Fukushima Daiichi Water Leak Raised To Level 3 Severity 92
AmiMoJo writes "Japan's nuclear regulators have raised the level of severity of the radioactive water leak from a tank at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. It is now a level-3 serious incident. The revision from level 1 is based on estimates of the volume of radioactive substances leaked. The International Atomic Energy Agency supports the revision. They say the tank leak can be assessed separately from the Fukushima Daiichi crisis as a level 3 incident. Japanese experienced a level-3 nuclear event in 1997 with the fire and explosions at a fuel reprocessing plant in Tokai Village, Ibaraki Prefecture. 37 workers there were exposed to the leaked radioactive substances."
Re:Capitalism SUCKS! (Score:5, Funny)
Workers must take the power!
Workers at Fukushima appear to be absorbing power, does that count?
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...brings up a fun question: Under what aspect does ionizing radiation count as "power"? Obviously not from an EE's point-of-view (wattage), but...
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And socialism worked so well at Cherynobl.
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Cherynobl
you're clearly a product of the socialist public school system.
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And socialism worked so well at Cherynobl.
Better than capitalism in Japan anyway. 2 years since accident - the freaking thing still massively leaks! Read about Chernobyl disaster - basically much larger hydrogen explosion and radioactive contamination was prevented with cost of liquidators lives.
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Wait, what? You think Fukushima is worse than Chernobyl was? Why?
See the wikipedia comparison [wikipedia.org]. Maybe Chernobyl was bigger to start with, but Fukushima has 10x the amount of fuel. So potentially, if they cannot stop the leaking, it might become much bigger. It will probably and hopefully be more gradually. For Japan, most of the contamination leaks into the ocean, so that cleans up a lot I suppose, although for a fishing nation like Japan it might come back that way.
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Wait, what? You think Fukushima is worse than Chernobyl was? Why?
I'm saying liquidation was handled much worse in Fukushima accident. Look how Chernobyl was handled - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster#Immediate_crisis_management [wikipedia.org]. Fire containment, that prevented fire to spread another reactor, volunteers swimming in bubbling radioactive water to open the valve - 3 people prevented one more hydrogen explosion and died shortly afterwards, and later quarter million workers building sarcophagus over reactor 4, sealing it to prevent future contamination. If Cher
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They should form a collective bargaining group, so they can get unioninzed.
Sad trombone.
The fate of the 1997 workers (Score:5, Insightful)
What was the fate of the 1997 workers exposed like that? That would be a good way to assess what kind of consequences we could expect from the current incident,
Re:The fate of the 1997 workers (Score:5, Funny)
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The rest turned into turtles.
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Hats off to you , sir.
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You mean 3 became 5 power rangers.
Re:The fate of the 1997 workers (Score:5, Informative)
Nothing happened to those workers.
They had a worse incident where they were carrying uranium in a bucket and it went super-critical in 1999. That was a level 4. 2 people died of multiple organ failure.
http://www.mun.ca/biology/scarr/4241_Tokaimura_Accident.html [www.mun.ca]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokaimura_nuclear_accident [wikipedia.org]
The three operators' doses were far above permissible limits at 3,000, 10,000, and 17,000 mSv; the two receiving the higher doses died several months later.[4] The most severely exposed worker had his body draped over the tank when it went critical. He suffered serious burns to most of his body, experienced severe damage to his internal organs, and had a near-zero white blood cell count.[4]
The cause of the accident was said to be "human error and serious breaches of safety principles", according to the International Atomic Energy Agency.[5]
Re:The fate of the 1997 workers (Score:5, Funny)
Worst trick-or-treat candy ever.
Re:The fate of the 1997 workers (Score:5, Insightful)
they were carrying uranium in a bucket and it went super-critical in 1999. That was a level 4. 2 people died of multiple organ failure.
Starting with the brain failure that preceded the criticality. One doesn't simply throw another bucket of 18% enriched uranium into the tank.
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Indeed. Never allow the assembly of a critical geometry. This is why they invented rings of power [wikipedia.org].
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That's overblown as a safety protocol. It only takes one spunky hobbit to cause a meltdown.
Re:The fate of the 1997 workers (Score:5, Insightful)
frank grimes
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TEPCO and the Japaneesy government has decided that there where no consequences from the 1997 event. Now shut the fuck off an continue to shovel sand onto the nuclear pile over there...
captcha: unaware... no shit, sherlock...
Re:The fate of the 1997 workers (Score:4, Insightful)
What was the fate of the 1997 workers exposed like that? That would be a good way to assess what kind of consequences we could expect from the current incident,
That assumes that this incident won't be upgraded again. So far, every previous Tepco announcement has turned out to downplay the severity of the situation.
Re:The fate of the 1997 workers (Score:4, Informative)
One consequence is that I am now unable to get travel insurance to visit my girlfriend who lives in Japan. The UK government is advising against travelling to any part of Japan [www.gov.uk] because of the on-going problems with Fukushima, so even if I have insurance it will be invalidated by visiting a country on that list.
I'm going to go anyway. Most of the country is safe, and that seems like a big over-reaction to me, but if I get ill and need medical attention I won't be insured.
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No they don't, unless you visit Fukushima.
They write 'The FCO advise against all travel to parts of the country.' a bit clumsily.
'parts of the country' == the exclusion zone.
Please take health insurance though, it's a real PITA if something happens and you don't have it. Even if you can't get it in the UK, you could always get it online from companies based elsewhere.
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One consequence is that I am now unable to get travel insurance to visit my girlfriend who lives in Japan.
That's OK, she'll be able to fly over to see you on moth wings shortly.
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No. They are advising against travel to one specific area; the exclusion zone around the Fukushima plant.
People should actually read the contents of links before modding up.
Level 3? (Score:4, Funny)
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In this context - "One Hectomicrohiroshima"
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[The Infallible] Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] says that Chernobyl released around 5.8 times as much radiation into the atmosphere as Fukushima. How much radiation did Chernobyl release into the ocean?
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You can only sue Nahmi.
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Sure! All you need is legal standing to sue.
Which means you have to be able to demonstrate ACTUAL damages to yourself.
I'll wait while you sort out the difference between ACTUAL and HYPOTHETICAL damages....
waiting for a Godzilla sighting near Fukushima (Score:5, Funny)
Or at least a Godzilla reference in responses to this article. Here's one now!
*cident (Score:3, Insightful)
thank god the level has not been raised from "incident" to "accident" (per the stupid pyramid graphic)
these useless terms smell like (profusely reek of) the result of years expensive international negotiations by diplomats lawyers and politicians until they reached the exact level of imprecision to not inform anyone of anything that is actually going on in any useful way
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Guys, don't worry (Score:5, Funny)
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I learned about a new keyboard shortcut "Ctrl+Shift+T".
It makes a previously removed radioactive leak reappear?
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Does it turn all your radiation leaks into OMG!!! PONIES!!?
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Impractical joke. (Score:3)
I just thought it would be funny to put some blue plastic over a flashbulb, and use it near nuclear plant workers to see what their reaction is.
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Hey buddy, I've got a nice bridge you might be interested in...
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of which at least three melt-throughs are in bedrock evidenced by drilling samples
If that had happened, we'd see a huge steam release from the core hitting ground water as well as the water piled on top of the core. In other words, there'd be a lot more heat there than there actually was. But we didn't see that. What is more likely is that your alleged drilling samples don't even remotely suggest what you claim.
The spent fuel pool disaster clock is ticking (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The spent fuel pool disaster clock is ticking (Score:5, Insightful)
Bollocks. TFA states the pools contain "85 times the cesium released" at Chernobyl, which tells us little by itself.
How much cesium might be released into the atmosphere by a fire? An how much of the exposure at Chernobyl was caused by cesium? I thought most of the exposure was from iodine and other shorter-lived isotopes.
To says an "85 times bigger disaster" is shameful dishonest scaremongering.
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That's only the #4 pool, and there are others that will go if there is a "gamma shine" event.... it could be worse than that. The article mentions that they believe 1/2 of Japan would be uninhabitable after that.
There's plenty of scare to go around in Fukushima, without any mongering
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I'd hardly dignify the post by calling it an article. As a recent comment states:
So according to this article the total world wide contamination of CS-137 would go up by 50% compared to the near undetectable levels that are already there from previous events.
But somehow that's going to extinguish all life on earth?
Nonsense. (Score:3)
Nonsense, the arrays are already encased in boron cages in the fuel storage racks, they will not go critical even if they are not cooled. Cooling is needed to keep the fuel arrays mechanically sound so they couldn't release the radioactive materials inside them. There is no serious damage in the fuel arrays in the spent fuel pool of unit 4. The damage in each of the 4 units destroyed is very different, so a single event making all of the remaining fuel release their radioactive materials is highly unlikely,
Possible Solution (Score:1)
Has anyone else seen the info where it's claimed that nuclear waste rods are dispelled of their radiation rapidly when exposed to a hydron/oxygen flame (Also called Brown's Gas by welders).
I ran across this information some years ago when I was experimenting with adding hydrogen to my car's engine.
So here's a web site where they make te case for the technique:
http://zapnuclearwaste.com/ [zapnuclearwaste.com]
I'd appreciate any constructive comments.
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A problem with this solution is that some claim there is a 250 billion dollar industry in nuclear waste containment, plus governments like to use the nuclear waste for weapons. So there are financial interests at stake. On the other hand the world would have a nice reduction in the cost of living if they could just get an under water robot with a hydrogen flame down to treat those nuclear waste rods.
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Physical means that might work are: speeding up the transmutation process by bombarding it with neutrons in an extremely radioactive fast breeder reactor (BAD idea, IMHO), or maybe some scientists suggest that a neutrino flux seems to have some influence, like e.g. if you hold a star like our sun next to it impr
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I think it's worth trying the hydrogen flame.
I'm not suggesting boiling drinking water... although using the hydrogen flame might help if this technique is proven out.
Thanks for your comments though. I really do appreciate them.
Zirconium (Score:5, Interesting)
I learned something very interesting about zirconium. I don't remember when this was but I found the properties of this element very fascinating and it has come back to mind with this article. You see zirconium is a metal that is nearly transparent to neutrons. Because of this property, and other properties that metals have, it is used to make the fuel rods in all fission reactors today.
Using zirconium makes sense. Just like we use glass in light bulbs we use zirconium in nuclear fission reactors. A light bulb is not very useful unless the light can escape from the filament but no barrier exists to protect the filament from damage. We use zirconium to contain the fission fuel and also allow the neutrons that sustain the fission to reach the fuel contained in the other rods.
Zirconium has another very interesting property, it burns when exposed to steam. So, in every fission reactor we have today we place zirconium tubes filled with nuclear fuel in some very hot water. If the ability to cool this water is lost then the water begins to boil. The zirconium ignites. The tubes containing the nuclear fuel burns away. The nuclear fuel falls away from the control mechanisms and piles up at the bottom of the reactor vessel.
Once the nuclear fuel piles up high enough fission will occur. Dumping water on the fuel at this point moderates the fission, that is bounce any escaping neutrons back at the fuel to increase the fission rate, and creates more steam to burn away the zirconium. But not dumping water on the fuel means some very dangerous elements, ones that are solid at any lower temperature, boil away. What needs to be done is to dump enough water on the fire so that the zirconium and other stuff in the pile stops burning. At some point the mess that was once fuel rods melts enough metal and concrete in the reactor floor, and mixes with it, that fission stops.
I don't mention all of this to scare people away from nuclear fission power. I mention this to point out that the technology we use in nuclear fission right now is very stupid. We need nuclear fission power. What we need is nuclear power that does not require zirconium in contact with hot water.
We need molten salt reactors.
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You'll find those kinds of crazies are present in many different industrial processes. I often wonder who came up with this stuff. Like a Fluidised Catalytic Cracking Unit which has been used for upgrading the heavy crap into gasoline products after distilling crude oil. In an FCCU you have hydrocarbons at about twice the auto ignition temperature in a top vessel which contains cyclonic separators, and the resulting catalyst (hopefully now hydrocarbon free) is then gravity fed into a bottom vessel where it'
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Makes you wonder why some sort of dry agent hasn't been developed to cope with this as with any fire where water is a bad idea, but still better then the alternatives. I guess this goes to show that nuclear is still in it's infancy.
Yep. Nuclear power... (Score:2)
In Other More Positive News... (Score:2)
A TEPCO spokeperson was quoted as saying, " Isn't nature wonderful! It created this mess, by bringing the sea up to the reactor, but now it is cleaning it up , by taking the reactor elements out to sea. Such a beautiful circle."
In other news (Score:2)
Protesters have dumped several chests of tea into Boston harbour.
Seriously, this was reported over a week ago - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-23776345 [bbc.co.uk] I thought this was supposed to be a news website.