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AntZ
03-13-2011, 11:25 AM
US experts fear 'Chernobyl-like' crisis for Japan

Posted: 13 March 2011




WASHINGTON - US nuclear experts warned Saturday that pumping sea water to cool a quake-hit Japanese nuclear reactor was an "act of desperation" that may foreshadow a Chernobyl-like disaster.

Several experts, in a conference call with reporters, also predicted that regardless of the outcome at the Fukushima No. 1 atomic plant crisis, the accident will seriously damage the nuclear power renaissance.

"The situation has become desperate enough that they apparently don't have the capability to deliver fresh water or plain water to cool the reactor and stabilize it, and now, in an act of desperation, are having to resort to diverting and using sea water," said Robert Alvarez, who works on nuclear disarmament at the Institute for Policy Studies.

"I would describe this measure as a 'Hail Mary' pass," added Alvarez, using American football slang for a final effort to win the game as time expires.

An 8.9 magnitude earthquake that struck Japan on Friday set off the emergency at the plant, which was then hit by an explosion Saturday that prompted an evacuation of the surrounding area.

Workers doused the stricken reactor with sea water to try to avert catastrophe, after the quake knocked out power to the cooling system.

What occurred at the plant was a "station blackout," which is the loss of offsite air-conditioning power combined with the failure of onsite power, in this case diesel generators.

"It is considered to be extremely unlikely but the station blackout has been one of the great concerns for decades," said Ken Bergeron, a physicist who has worked on nuclear reactor accident simulation.

"We're in uncharted territory," he said.

The reactor has been shut down but the concern is the heat in the core, which can melt if it is not cooled. If the core melts through the reactor vessel, Bergeron explained, it could flow onto the floor of the containment building. If that happens, the structure likely will fail, the experts said.

"The containment building at this plant is certainly stronger than that at Chernobyl but a lot less strong than at Three Mile Island, so time will tell," he said.

Peter Bradford, former member of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), said that if the cooling attempts fail, "at that point it's a Chernobyl-like situation where you start dumping in sand and cement."

The two worst nuclear accidents on record are the 1986 Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine and the partial core meltdown of the Three Mile Island reactor in the US state of Pennsylvania in 1979.

Early Sunday, nuclear plant operator Tokyo Electric Power said radiation levels had surpassed the legal limit at its Fukushima No. 1 plant, hit by a blast the previous day, Kyodo News reported.

"If it continues, if they don't get control of this and... we go from a partial meltdown of the core to a full meltdown, this will be a complete disaster," Joseph Cirincione, the head of the Ploughshares Fund, told CNN.

Cirincione said the presence of radioactive cesium in the atmosphere after the plant was vented indicated that a partial meltdown was under way.

"That told the operators that the fuel rods had been exposed, that the water level had dropped below the fuel rods and the fuel rods were starting to burn, releasing cesium," he said.

Japan's nuclear safety agency rated the Fukushima accident at four on the International Nuclear Event Scale from 0 to 7. The Three Mile Island accident was rated five while Chernobyl was a seven.

The government declared an atomic emergency and said tens of thousands of people living within 12 miles (20 kilometers) of the plant should leave after an explosion at the nuclear plant Saturday.

Paul Gunter is the US organization Beyond Nuclear, told Fox News that the evacuation zone might be too small: "If that containment is lost... this will spread a tremendous amount of radioactivity, and it will then be borne on the weather."

The NRC said it has sent two experts to Japan -- experts in boiling water nuclear reactors who are part of a broader US aid team sent to the disaster zone.

Bradford, the former NRC member, said: "This is obviously a significant setback for the so-called nuclear renaissance."

"The image of a nuclear power plant blowing up before your eyes on the television screen is a first."

But World Nuclear Association spokesman Ian Hore-Lacy told CBS News that the threat of a full meltdown is minimal.

"That possibility is remote at the best of times and is diminishing by the hour as the fuel gets cooler and generates less heat," he said.

- AFP/ls/ir



http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_asiapacific/view/1116149/1/.html

RBP
03-13-2011, 12:02 PM
Scary stuff!

Deepsepia
03-13-2011, 04:11 PM
Doesn't look like Chernobyl. This is one of those things where people are doing a little disaster porn. The article states that you get to a "Chernobyl" situation if you're unable to cool the core. Well, that would be true of any nuclear reactor, so its in the "so what" category. At this point, they're able to cool the core, and with each day that passes, the cooling requirements diminish.

In fact, ironically, the Japanese reactors have performed quite well. From what we know -- which is very incomplete-- the problems that have occurred are due to the interruption of backup power from diesel generators (which seem to have gotten trashed by the tsunami).

Again, its incredibly ironic, but from what we know today, if the Japanese hadn't initiated the emergency shutdowns, the reactors would all be running fine now (because they supply their own electric power -- so long as they're running, you don't need power from anywhere else to run the cooling system. Once they shut down, then you had to get power from the diesels, and then they got trashed by the tsunami.)

So far as has been reported, the reactors themselves were not damaged by the quake or the tsunami, which is pretty incredible . . . the failure here appears to be in the design of the backup generation system, which should have been on high ground.

Teh One Who Knocks
03-13-2011, 04:29 PM
Unfortunately, the anti-nuclear brigade is going to use the whole 'worst case scenario' scare tactics of what could happen to the Japanese reactors, to harp onto why we shouldn't build any more nuclear power plants in the United States.

Deepsepia
03-13-2011, 04:40 PM
Unfortunately, the anti-nuclear brigade is going to use the whole 'worst case scenario' scare tactics of what could happen to the Japanese reactors, to harp onto why we shouldn't build any more nuclear power plants in the United States.

Note that the first guy quoted in the story is an anti-nuke guy-- the Institute for Policy Studies is very left. And he's not a "nuclear expert" so far as I can see, he doesn't seem to have any kind of technical qualification at all . . . reading his bio I'd call him "an anti-nuclear activist". Doesn't mean that he doesn't know anything, or that he might not be right, but I don't see anything in his CV that would make me say "this guy has real world experience with nuclear reactors".



Between 1993 and 1999, Mr. Alvarez served as a Senior Policy Advisor to the Secretary and Deputy Assistant Secretary for National Security and the Environment. While at DOE, he coordinated the effort to enact nuclear worker compensation legislation. In 1994 and 1995, Bob led teams in North Korea to establish control of nuclear weapons materials. He coordinated nuclear material strategic planning for the department and established the department’s first asset management program. Bob was awarded two Secretarial Gold Medals, the highest awards given by the department.

Prior to joining the DOE, Mr. Alvarez served for five years as a Senior Investigator for the U. S. Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs, chaired by Senator John Glenn, and as one of the Senate’s primary staff experts on the U.S. nuclear weapons program. While serving for Senator Glenn, Bob worked to help establish the environmental cleanup program in the Department of Energy, strengthened the Clean Air Act, uncovered several serious nuclear safety and health problems, improved medical radiation regulations, and created a transition program for communities and workers affected by the closure of nuclear weapons facilities. In 1975 Bob helped found and direct the Environmental Policy Institute (EPI), a respected national public interest organization. He helped enact several federal environmental laws, wrote several influential studies and organized successful political coalitions. He helped organize a successful lawsuit on behalf of the family of Karen Silkwood, a nuclear worker and active union member who was killed under mysterious circumstances in 1974.

Bob Alvarez is an award winning author and has published articles in prominent publications such as Science Magazine, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Technology Review and The Washington Post. He has been featured in television programs such as NOVA and 60 Minutes.
http://www.ips-dc.org/staff/bob


We certainly want to think very hard about the vulnerability of back up power supplies. That's the real problem here, and I certainly would vote against a new reactor with that vulnerability.

That said, this was a Generation II design, been operating for 40 years, and the design was at least ten years old when built -- it dates to the 1960s.

The new Generation IV designs have passive safety features (eg: takes energy to keep the core hot, turn off the juice and the reaction turns off and the core cools-- a "dead man's switch)

Teh One Who Knocks
03-13-2011, 04:52 PM
But therein lies the problem. If people don't do any research into the person saying things, then on the surface it makes it look like the person is a so-called "expert" on the situation. And they go off spouting the 'doom and gloom' scenario with their only intent being to scare the public at large to further their, in this case, anti-nuclear agenda.

As you pointed out, nuclear power plant design and technology has come a long way since most of the commercial power plants have come online throughout the world and they are ultra-safe. Are they completely disaster-proof? Of course not, but nothing is and no matter how many precautions and safeguards are in place, accidents will happen.

Deepsepia
03-13-2011, 04:58 PM
The problem is that the public doesn't know much (about anything, but about nuclear power in particular). And the history isn't filled with electric power companies covering themselves with glory (as in why-the-fuck did the Japanese put this power station on a beachfront !)

But you'll find that amidst the scare stuff, there are people saying sane stuff too -- but it probably doesn't get 1/100 the hits that the "Chernobyl" does



"This is not a serious public health issue at the moment," Malcolm Crick, Secretary of the U.N. Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation, told Reuters.

"It won't be anything like Chernobyl. There the reactor was operating at full power when it exploded and it had no containment," he said. As a precaution, around 140,000 people have been evacuated from the area around Fukushima.

Crick said a partial meltdown of the Three Mile Island plant in the United States in 1979 -- rated more serious than Japan's accident on an international scale -- released low amounts of radiation.

"Many people thought they'd been exposed after Three Mile Island," he said. "The radiation levels were detectible but in terms of human health it was nothing."

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/13/us-japan-quake-health-idUSTRE72C2OS20110313

Teh One Who Knocks
03-13-2011, 05:16 PM
The problem is that the public doesn't know much (about anything, but about nuclear power in particular).

Exactly why it's easy to scare people ;)

AntZ
03-13-2011, 07:14 PM
The problem is that the public doesn't know much (about anything, but about nuclear power in particular). And the history isn't filled with electric power companies covering themselves with glory (as in why-the-fuck did the Japanese put this power station on a beachfront !)




Not sure what you mean by the "why on the beach front?" statement.

Many people know, especially from California! You get cooling two ways, either tall cooling towers like Three Mile Island, Palo Verde, and much of the rest of the worlds plants. Or you draw in sea water like San Onofre on the beach in So.Cal and Diablo Canyon on the beach in Central Calif. The plant in question in Japan also uses sea water, thus the lack of cooling towers. The use of sea water has now been banned in the U.S., from what I understand, they will possibly need to build them and remove the sea water all together at those two plants.

I have not heard that the diesel generators were knocked out by the tsunami, your statement is the first I've heard. In fact, I haven't heard or read the tsunami even touched this plant at all?? This problem with the reactors and failed cooling also affected other plants as well, also untouched by the tsunami! If you have a source, I'm interested to look at it. It does raise some serious questions in planning and design, that equipment is installed for the worst case scenario and it all fails when needed!

Southern Belle
03-13-2011, 08:03 PM
My ex is on "apocalypse alert". He called me twice last night about it. Once to ask how long seeds in those little packets would stay viable. Then to tell me I needed to start buying extra canned food.
I already have about 300 lbs of dehydrated food that my paranoid former best friend bought after she became a follower of Alex Jones. ffs

Deepsepia
03-13-2011, 08:17 PM
Not sure what you mean by the "why on the beach front?" statement.

Not something that makes the most sense in a zone well known for tsunamis. Build inland with cooling towers, or build behind a massive headland and or seawall. But you look at the siting of this, and it's very exposed to what was not an un known risk.



I have not heard that the diesel generators were knocked out by the tsunami, your statement is the first I've heard. In fact, I haven't heard or read the tsunami even touched this plant at all?? d!

There are no reports that any of the nuclear stations suffered anything other than minor damage from the earthquake itself. They're built to withstand seismic shocks and they did. They were automatically put into shutdown mode with the quake, but then (it appears from all reports) the tsunami took out their backup generators.

The source for this is the International Atomic Energy Association, viz



Japanese authorities have informed the IAEA's Incident and Emergency Centre (IEC) that today's earthquake and tsunami have cut the supply of off-site power to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. In addition, diesel generators intended to provide back-up electricity to the plant's cooling system were disabled by tsunami flooding, and efforts to restore the diesel generators are continuing.
*
http://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/tsunamiupdate01.html

minz
03-13-2011, 10:21 PM
Chernobyl Was a completely different design to the station used in Japan and an accident just waiting to happen, sure its a bad situation to be in but I very much doubt you are looking at another Chernobyl. They have added boron to the sea water to help cut out any reactions, seems to me they are doing their best in very difficult circumstances, scare mongering doesn't do anyone any favours.

AntZ
03-13-2011, 10:30 PM
I'm sure there are other problems that led to this, Japan has a long history of corruption and covering up any and all short comings. Things just don't seem to add up! A few quotes in various news stories help paint the picture:


The blast at the Japanese nuclear facility came as plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) was working desperately to reduce pressures in the core of the reactor.

The company has had a rocky past in an industry plagued by scandal. In 2002, the president of the country's largest power utility was forced to resign along with four other senior executives, taking responsibility for suspected falsification of nuclear plant safety records.



High-pressure pumps can temporarily cool a reactor in this state with battery power, even when electricity is down, according to Arnold Gundersen, a nuclear engineer who used to work in the U.S. nuclear industry. They can open and close relief valves needed to control pressure. Batteries would go dead within hours but could be replaced.

The IAEA said "mobile electricity supplies" had arrived at the Daiichi plant. It wasn't clear if they were generators or batteries.


It just seems that things became too critical too quickly! I'm sure no one will ever know because usually no Japanese blow whistles.

Deepsepia
03-13-2011, 11:37 PM
I'm sure there are other problems that led to this, Japan has a long history of corruption and covering up any and all short comings. Things just don't seem to add up! A few quotes in various news stories help paint the picture:

It just seems that things became too critical too quickly! I'm sure no one will ever know because usually no Japanese blow whistles.

Not sure what your point is.

The reactors were shutting down fine after the quake. Perhaps the Japanese are lying about that, but this is a hard one to conceal-- there are a lot eyes on this.

So reactors are in shutdown, with the main fission reaction stopped, but you still have the decay elements going (eg Cesium, Iodine). So you have to keep the thing cool till those reactions stop.

Then tsunami hits, taking out the backup power . . . they're apparently still running on batteries at that point (which means that the cooling system is still working-- it just needs a lot of power).

After batteries run down, the cooling system is unpowered.

That's bad.

You very quickly get very high temperatures and very high pressures building up-- you have to vent them.

Trouble is, inside the containment vessel the pressures and temperatures have split water into Hydrogen and Oxygen . . . what you saw was the explosive recombination of those two elements after venting

But the core problem remains the failure of the backup power due to tsunami-- there's no sign in any of this that the quake itself did any damage to the reactors (though it may have taken out the connection to the power grid itself).

Noilly Pratt
03-13-2011, 11:48 PM
Well, depending on which local news media you see here where I (and GF and to a lesser extent because of distance, Hal) live, they at first were predicting tsunamis off our island coast, which didn't come to pass. The waves looked "different in rhythm" is all they would say.

Now they're like "I don't want to panic you, but the jet-stream puts the radioactive fallout right overhead eventually if something does blow. Now, let's see how Charlie Sheen is doing. "

Ah good then. It could be bad, then they leave you hanging and don't inform you about much.
They're doing a disservice by not giving facts to the public. (Example - bottled water lasts usually only 6 months.)

So many friends have called me asking what to do if that happened because I took a disaster recovery course. My smart-ass answer....

Upon seeing the ocean now replaced by nothing but molten lava coming towards us, put your head firmly between your legs...and kiss your a** goodbye! :D

Here's hoping that it gets alll solved. I can't do much about it other than keep some supplies on-hand.

Deepsepia
03-14-2011, 12:04 AM
Well, depending on which local news media you see here where I (and GF and to a lesser extent because of distance, Hal) live, they at first were predicting tsunamis off our island coast, which didn't come to pass. The waves looked "different in rhythm" is all they would say.

I'm just a little south of you.

Our offshore fault is almost a mirror image of the one the caused the quake-- in fact, it caused one of the largest tsunamis on record, in 1700. There were first nations/native americans in the NW at the time, but no one to write down a record -- but the tsunami went as far as Japan, where they did record it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1700_Cascadia_earthquake

This fault will go again . . . when is anyone's guess. Could be tomorrow.

Godfather
03-14-2011, 07:24 AM
Looks like there was a second explosion at the plant :wha: Number 1 reactor blew on the 12th, this time number 3 has blown

They're saying it was another hydrogen build-up. Looks like some believe the government is seriously downplaying how out of control it is

AntZ
03-14-2011, 08:22 AM
Not sure what your point is.



Likewise!

Why are you just repeating what's widely posted and reported?


There's no argument here! I don't know why you are trying to gear up for another battle??


I'm simply thinking out loud and asking a rhetorical question as to why something so critical as keeping an N-plant from melting down failed so miserably?

We all know the plant shut down because of the quake! The generators should have started, o.k., we now know that they were flooded! BUT, what if someone forgot to fill the tanks with diesel? There should have been protection for them! Too late now, their gone! Now the batteries should take care of it and it's obvious they didn't do much but barely prevent a total melt down, and that is still up in the air?

Pointing out the obvious failures in their safety features isn't a stretch here. Planning for the worst, no matter how bad it could get, is the whole purpose of planning for the worst! And because the Japanese have a history of safety failures as noted above, I'm questioning if they were even prepared?

This reminds me again about the Northridge quake that hit L.A., Cal-Tec and Cal Trans approached the Japanese with critical data concerning elevated highways and concrete stresses after evaluating what survived and what freeways and bridges failed around L.A. The Japanese scoffed at the proposal and said that their bridges are just fine, after all, they're Japanese designs. The world saw two years later when most all of their elevated highways and bridges crumbled in Kobe.

lost in melb.
03-14-2011, 09:40 AM
You actually made a good point Anthemz about conformity amongst the Japanese ( non-whistle blowing). I would like to think that they are a step up in the region, though. They have some pretty high-tech stuff that seems to work well - or so we hear.

Teh One Who Knocks
03-14-2011, 11:36 AM
Looks like there was a second explosion at the plant :wha: Number 1 reactor blew on the 12th, this time number 3 has blown

They're saying it was another hydrogen build-up. Looks like some believe the government is seriously downplaying how out of control it is

Stricken Japan nuclear plant rocked by 2nd blast
By ERIC TALMADGE and SHINO YUASA, Associated Press


SOMA, Japan – The second hydrogen explosion in three days rocked a stricken Japanese nuclear plant Monday, sending a massive cloud of smoke into the air and injuring 11 workers. Hours later, the U.S. said it had shifted its offshore forces away from the plant after detecting low levels of radiation.

The aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan was about 100 miles (160 kilometers) offshore when it detected the radiation, which U.S. officials said was about the same as one month's normal exposure to natural background radiation in the environment.

It was not clear if the leak happened during Monday's explosion. That blast was felt 25 miles (40 kilometers) away, but the plant's operator said radiation levels at the reactor were still within legal limits.

The explosion at the plant's Unit 3, which authorities have been trying to cool with sea water after a system failure in the wake of Friday's massive earthquake and tsunami, triggered an order for hundreds of people to stay indoors, said Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano. The two disasters left at least 10,000 people dead.

Operators knew the sea water flooding would cause a pressure buildup in the reactor containment vessel — and potentially lead to an explosion — but felt they had no choice if they wanted to avoid a complete meltdown. In the end, the hydrogen in the released steam mixed with oxygen in the atmosphere and set off the blast.

The inner containment shell surrounding the Unit 3 reactor was intact, Edano said, allaying some fears of the risk to the environment and public. But the outer building around the reactor appeared to have been devastated, with only a skeletal frame remaining.

Tokyo Electric Power Co., which operates the plant, said radiation levels at Unit 3 were well under the levels where a nuclear operator must file a report to the government.

A similar explosion occurred Saturday at the plant's Unit 1, injuring four workers, causing mass evacuations and destroying much of the outer building.

Shortly after Monday's explosion, Tokyo Electric warned it had lost the ability to cool another reactor, the plant's Unit 2. Takako Kitajima, a company official, said plant workers were preparing to inject sea water into the unit to cool the reactor, a move that could lead to an explosion there as well.

More than 180,000 people have evacuated the area in recent days, and up to 160 may have been exposed to radiation — pouring misery onto those already devastated by the twin disasters.

While Japan has aggressively prepared for years for major earthquakes, reinforcing buildings and running drills, the impact of the tsunami — which came so quickly that not many people managed to flee to higher ground — was immense.

By Monday, officials were clearly overwhelmed by the scale of the crisis, with millions of people having spent three nights without electricity, water, food or heat in near-freezing temperatures.

Officials in one devastated town said they were running out of body bags.

Officials have declared states of emergency at six Fukushima reactors, where Friday's twin disasters knocked out the main cooling systems and backup generators. Three are at Dai-ichi and three at the nearby Fukushima Daini complex.

Most attention, though, has been focused on Dai-ichi units 1 and 3, where operators have been funneling in sea water in a last-ditch measure to cool the reactors. A complete meltdown — the melting of the radioactive core — could release radioactive contaminants into the environment and pose major, widespread health risks.

Edano said no Fukushima reactor was near that point, and he was confident of escaping the worst scenarios.

International scientists say there are serious dangers but little risk of a Chernobyl-style catastrophe. Chernobyl, they note, had no containment shell around the reactor.

"The likelihood there will be a huge fire like at Chernobyl or a major environmental release like at Chernobyl, I think that's basically impossible," said James F. Stubbins, a nuclear energy professor at the University of Illinois.

And, some analysts noted, the length of time since the nuclear crisis began indicates that the chemical reactions inside the reactor were not moving quickly toward a complete meltdown.

"We're now into the fourth day. Whatever is happening in that core is taking a long time to unfold," said Mark Hibbs, a senior associate at the nuclear policy program for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "They've succeeded in prolonging the timeline of the accident sequence."

But despite official assurances, many residents expressed fear over the situation.

"First I was worried about the quake," said Kenji Koshiba, a construction worker who lives near the plant. "Now I'm worried about radiation." He spoke at an emergency center in Koriyama, about 40 miles (60 kilometers) from the most troubled reactors.

Overall, more than 1,500 people had been scanned for radiation exposure in the area, officials said.

The U.N. nuclear agency said a state of emergency was also declared Sunday at another complex, the Onagawa power plant, after higher-than-permitted levels of radiation were measured there. It said Japan informed it that all three of those reactors there were under control.

Four nuclear complexes in northeastern Japan have reported some damage from the quake or the tsunami.

Arkady Renko
03-14-2011, 12:16 PM
By now I think we're gonna see much much worse than chernobyl, not least because the surrounding areas are so densely populated.

This said, if this desaster has any implications on the atomic energy debate in Europe and the US, it shouldn't concern new reactor projects all that much but rather what we should do with the old ones that date back to the sixties and seventies. Some of them even located in seismically active areas like the Rhine valley or southeastern France. Maybe it's time to switch those dinosaurs off before we learn the hard way that they're not safe enough anymore. Doesn't mean we can' build any new ones with improved safety features.

FBD
03-15-2011, 01:19 PM
That's the type of uninformed garbage that winds up costing taxpayers billions of dollars when subscribed to by myopic politicians. Do you have any idea what the difference between rods melting and "a meltdown" even is?

Deepsepia
03-15-2011, 05:11 PM
There's some ugly stuff here, but its nothing like Chernobyl.

There is certainly a case to be made that reactors based off of a 50 year old design are not state-of-the art. And there's a case that some poor site design issues are involved. I saw an interview with the manager of the Diablo Canyon plant . . . his plant is 85 feet above sea level, and his backup power supply is above that. He's got backup cooling in ponds above the reactor site, so can gravity feed. That certainly sounds like a better plan than "near sea level with backup power on same level and dependent on power for water"

AntZ
03-15-2011, 10:27 PM
Fukushima nuke plant situation 'worsened considerably': think tank

WASHINGTON, March 15, Kyodo



The situation at the quake-hit Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant in northeastern Japan ''has worsened considerably,'' the Institute for Science and International Security said in a statement released Tuesday.

Referring to fresh explosions that occurred earlier in the day at the site and problems in a pool storing spent nuclear fuel rods, the Washington-based think tank said, ''This accident can no longer be viewed as a level 4 on the International Nuclear and Radiological Events scale that ranks events from 1 to 7.''

Noting that a level 4 incident involves ''only local radiological consequences,'' it said the ongoing crisis is ''now closer to a level 6, and it may unfortunately reach a level 7'' -- a worst case scenario with extensive health and environmental consequences.

''The international community should increase assistance to Japan to both contain the emergency at the reactors and to address the wider contamination. We need to find a solution together,'' it said.

==Kyodo

http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/2011/03/78374.html

AntZ
03-15-2011, 10:32 PM
Fire erupts again at Japanese nuclear plant


Mar 15, 6:07 PM EDT



TOKYO (AP) -- The operator of Japan's stricken Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant says a fire has broken out again at its No. 4 reactor unit.

Tokyo Electric Power Co. spokesman Hajimi Motujuku says the blaze erupted early Wednesday in the outer housing of the reactor's containment vessel. Fire fighters are trying to put out the flames. Japan's nuclear safety agency also confirmed the fire, whose cause was not immediately known.

On Tuesday, a fire broke out in the reactor's fuel storage pond - an area where used nuclear fuel is kept cool - causing radioactivity to be released into the atmosphere.

Officials are struggling to address the failure of safety systems at several of the plant's reactors after Friday's massive earthquake and tsunami.

Arkady Renko
03-16-2011, 04:02 PM
That's the type of uninformed garbage that winds up costing taxpayers billions of dollars when subscribed to by myopic politicians. Do you have any idea what the difference between rods melting and "a meltdown" even is?

Are you bitching at anyone in particular or just at random?


There's some ugly stuff here, but its nothing like Chernobyl.

Until now the incident is less severe than the one in 1987 because they managed to initiate shutdown before things got out of hand, but there's still a considerable risk of one or several reactors melting down completely. Seeing how the company only admit whatever is undisputable, we may not know the full extent of the disaster for a while yet. And while the Chernobyl accident was marked by the fact that a lot of plutonium was released into the atmosphere (which doesn't seem likely in Japan now), the reactor that blew up there was a lot smaller than the ones at fukushima.

FBD
03-16-2011, 05:42 PM
:lol: just calling out a myopic and alarmist statement, that's all

Deepsepia
03-16-2011, 06:00 PM
:lol: just calling out a myopic and alarmist statement, that's all

Unfortunately, the alarmists have had the better of the argument. Nothing in this scenario has gotten better, and a lot has gotten worse.

The thing that didn't occur to me was the danger of the spent fuel ponds, and we now have a statement from the Japanese authorities



the Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) has warned: "The possibility of re-criticality is not zero"?


What they're talking about here is that the spent fuel rods in the pools, uncovered by water, may begin an uncontrolled, and uncontained nuclear reaction

It appears that reactor #4 had the greatest amount of fuel in the pools, but in theory if the water drains from all these pools, you could have this in the other spent fuel pools.

That's very bad .. . not a nuclear explosion, but an unshielded, uncontained nuclear reactor.

And the problem is that if you have even one of these go critical, then you'll be unable to approach any of the reactors-- except with the expectation that you're going to ask for "volunteers"

I think that's where this is headed. What needs to be done is reminiscent of Chernobyl, where lots of folks fighting the fires got massive exposures, you need folks who're willing to put water on these things, at the probable expense of their lives. Maybe it could be done robotically, remotely, but that's an involved project, and i don't think they have the time to get something that complex working.

AntZ
03-16-2011, 06:32 PM
I think that's where this is headed. What needs to be done is reminiscent of Chernobyl, where lots of folks fighting the fires got massive exposures, you need folks who're willing to put water on these things, at the probable expense of their lives. Maybe it could be done robotically, remotely, but that's an involved project, and i don't think they have the time to get something that complex working.


If I remember right, and proved in the Chernobyl clean up, most all robots become useless either immediately or soon after massive exposures. The radiation destroys the power source, the remote communication, and any video equipment provided for the operator. Even with shielding, the multiple types of ray blasts eventually break them down.

AntZ
03-16-2011, 06:37 PM
As the days go by, more information about the cover-ups in maintenance are surfacing! Like I said above above about the Japanese hiding their short comings, it looks like they can't hide it anymore. This plant has had problems dating back some 25 years!

Deepsepia
03-16-2011, 07:14 PM
As the days go by, more information about the cover-ups in maintenance are surfacing! Like I said above above about the Japanese hiding their short comings, it looks like they can't hide it anymore. This plant has had problems dating back some 25 years!

I don't see an obvious maintenance issue here. The Japanese have had maintenance issues and coverups, but so far, there's no sign that that is what's going on here . . . this is a basic planning issue, not the failure to maintain stuff properly.

The problem is the design of the reactor complex and disaster/tsunami planning there are three things wrong, two obvious, one perhaps less so

1) Backup power supplies were not protected against an obvious hazard. The Japanese know that they get tsunamis. They prepare for tsunamis. And yet they had the fuel tanks for their backup generators on low lying land.

2) Spent fuel ponds. There's been a lot of complaint about this -- in fact, in the US today, we have tremendous amounts of material sitting in spent fuel ponds -- because we haven't opened the permanent repository in Nevada. If there's one thing we should do immediately in response to the Japanese experience its to open Yucca mountain and get the spent fuel out of the reactors

3) large number of reactors at one site. Having 5 reactors and spent fuel pools in close proximity really is trouble-- when something goes wrong with one of them, the ability to manage the others is compromised.

In terms of "cutting corners" the only allegation that I've heard is that the Japanese have kept too much spent fuel in the spent fuel pond. If that's true, then that could have contributed to the current problems.

AntZ
03-16-2011, 10:01 PM
U.S. to fly spy plane over Fukushima nuclear plant for closer look

TOKYO, March 17, Kyodo


The U.S. military will operate a Global Hawk unmanned high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft over a stricken nuclear power plant in Fukushima Prefecture, possibly on Thursday, to take a closer look at its troubled reactors, a Japanese government source said Wednesday.

Photographs taken by the plane equipped with infrared sensors could provide a useful clue to what is occurring inside the reactor buildings, around which high-level radiation has been detected.

The planned mission comes as the Japanese government appears unable to contain the crisis days after the coastal nuclear plant was struck by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami.

It would represent a deepening of Japanese-U.S. cooperation in coping with the escalating crisis, with the U.S. military having already provided logistical transportation, and search and rescue efforts in the wake of the disaster that hit northeastern Japan.

==Kyodo

Deepsepia
03-16-2011, 10:12 PM
U.S. to fly spy plane over Fukushima nuclear plant for closer look

TOKYO, March 17, Kyodo


The U.S. military will operate a Global Hawk unmanned high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft over a stricken nuclear power plant in Fukushima Prefecture, possibly on Thursday, to take a closer look at its troubled reactors, a Japanese government source said Wednesday.

Very worrisome. Suggests that they can't get close enough to some areas to see what's going on.

May also be a sign that the US (and perhaps the Japanese) government doesn't fully trust/believe what TEPCO is saying about what's happening on site.

Is also possible that Global Hawk has radiation detection capabilities which have not been advertised.

AntZ
03-16-2011, 10:49 PM
Very worrisome. Suggests that they can't get close enough to some areas to see what's going on.

May also be a sign that the US (and perhaps the Japanese) government doesn't fully trust/believe what TEPCO is saying about what's happening on site.

Is also possible that Global Hawk has radiation detection capabilities which have not been advertised.

Isn't that what I've been suggesting? ;)

Deepsepia
03-16-2011, 11:12 PM
Isn't that what I've been suggesting? ;)


Its a possibility, but there are many others, at this point all there are are guesses.

I don't think the Japanese would open their airspace to a US spy plane in order to discover that they were lying, would hardly make sense. More consistent with the idea that the Japanese are trying to reassure their population that nothing is being hidden. They're doing "radiation reports" on the evening news, now.

My "best guess" is that Global Hawk has capabilities which haven't been advertised, for examining the atmosphere for nuclear products -- this would make sense if you were trying to track down nuclear weapons, or hunt for Iranian nuclear reprocessing facilities.

Very sensitive analysis of atmospheric concentrations of various isotopes can give you some idea of exactly what kinds of processes are occurring. That might be helpful information, if what you're trying to determine is "what part of what we're seeing is a core breach, and what part is criticality in the spent fuel pond"

But at this point, we don't have more than guesses.

What I think we know is that none of this need have happened, if the Japanese had had an appropriate designed backup power supply.

Its very, very frustrating.

AntZ
03-16-2011, 11:41 PM
Absolutely!

I'm sure there are capabilities that the Global Hawk has that are very black! There are even secrets surrounding the old versions of the U2, the SR-71, and the "Have Blue" that are still highly classified. You would think that after all these years, the technologies are long obsolete. I'm sure the GW can read exactly the levels of radiation and paint a picture of the levels of development in weapons programs of friendly and unfriendly nations. They could possibly get detailed animated snapshots of exactly where the leaks are and the integrity of the containers.

In Japan, large super groups of powerful corporations and utilities yield immense political power. Out of fear the government has been known to look away when abuses are clearly taking place, and when things occasionally go too far, an insignificant cog will fall on his sword for the company to save face. In this case of unprecedented death, destruction, and disarray in an international spotlight, all bets are off! I'm sure down the road when they get back on their feet, heads will roll in the power company and the government!

Deepsepia
03-17-2011, 12:33 AM
In Japan, large super groups of powerful corporations and utilities yield immense political power. Out of fear the government has been known to look away when abuses are clearly taking place, and when things occasionally go too far, an insignificant cog will fall on his sword for the company to save face. In this case of unprecedented death, destruction, and disarray in an international spotlight, all bets are off! I'm sure down the road when they get back on their feet, heads will roll in the power company and the government!

Yes, the lack of confidence in TEPCO is there to be seen.

We're seeing a very weak government, a very secretive company, and a very scared public.

Notice that the reports on the conditions at the plant are coming from TEPCO, not from a government disaster response unit (eg like FEMA). So the two government people you're seeing, the Cabinet Secretary, and the Prime Minister-- they don't actually have any way of verifying much directly.

After this disaster-- well the honorable thing for the TEPCO chairman would be to carry a hose into reactor 4. Japan is a place where people hang themselves when they get fired, because of the disgrace . . .

AntZ
03-17-2011, 07:55 AM
U.S. radiation experts try to decipher reports from Japan

By Steve Sternberg, USA TODAY



The Japanese government's radiation report for the country's 47 prefectures Wednesday had a notable omission: Fukushima, ground zero in Japan's nuclear crisis. Measurements from Ibaraki, just south of Fukushima, were also blanked out.

Radiation experts in the USA say that the lack of information about radioactivity released from the smoldering reactors makes it impossible to gauge the current danger, project how bad a potential meltdown might be or calculate how much fallout might reach the USA.

Japanese nuclear experts are hard at work gathering information, said Fred Mettler, the U.S. representative for the United Nation's committee on the health effects of radiation. "They're monitoring and evaluating and watching the meteorology," he said. "They need to know what the dose rates are in various places, what direction the (radiation is) moving in and what's causing it."

Conflicting accounts of the radiation levels emerged in Tokyo and on Capitol Hill. Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said Wednesday that the radiation detected at the Fukushima plant had fallen steadily over the past 12 hours. But U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) chief Gregory Jaczko told a House energy subcommittee earlier in the day that radiation levels at the Fukushima plant were "extremely high."

The chief of the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency, Yukiya Amano, told reporters he will visit Japan to obtain "firsthand information" about the crisis and prod the Japanese government to provide more. Experts from the NRC, led by Charles Casto, were to arrive in the country on Wednesday.

Given accurate readings, U.S. experts can develop computer models of radiation released from the crippled reactors, factoring in prevailing winds, altitude and rainfall, said Owen Hoffman, a radiation expert from SENES Oak Ridge Inc., a consulting firm that calculated risks from Cold War nuclear tests.

One agency equipped to predict where the fallout may travel is the Department of Energy's National Atmospheric Release Advisory Center at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. The center has tracked radiation emitted by the meltdowns at Three Mile Island in 1979 and Ukraine's Chernobyl in 1986.


History may offer hints of what's to come. At Three Mile Island, near Harrisburg, Pa., only a small amount of radiation was released before the meltdown was controlled. Chernobyl spewed radiation for days, which rode wind currents worldwide.

Radioactive iodine falls from the plume in rainfall and settles on the grass, where it's eaten by cows and builds up in their milk. Decades after Three Mile Island, no cancers or deaths have been conclusively linked to the U.S. disaster. Researchers have logged 6,000 thyroid cancers in survivors of Chernobyl, all in people who were younger than 18 when they were exposed. That's about one-third of the 14,000 projected to occur.

Thyroid cancer is a major risk because the thyroid needs iodine to make thyroid hormone, which regulates metabolism. For those downwind of Chernobyl, the highest dose exceeded 1 gray, a measure of the radioactivity absorbed in the thyroid.


Children who drank commercial milk during the Cold War nuclear tests received about one-tenth of that, on average, Hoffman said. That was enough to boost their thyroid cancer risk to one in 100, more than twice the usual risk.

The Chernobyl meltdown also contaminated vast tracts of Ukraine, Belarus, Russia and northern Europe with radioactive cesium. "There are still limitations on the export of sheep from Cumbria, in the U.K., and reindeer from Scandinavia," Hoffman said. Cesium also contaminated fish from Scandinavia's northern lakes.

Cesium is absorbed by plants and works its way through the food chain, getting into meat and milk. Unlike radioactive iodine, which has a short half life, cesium lingers in the environment. "Radioactive iodine will be gone in a month," Hoffman said. "Cesium's going to be around for decades."


http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2011-03-17-japanradiate17_ST_N.htm#

FBD
03-17-2011, 12:51 PM
:lol:

http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2011/03/new-respect-for-michael-crichton.html


I have always enjoyed Michael Crichton’s books, but sometimes turn up my nose at his science. I must say though that the chain of seemingly stupid errors that led to the park crashing in Jurassic Park bear an amazing resemblance to what is going on with the Japanese nuclear plans. I don’t buy his application of chaos theory to the chain of events, but its hard not to see parallels to this:

Engineers had begun using fire hoses to pump seawater into the reactor — the third reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 complex to receive the last-ditch treatment — after the plant’s emergency cooling system failed. Company officials said workers were not paying sufficient attention to the process, however, and let the pump run out of fuel, allowing the fuel rods to become partially exposed to the air.

Once the pump was restarted and water flow was restored, another worker inadvertently closed a valve that was designed to vent steam from the containment vessel. As pressure built up inside the vessel, the pumps could no longer force water into it and the fuel rods were once more exposed.