Posted on 04/02/2011 10:21:48 AM PDT by ex-Texan
A nuclear expert has warned that it might be 100 years before melting fuel rods can be safely removed from Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant.
The warning came as levels of radioactive iodine flushed into the sea near the plant spiked to a new high and the Wall Street Journal said it had obtained disaster response blueprints which said the plant's operators were woefully unprepared for the scale of the disaster.
Water is still being poured into the damaged reactors to cool melting fuel rods.
But one expert says the radiation leaks will be ongoing and it could take 50 to 100 years before the nuclear fuel rods have completely cooled and been removed.
"As the water leaks out, you keep on pouring water in, so this leak will go on for ever," said Dr John Price, a former member of the Safety Policy Unit at the UK's National Nuclear Corporation.
"There has to be some way of dealing with it. The water is connecting in tunnels and concrete-lined pits at the moment and the question is whether they can pump it back.
"The final thing is that the reactors will have to be closed and the fuel removed, and that is 50 to 100 years away.
"It means that the workers and the site will have to be intensely controlled for a very long period of time."
But Laurence Williams, Professor of Nuclear Safety at England's University of Central Lancashire and the former head nuclear regulator for the UK, is relatively comfortable with the situation.
"I have been monitoring it for the last couple of weeks and [the] three reactors seem to be more or less unchanged from initially when they got into the seawater flowing into them," he said.
"We don't know exactly the state of the fuel in those reactors but looking at the data, the pressures and temperatures look fairly stable over the last couple of weeks.
"My view is that as there hasn't been any sort of major catastrophic release of radioactivity, if they can continue to get the fresh water into the reactors and cool them, the decay heat is now fairly stabilising.
"It will take some time before it disappears but so far, so good. But it will take some time to bring under control."
Both experts agree capping the damaged reactors with concrete is not an option.
Meanwhile the Wall Street Journal says it has obtained disaster-readiness plans which show the facility only had one satellite phone and a single stretcher in case of an accident.
The blueprints also provided no detail about the possibility of using firefighters from Tokyo or national troops - both of which have been part of the response to the Fukushima crisis - to deal with any disaster.
Levels of radioactive iodine-131 in the Pacific off the plant have been recorded at a new high of 4,385 times the legal limit.
In 2002, the plant's operator TEPCO admitted to falsifying safety reports, leading to all of its 17 boiling water reactors being shut down for inspection.
TEPCO has already vowed to dismantle the four reactors at the centre of the world's worst atomic accident in 25 years, but now Japanese prime minister Naoto Kan says the Fukushima plant must be scrapped.
“BTW: I’m ex US Navy submarine officer/engineer with 27 years experience in BWR design, testing and operation “
What does this poster say?
http://www.physicsforums.com/showpost.php?p=3225300&postcount=2535
Which brings about the question of this plant
http://www.wltx.com/news/national/article/130536/142/SoCal-Nuclear-Plants-Safety-Questioned
not one of the experts roaming around on the threads for the last two days have answered my question as to whether that US plant is safe.
“The 28-year-old plant is just five miles from an earthquake fault. Like Fukushima, it has a long history of management problems and safety violations including faulty diesel generators, falsified fire watch reports, and inoperable emergency batteries.”
Detroit needs an influx of ambitious, industrious people.
Bring your tooling, start building honda/toyotas tomorrow! Lots of empty buildings for them to setup shop in. And likely free to boot!
Just make sure you don’t let the UAW in.
btw, how can this Nuke plant be safe when they are seeking more than 100 exemptions from regulations
http://www.allgov.com/Top_Stories/ViewNews/Indian_Point_Nuclear_Plant_Accused_of_Violating_Safety_Rules_110331
It has a reactor on a fault line.
They have already gotten
exemptions for regulations governing fire safety, storage of spent fuel, and systems designed to prevent meltdown.
sheesh, why can’t these Nuke Plant operators just operate their plants in a safe manner - whether it is Japan or the US.
Can anyone give me a reasonable answer to why spent fuel is stored onsite rather than being reprocessed?
“not one of the experts roaming around on the threads for the last two days have answered my question as to whether that US plant is safe.”
The difference between Southern California and Japan is that we have Barack Obama. If anything happens, he’ll save the day. Didn’t you watch him in action during the Gulf oil spill? Rest easy: there’s nothing to worry about...
I'd go one level higher and mandate that enough cooling water be stored on site, uphill from the plant, so in the event power is lost you can gravity feed coolant to the reactors.
Many nuclear plants have cooling ponds; is it too much to ask that they be large enough to supply the reactors for weeks without replenishment, and upstream from the reactors so you can cool them by simply opening a valve?
We specialize in environmental and energy litigation and federal and state administrative law, and we strive to achieve the best possible outcome for our clients. Our technical research and paralegal services are thorough and therefore enable our clients to make timely decisions regarding possible intervention, administrative law hearings, or preparation for litigationI watched his video, and I watched the original video, and I can't tell whether the fuel rack was exposed or not. But since the people at the plant were working so hard to put water in the tank, it certainly was possible that the water level dropped below the rods. And there's been a lot of speculation about that.
But you have to remember that the entire water tank is encased in concrete, and that entire concrete encasement's TOP is below the entire blown-off structure. If you look at the video, and see the green equipment, that is the fuel mover, and it's above the floor, and the entire pond is below that floor, and the floor is intact.
Doesn't mean it didn't crack and leak, or the water didn't boil out. Just that you can't see enough from that video to really tell. Fairwinds has an ulterior motive related to how they make their money.
Greenpeace, on the other hand, there's a really good group. And those numbers were really high. 2043. That's a big number. Wish I knew whether I could trust exactly what they were saying about the units of measure.
“Bring your tooling, start building honda/toyotas tomorrow! Lots of empty buildings for them to setup shop in. And likely free to boot!
Just make sure you don’t let the UAW in.”
I second the motion. All in favor please respond by saying so.
Media distraction from domestic political and financial crisis
Fukushima Has Preexisting and Un-repaired Damage from 2003 !
This reactor had major damage and cracking for 8 years and TEPCO must have known about this dangerous condition. And, apparently did nothing to repair the problems.
Also no mention of this issue in MSM. Wankers, fools, and idiots are running the show. Just like 0's greedy NWO play callers.
Those Brits say concrete is not an option and yet concrete is already being used: Tepco dumps concrete to plug radiation leak at No. 2
Further Giant barge to join huge concrete truck in nuclear plant fight
In your zeal to stir panic, you ignored the expert in your own article who is "comfortable" with the situation and promoted Greenpeace.
Just a drop in the bucket. Reread your linked info. A small leak was plugged and the fact remains that the major damaged sections of the facility cannot be encased in concrete. In your own zeal to say, “Everything’s A-OK in Japan” you missed the boat
Still the formation of the Caliphate and Hussein’s treason are much more serious matters.
BHO44 is worse than Jimmu Carter -- far worse. But the mainstream media is ignoring all his many faults to push the New World Order Agenda. Meanwhile, this problem in Japan will be around for many years ahead. Long after 0 is run out of office.
Take a peek that this:
Excerpt:* * * If this reactor fully melts down, and it appears to be heading in that direction with nary a thing the small contingent of brave workers can do about it, then this fuel could burn its way down through to the water table where a huge explosion would result.
A radioactive geyser could erupt from the earth shooting high into the sky. A plutonium and uranium fountain of death. Old Unfaithful.
There is so much deadly radioactive fuel, depending on the vagaries of the wind, the MOX pox could spread across northern Japan, threaten Tokyo, poison the Pacific and ride the jet stream to impact North America and Europe.
There are 32 MOX fuel assemblies in Reactor 3, according to New York Times reports. Each has about 400 pounds of a uranium/plutonium fuel mixture with a 7% concentration of plutonium. That comes to 900 pounds of plutonium in an uncontrolled state at the Japanese site where desperate crews are waging a pitched battle.
In total, Fukushima’s Reactor #3 holds 170 tons of radioactive fuel. The plutonium in the melted fuels is millions of times more poisonous than the uranium according to an expert who appeared on NHK television streaming last night. * * *
But of course this may be all lies because the blog is not a major media source.
“Corrupt leaders or misguided officials trying to make light of a situation that is worse than Chernobyl “
Yes you are right this is going to be worse than Chernobyl. Apparently the Japanese electric company has made the decision to go ahead and pump cement on it even though as you pointed out in a previous post it may not work. The leaking water into the sea is really really troubling.
Structural integrity evaluations were carried out for the cracked shrouds of 1F-4, 2F-3, 2F-4 and KK-1, -2 and -3. A large safety margin was confirmed in the structural integrity of these shrouds at the present time and five yearslater. An example of the evaluation of the circumferential cracking in KK-2 is shown below.If I remember correctly, Diacha is 1F-4, Dana would be 2F-3 and 2F-4. 1F-4 is the reactor that has been shut down for repair and had no fuel in it (it was in the pool, and probably would have had less trouble if the fuel had still been in the core).
Anyway, far from "major damage", the report you claim to be your basis says that there were still large safety margins; no indication of repairs needed is found in the reference.
Maybe there's another reference that gave more information?
Maybe they will build a tall retaining wall?
The concrete plug failed to stop radioactive water gushing out the pit.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.