Fukushima Finally Reaches Cold Shutdown 201
mvdwege writes "The BBC reports that the reactors at Fukushima have reached cold shutdown, meaning they no longer need active cooling to stay at safe temperatures. Plans can now be made to start the cleanup of the site. Unfortunately, TEPCO has also admitted not all problems were out in the open until now; an estimated 45 cubic meters of contaminated water have leaked out of cracks in the foundation of a treatment plant."
Despite eco-terrorists shrill laments ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Despite eco-terrorists shrill laments ... (Score:5, Funny)
And worst of all, no lazer-breathing super monsters.
Re:Despite eco-terrorists shrill laments ... (Score:5, Funny)
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Maybe we can at least haz cats-with-thumbz?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6CcxJQq1x8 [youtube.com]
Re:Despite eco-terrorists shrill laments ... (Score:4, Interesting)
And worst of all, no lazer-breathing super monsters.
About 20 years ago I was in Baltimore, MD, for a family member's memorial service. A walk-through photo exhibit of immediate and after effects of Chernobyl were on display - radiation illness, mutated offspring - human and animal. Nothing can remove that scar from my mine. I try to laugh about things like this, but it's really very difficult. I hope this is the last ever nuclear emergency in the world, but I doubt it will be.
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A walk-through photo exhibit of immediate and after effects of Chernobyl were on display - radiation illness, mutated offspring - human and animal. Nothing can remove that scar from my mine.
You do realize that a similarly horrific exhibit could be made even in the absence of Chernobyl? Birth defects and the like happen. We even see to a limited extent radiation illness (as sunburn).
Re:Despite eco-terrorists shrill laments ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Nothing can remove that scar from my mine. I try to laugh about things like this, but it's really very difficult. I hope this is the last ever nuclear emergency in the world, but I doubt it will be.
I dont think anyone wants to belittle how terrible cancer or radiation poisoning are, but when you take a dose of perspective and remember that the earthquake+tsunami (one of the most powerful events in recorded history as quakes go) killed some 16,000 people, injured another 6,000, and a further 4,000 are still unaccounted for, the Fukushima event becomes a mere blip. A plant was destroyed (as were another 125,000 buildings), the background radiation increased a bit, and some people may have gotten "slightly worrying" doses of radiation that will likely have no long term effects.
The big travesty about the whole thing was that the immediate international response by the media seemed more focused on "OHNOES WHAT ABOUT US? RADIATION IS COMING" and "hah, see, nuclear IS bad" rather than on focusing on the scale of the devastation caused by the tsunami and the relief efforts. I think I saw a few videos of the wave, and heard one or two stories on the recovery (almost ALL linked in some way with the Fukushima issue), compared with the months of debate on NPR about how we shouldnt have nuclear in our country (conservative media was not innocent in all of this either).
Its enough to make anyone feel bitter and cynical about our media.
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It isn't so much the amount of radiation people in Japan are worried about, it is the effect on the surrounding area and those living there, and the fact that it was a wake-up call regarding nuclear safety in earthquakes.
Fukushima and the majority of reactors in Japan are only designed to withstand magnitude 7.5 quakes. Fortunately most of them seem to be okay, although tests are still being run. The thing is that the epicentre of the quake was out at sea so by the time it reached land it was considerably l
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Hydro, geothermal, gas, solar thermal and so forth just don't have the capability to cause that much disruption, the worst possible accident being a large explosion and the resulting smoke and ash from the fire.
No, if a dam fails catastrophically, the flood downstream can be extremely destructive. And even while the dam is operational, it can have bad effects on the local environment (eg interfering with wildlife, changing the water table, harming agriculture, causing increased soil salinity, etc.).
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Trying to attribute deaths from dam failure to hydro is like trying to blame your car stereo for the wheels falling off. The two are unrelated.
Also, hydro is not limited to dams.
Fukushima Residents and Farmers Disagree (Score:2, Insightful)
What a relief! I wonder when they'll start moving people back into Fukushima Prefecture. I can't wait to sink my teeth into some Fukushima vegetables and I know you feel the same way.
When do you suppose that 12 mile radius exclusion zone will be lifted? This decade or next?
Now that we've decided that the maximum radiation dosage for a Japanese child is the same as an American nuclear worker, it's only a matter of time before they play in the shadow of Fukushima again!
And let's not forget how much better Tok
Re:Fukushima Residents and Farmers Disagree (Score:5, Insightful)
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People will just get compensations and move on to somewhere else. There were definately WORSE (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_disaster) disasters than this
So your argument is that money will make up for people having their lives wrecked and that other people in third world countries are suffering worse so they shouldn't complain?
Take my advice and don't run for public office. Or go there and tell that to them, unless you can run pretty fast.
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Last I checked, US nuclear workers had lower safe limits than US children do, so that's not as much problem as you might think.
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Last I checked, US nuclear workers had lower safe limits than US children do, so that's not as much problem as you might think.
It also highlights how much ignorance (or dishonesty, but I try to be an optimist) and fearmongering there is around this whole topic. It makes most of the discussions on Fukushima a waste of time.
Re:Fukushima Residents and Farmers Disagree (Score:5, Interesting)
This post is more inciteful than insightful.
(1) A 12-mile radius is NOTHING compared to all the intentional disaster areas (nuclear *weapon* testing underground, on ground, and over water) or all the major landfills or holes in the ozone. Those are the damages we "accept" as part of our way of life. Fukushima's failure was not a guaranteed result of running the plant, but a RISK that only existed due genuine natural cataclysm that was fought with decades old technology (when much better is available now). Ya, I'd call that a win. By the way, how do you think an oil refinery or a coal mine would have fared in that same situation?
(2) The maximum *allowed* radiation dose for an American nuclear worker is nothing to sneeze at when compared to a school bus driver, but then again, it's not deadly or else it wouldn't be allowed. People wouldn't work at nuclear power plants if they had good reason to believe that they would develop various cancers as a direct result. It's a heightened risk (one cannot deny that, mathematically), but it's by no means a death sentence nor does it guarantee a lesser quality of life.
(3) 30% less electricity for any metropolitan area can be spell doom. But it didn't in Japan. For the Japanese, it's an opportunity to innovate. To remodel. To rethink ways. I wouldn't be surprised if more low-power-consumption tech comes out of Japan due to this disaster and the world as a whole benefits.
Summary: *ALL* non-region-specific (solar, wind, geothermal, hydroelectric) power systems can fail due to cataclysm. Some fail before the stations even get the fuel (oil spills, coal mine collapses). None but nuclear have so many safe guards, even at the 1960s tech level, that can respond to such a major disaster with so little loss of life.
Re:Fukushima Residents and Farmers Disagree (Score:4, Insightful)
1) A 12 mile radius exclusion zone (& larger radius which people will avoid) is huge in a small country like Japan. Do you really think that Japanese people have chosen to have among the highest population density in the world even though they have a bunch of unused land?
When we consider how common Fukushima's reactor design is, and how reluctant power companies are to invest in new reactors, despite proven safety problems with their design, a disaster like this seems almost inevitable.
2) American nuclear workers carry dosimeters and are closely monitored. Children operate in a very different environment. Children are more susceptible to problems than adults, since they are still developing. I doubt that a nuclear plant would allow a worker to bring their child with them as they are exposed to radiation.
3) The loss of so much electricity in the Tokyo area has caused shortages in many components crucial to Japanese and global commerce. There is nothing innovative about turning off the air conditioning in an unplanned 30% loss of power. There is something deeply honorable about it though.
Summary: Large scale electric generation will always have drawbacks, but it's foolish to ignore their potential for destruction. As far as I know, the only part of Japan that 6 months after the Tsunami is uninhabitable by humans surrounds Fukushima.
I don't oppose nuclear power, but when the risks are ignored or downplayed (like in your post and in TEPCO's policies) a nuclear disaster is inevitable. And when people notice that you've been downplaying the risks, their unlikely to trust the industry to build new reactors, even though they improve safety.
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There is nothing innovative about turning off the air conditioning in an unplanned 30% loss of power. There is something deeply honorable about it though.
Somewhat of an overstatement, no? According to weather sites Tokyo summers are cooler than ours and most people here don't even own an AC.
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Bikini Atoll still has warning bouys 100 miles out all the way around it.
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Bikini Atoll still has warning bouys 100 miles out all the way around it.
What? According to the ubiquitous Wikipedia article [wikipedia.org] you can walk on the islands (just not eat the food).
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30% less electricity for any metropolitan area can be spell doom. But it didn't in Japan.
I agree, and in fact I was there at the time and the disruption wasn't that bad. I will make a correction though: Japan used to get 20% of its energy from nuclear, not 30%. At the moment 80% of reactors are offline but most of the restrictions on energy use have been lifted, so a 16% cut was tolerable.
Japan has enough renewable resources to replace nuclear entirely, but until recently there was not enough investment. Companies favoured technology they could export, but now that is changing.
Re:Fukushima Residents and Farmers Disagree (Score:5, Interesting)
1. The exclusion zone will be mostly lifted shortly (weeks to months). Of course, heavier contamination will remain offlimits due to abundance of caution (people live in the world where "natural" radiation levels are much higher than anywhere except next to melted reactor buildings, yet they are not "excluded" because the radiation levels of 50-300mSv/yr are "natural" (radium, uranium, etc.)). Contamination is mostly in a narrow streak from Fukushima going north west.
2. Food is monitored. And even if you eat the most contaminated thing you can find illegally, you'll still be fine unless you start eating it for next couple of years. Finally, it is simple (no pun intended!) to measure amount of cesium you have in your body. Simplest is measuring amount of cesium in your pee ;)
3. Tokyo does NOT have 30% less electricity. Japan is burning massive amounts of oil, gas and coal emitting a lot of CO2 and heavy metals and spending $38-$40 BILLION EXTRA on fuel PER YEAR so there are no shortages. All the fossil fuel plants that were offline because of nuclear are back online polluting. So only 2-3 years of non-nuclear fuel costs japan the same as compensation for their worst nuclear incident in last 65 years. (estimated compensation costs for Fukushima are up to $100-$110 billion).
Yes, I do realize you wanted to be sarcastic in your statements.
Re:Fukushima Residents and Farmers Disagree (Score:5, Insightful)
What a relief! I wonder when they'll start moving people back into Fukushima Prefecture.
Fukushima prefecture is 14500 km2 and 2M inhabitants less than 8% of the territory and 3.5% of population have been evacuated.
I can't wait to sink my teeth into some Fukushima vegetables and I know you feel the same way
Most of the japanese would be perfectly OK eating food from Fukushima prefecture without fear-mongering idiots scaring a gullible population with occasional radiations level in food lower than one would find in a simple banana or brazil nut.
When do you suppose that 12 mile radius exclusion zone will be lifted? This decade or next?
Exclusion will be lifted next year for all areas with less than 20mSv/y of radiations level, that's more 80% of the evacuated area. Also half the radiations are due to Cs-134 with a half-life of 2 years. That mean all zones will be available in less than a decade, including municipalities like Namie or Iitate.
Now that we've decided that the maximum radiation dosage for a Japanese child is the same as an American nuclear worker, it's only a matter of time before they play in the shadow of Fukushima again!
There's a big difference between what you are allowed to receive every years during your carreer and a maximum environmental exposure that could hypothetically only happen one year. I'm sure the inhabitants of Ramsar who live with a natural radioactivity level of more than 100mSv/y would be laughing a lot at this.
And let's not forget how much better Tokyo is with 30% less electricity.
Yeah sure I wonder how any other energy production facilities would have fared facing the same earthquake and tsunami. Do you really think the Japanese government will be dumb enough to replace nuclear plants with tenth os thousands of off-shore tsunami-proof windmills ...
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Exclusion will be lifted next year for all areas with less than 20mSv/y of radiations level, that's more 80% of the evacuated area.
Interestingly, were we to apply the same standards, several populated areas in the U.S. would be evacuated in spite of never having a nuclear accident.
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Seriously? Did you ever go visit there? The answers are pretty obvious to those who live at or even near altitude.
1. It's cold much longer, so they cover up.
2. When it's warm, sunburn occurs very easily, so they cover up.
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Please see my other reply on how vitamin D3 from UV-B from sunlight or supplements is essential for the body to fight cancer.
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"I sometimes wonder why skin cancers are almost unheard of there."
Because the immune system needs vitamin D (from UVB from sunlight) to fight cancer cells. Some people (like Dr. John Cannell) suggest dermatologists have caused ten or more cancers for every melanoma they have prevented. Why is the melanoma rate higher for indoor office workers than outdoor workers? Dr. John Cannell suggests essentially that most dermatologists are guilty of malpractice because they have caused so much cancer and other health
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That depends on if you're a vault dweller.
So many experiments. So it's a good thing that Fallout is still just a game if you're going to be a vault dweller.
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Clearly it's 'terrorism' to point out that for the cost of the cleanup alone, one could have built a whole lot of renewable energy. Nuclear doesn't make a whole lot of economic sense once the lifecycle cost is considered.
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Re:Despite eco-terrorists shrill laments ... (Score:4, Interesting)
Sure, the current class of low efficiency(~5%), high pressure (~150ATM), radioactive steam-bomb, light water reactors don't seem to be making economic sense, especially when spent-fuel disposal and the locked-in fuel-supply-chain are taken into consideration.
But when you look at technologies like LFTR, then all those problems magically vanish. Sure, there are hurdles such as Thorium mining infrastucture (Which brings its own benefits such as rare-earth elements that we are relying on other countries for) and high temperature (but low pressure) vessels to name but two, but that is what research is for. This needs to get recognised and get funded. It's cleaner (minimal waste), safer (lower pressure, passive cooling systems), efficient (most of the fuel is burned, steam turbines are more efficient) tech!
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But when you look at technologies like LFTR, then all those problems magically vanish.
Because no one has built a commercial Thorium reactor so everything about them is magic and fairy dust. Yes, it's nice that a couple of small ones were were built in the 1960's, that doesn't imply that it's a viable technology.
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Which is why research money needs to be spent. They didn't get further than a couple of small ones in the 60's due to political reasons, not technical ones.
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Uranium-233 is a different isotope to the Uranium-238 (Which is bred to Plutonium-239) used in current reactor technologies. It has a different decay path that is much safer than those of the currently used isotopes.
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And obviously, all of that renewable energy would have withstood a 9.0 quake and 40-foot tsunami, right?
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Indeed, which probably is a good sign for the safety of the light water reactor type. It sounds like there was a core melt down and a criticality event way beyond what engineers even considered as a plausible scenario, but without a moderator it is bound to be self contained. That is very much unlike the event in Chernobyl, which demonstrated an inherently dangerous (as in explosive) reactor design, handled by an incompetent crew.
But there are certainly lessons to be learned. If we want to use nuclear en
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Sky did not fall, Japan is not irradiated wasteland, Fallout is still just a game.
Yeah. Oh, and mind the sushi, it's got three eyes.
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http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/Blinky
Re:Despite eco-terrorists shrill laments ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course, such subtleties escape the so-called environmentalists. (As does the fact that paving an area of 940km^2 [wikipedia.org] with photovoltaics would yield no more energy than a 3.5GW power plant (ignoring all energy-storage issues) and turn it into something with a striking resemblance to Coruscant [wikipedia.org].)
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In fact, most of the evacuation area (the southern and eastern part) is barely contaminated, it should have long been opened up again.
That simply isn't true. Contamination doesn't spread evenly over an area so you need to check everywhere before allowing people back in. You might be find with the odd spot here or there, but the people who have to live and work there won't be. Since a lot of it is farm land they can't just hope it is fine, especially since Japanese produce has already failed radiation checks in other countries where it was shipped. Soil and food contamination is the worst because it gets the radioactive material inside the
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOIDFh3wPXY [youtube.com]
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Repo Men (Score:2)
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You don't have the right to call anyone shills. Even if you only monitored the mainstream news casually you would have heard that not all information was released and not all information given was truthful.
I wonder what the cancer rates will be like years from now.
However, but then nukeish fanboys like you will be long gone while other people suffer.
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Tell that to my in-laws and the remaining residents of their once beautiful (My Neighbor Totoro-esque) farming town.
How about you become part of the solution and you tell them that? Also, sounds like they were harmed due to the Fukushima accident. That means TEPCO is on the hook for damages. Document the harm and get a good lawyer.
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Why are lawyers ever offered as a solution to anything?
Because we have a complex legal dispute. A lawyer has the specialized knowledge and the time to navigate whatever legal obstacles there are.
So they start a lawsuit, and five or ten years of continual exposure later if TEPCO hasn't declared bankruptcy they might get enough money to move elsewhere, if they're willing to abandon their homes, their ancestors' graves, and everything they have worked for their entire lives for.
Well, yes, they could always just suck it up without any sort of compensation for their trouble. I wonder why I didn't think of that first?
45 cubic meters of water (Score:4, Informative)
In units of volume, that is 12,000 US Gallons, or 45,000 liters.
Also, about ¾ the volume of a typical 40' shipping container.
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Harder to conceptualize. I assume the presser used cubic meters because 45 of something doesn't sound as bad as 45,000 of something.
50 one-meter cubes is just as difficult to visualize as 1/50th of a pool. However, most everyone has seen a semi-trailer, and many people actually stood inside one, so it seemed like a good point of reference.
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A 45 square meters area is quite easy to conceptualize. If you make a pool 2 meters deep, that changes into a 22.5 m2 area.
Way more usefull a measure than 45000 litters (that I'd convert into 45m3 to understand anyway).
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The problem is that it leaked, potentially into groundwater, where it will be diluted but still highly toxic.
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Realized right after I clicked post that I should have said, "In the layman's units of volume," or something to that effect. Meh.
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I can easily imagine the size of a cargo container. I cannot easily imagine your example.
More people come in contact with cargo containers on a regular basis than do people creating various size pools.
This is absurd (Score:5, Informative)
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Containment has almost nothing to do with cold shutdown.
Cold shutdown is defined as a fissionable material no longer requiring active cooling to remain at a stable temperature. This indicates that whatever fission may still be occurring in the nuclear material (whether it breached containment or not) it is in such small and sporadic amounts as to not be a concern to restart itself and continue melting through containment or into the open air.
Please back the truck of panic up.
"cold shutdown condition" (Score:4, Insightful)
BMOC: Containment has almost nothing to do with cold shutdown.
According to TEPCO, it does:
TEPCO: Definition of "Cold Shutdown Condition": ... Release of radioactive materials from PCV is under control and public radiation exposure by additional release is being significantly held down.
(Roadmap towards Restoration from the Accident at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station [tepco.co.jp], 17 Nov 2011, Nuclear Emergency Response Headquarters, Government-TEPCO Integrated Response Office)
TEPCO *is* changing the standard definition of "cold shutdown" somewhat. Now, they have *added* a containment requirement, so they're not really loosening any standards. Of course, normally "cold shutdown" doesn't include a containment requirement because normally the reactor vessel isn't breached.
zeigerpuppy has a point in that "cold shutdown" normally implies a state of normal control. Cold shutdown typically means the reactor is stopped, doesn't need active cooling, and can be safely opened for maintenance. Fuku is still an active disaster site.
I'm not advocating panic (what's the sense in that?), but fair criticism of TEPCO is, I think, well-deserved.
Re:This is absurd (Score:5, Interesting)
I agree. They created a new definition to fit this scenario. They are calling it a "cold shutdown condition".
http://nukespeak.org/2011/12/08/fukushimas-cold-shutdown-condition/ [nukespeak.org]
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Does this sound contained to you?
Yes. I was asked the same thing in early April of last year and my view remains the same. This accident has been contained ever since the beginning of April. Bad consequences can still happen, such as the possibility of increased cases of cancer and birth defects, but the accident isn't generating more future bad consequences now than it was in April.
The cracks were made public. (Score:2)
Or at least the suspicion there may be seepage through cracks in the foundation. It was in the news quite a while ago, I guess they just released some numbers now and that's what the article was referring to? It's not the first "spill" either, one of the pools overflowed and some water was released into the ocean.
Still no tsunami protection for cities (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Still no tsunami protection for cities (Score:5, Insightful)
Agreed. It is staggering how many people can't grasp the magnitude of what the plant was put through.
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Re:Still no tsunami protection for cities (Score:5, Insightful)
My point is that it is staggering how many people don't grasp the magnitude of what JAPAN was put through.
It is just as staggering how many people don't care about the non-existence of vital, standard safety measures Fukushima Daiichi. Such as a sufficient number of emergency generators distributed over the site to prevent common cause failure. (Instead of having just 13 for 6 reactors, seven of which standing right next to each other along the sea shore with a safety distance of, oh, 25cm or so between each other.) Or catalytic converters to prevent hydrogen from reaching explosive concentrations (which took hours in all cases, as predicted in simulations 30 years ago) and filtered containment vents that can filter out 99.99% of the Cs-137 and 99% of elemental I-131. Most of the rest was contained by the containment, as it should.
This needs to change, not just in Japan, but everywhere where safety measures are not up to date.
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"who puts a nuclear plant right next to a well known tsunami zone?"
People who live in a well-known tsunami zone already.
otsukaresama desita (Score:3, Insightful)
hope some people can finally take a breather, it's only been... 9 months...
Well, "cold shutdown", sort of. (Score:3)
They had to redefine "cold shutdown" to get there. Normally, cold shutdown of a reactor means temperature is below boiling and pressure is at 1 atmosphere. It's then possible to take the lid off the reactor and replace fuel rods.
Humans still can't enter the containment, and probably won't be able to do so for decades, if not centuries. So cleanup is going to have to be a robot job. Some kind of machinery is going to have to go in there and take the core apart, transferring each bit into a separate storage container.
Strangely, Japan seems to be behind the US in mobile robots for doing heavy work. They had to send to the US for iRobot units just to look around inside the containment, and for remote-controlled concrete pumping trucks to pour in water.
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Strangely, Japan seems to be behind the US in mobile robots for doing heavy work.
I'm fairly certain this has military roots, with some added help from the massive US university system.
Re:Have they addressed the meltdown?? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Have they addressed the meltdown?? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Another way to put it is: Trust them or not, they are usually in the best position to deal with an ongoing crisis. Note the weasel word "usually".
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Of course! Power corrupts. America is all about limiting power. We have a long history of distrusting what power does to people. Got to watch them, make sure they do their jobs and do them fairly.
One of the more troubling things that many people accept is this idea that secrecy is important or necessary for formulating public policy. It's always the opposite. We have better policy when issues are in the open, when there is vigorous opposition, and when it is hard for someone to anonymously slip in a
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You didn't address the question: What constitutes authority? From my perspective an authority is any person with reasonable skills to complete the task and has some say in the direction of matters. I would definitely trust a person to make conscious decisions based on their expertise while it *sounds* like you'd prefer to have an amateur running the show so long as they spill every detail regardless of its validity and confirmed presence.
I am an authority on not trusting authority.
Don't trust me.
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Re:Have they addressed the meltdown?? (Score:5, Interesting)
How about the fact that they lied for months (if they aren't still lying) about the severity of the meltdown
Don't you need evidence for such assertions? I see evidence that both TEPCO and the Japanese government made statements that later turned out to be false, but no evidence of lying, a deliberate falsehood.
and allowed/forced people to live in areas that are irradiated?
So what? Nobody was required to live anywhere irradiated.
How about the fact that rather than address radiation making its way into food and water, they merely raised the allowable amount of radiation in food and water?
Sounds like a reasonable solution to a tough disaster situation, especially given that radiation thresholds are intentional set too low anyway. They can change it back to the normal threshold when the disaster goes away.
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Don't you need evidence for such assertions? I see evidence that both TEPCO and the Japanese government made statements that later turned out to be false, but no evidence of lying, a deliberate falsehood.
If you're going by that argument, then we can't accuse any government who bothers to cover their asses. Do the public have access to materials that could point one way or the other? Not to mention that governments should generally be accountable for their misstatements, a simple "whoops" isn't really enough.
Re:Have they addressed the meltdown?? (Score:5, Insightful)
How about the fact that rather than address radiation making its way into food and water, they merely raised the allowable amount of radiation in food and water?
This might blow your mind... but often policy makers have to juggle multiple and conflicting priorities at the same time.
In the case of the Japanese Crisis you had a country devastated by an enormous disaster with people freezing in makeshift shelters with inadequate food and water.
Now you could say "sorry everyone you don't get to eat today." Or you can say "Here is some food that's irradiated above what in a normal situation we would expect but over a short period of time is a better alternative than hunger and malnutrition."
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This whole event proves that authorities cannot be trusted during a crisis.
If there is something that this mess shows is that private entities should not be allowed to control nuclear power plants.
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To be fair, the British government managed to mess up quite spectacularly [wikipedia.org] too...
Re:Cracks in the foundation...? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Don't forget the massive hydrogen explosions that blew the walls off the buildings. I'm sure that overpressure can't cause any significant cracking in concrete either.
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Well, a very large earthquake, being steeped in contaminated water for almost a year, hydrogen explosions, large metal vessels being knocked over... there's a lot of ways those cracks could have formed during and after the incident.
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The soil test pylon in berlin that Hitler made would take a 12.0 earthquake without a crack.
What? I've tried googling a variety of terms and have yet to find anything about this object. Also, how large is it? Is it comparable in size to a nuclear reactor?
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The soil test pylon in berlin that Hitler made would take a 12.0 earthquake without a crack.
Or it might split in a 6.0 earthquake. Concrete cracking of massive structures is not usually caused by the shaking, but by the shifting of stress on the structure. Even a relatively small quake can apply stresses to this pylon which would split it. For example, if one side of the structure was pushed 5 cm one way and the other pushed 5cm the other, there will be cracking.
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This is the problem with nuclear energy...everyone is so sure we can make it safe. Hubris is the problem.
I think it's ignorance myself. Suc as people who can't argue the point on its merits and appeal to a vague notion of "hubris" instead.
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I seem to recall reading that hte quake was twice as severe as the plant was designed to withstand.
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When there's a car wreck, what's left often isn't what you'd call a "vehicle" any more, but it's still entirely valid and prudent to say things like "the car finally stopped burning" to make it clear what you were referring to.
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What exactly do you think the difference between "fission" and "decay" is?
Re:Pet peave (Score:5, Informative)
One involves the splitting of the nucleus into two roughly equally sized (I said *roughly*, pedants), and the other involves the emissions of much smaller particles such as alphas or betas. Fission in a nuclear power sense usually refers to that induced by neutron capture in a chain reaction, though there is a small amount of spontaneous fission for certain isotopes. The energy released by fission is much larger than from a typical decay.
For the pile of molten crap that the cores now consist of, almost all of the heat production is through decay, not fission.
Re: (Score:2)
The difference is very well defined. Decay comes in 3 forms: Alpha, Beta, and Gamma (named for the form of radiation given off by each type of decay). Fission is the splitting of an atomic nucleus into two parts that are (by the nature of the nuclei that *can* undergo fission) much larger than an Alpha particle.
Even in nuclei that are large enough to undergo fission normally undergo one of these forms of decay unless encouraged to do otherwise (in a reactor the encouragement is typically in the form of a ne
Re: (Score:2)
Simple, because the fissile material is _outside_ of the "reactors."
It puzzles me how people don't get it. While there are clearly failures in the design such as the complete loss of power to the reactors, the hydrogen explosions, and having to use sea water to cool the reactor, the reactors are designed to handle meltdown when these sorts of circumstances happen and they did.
If I drive a recent car into a brick wall, I don't expect the vehicle to operate after that point. But I do expect that I'll have a good chance of surviving, given that I wore a seatbelt and the oth