLOSION at a NUCLEAR POWER PLANT... but when they build these things, they DO take some pretty wild scenarios into account.

After the hydrogen explosion at reactor #1 the spokesperson said that they had built the not built the walls of the building to contain a significant amount of pressure from steam or to contain an explosion.

They also said that the nuclear plant was only rated for a 7.9 earthquake and nothing higher, nor did they consider the effects of a tsunami in their disaster-planning.

I wonder whether any of the flaws that they are discovering are going to influence future plants. In particular, what's going to happen to the plants they're building in Georgia now?

This is the design that's been pushed through the approval process.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westinghouse_AP1000

[Paul F.]

According to Wikipedia, the Fukushima reactor #1 is a BWR1 design... so mid 1960's technology... a single-loop, boiling water reactor.

The one you post is a modern generation, two loop, pressurized water reactor.

I'm CERTAIN that whatever we learn from Fukushima is going to be applied...
HOW it's going to be applied is going to depend on a couple years of "post mortem" examination of this accident.

SHOULD Fukushima #1 (and #3) have been designed for a 9.1 quake, AND a Tsunami? Quite possibly... it's a once in a thousand year event..Maybe even once in SEVERAL thousand years.