Monday in Japan: Storm, blueprint, boiling water at Fukushima

[robdogbucky]

Blueprint:

Monday, May 30, 2011

Stabilizing reactors by year's end may be impossible: Tepco

Kyodo

Stabilizing the crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 power plant by the end of the year may be impossible, senior officials at Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Sunday, throwing a monkey wrench into plans to let evacuees return to their homes near the plant.

The confirmation of core meltdowns hitting reactors 1 through 3, accompanied by breaches to the critical pressure vessels that hold the nuclear fuel, has led officials to believe that "there will be a major delay to work" to contain the situation, one official said.

Tepco, the plant's operator, announced on April 17 its road map for bringing the troubled reactors into a cold shutdown within six to nine months.

Even though the fuel in the No. 1 reactor was later found to have melted through the pressure vessel, the utility said as recently as May 17 that it did not see a need to revise its projections...

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20110530a2.html


Yikes! Still don't know where contaminated leaking water is coming from at #1




Storm:


TEPCO prepares for hard rain at Fukushima plant

The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant is taking measures to stop heavy rain and strong winds affecting the cooling system. Local weather authorities in Fukushima Prefecture say the rain and winds are expected around the plant on Monday morning.

TEPCO is piling up sandbags to prevent rain from getting inside electrical facility buildings...

...Contaminated water levels in the tunnels and the turbine buildings of the Number 2 and 3 reactors have been rising.

TEPCO will continue to monitor the situation to make sure that contaminated water does not overflow and run into the sea or groundwater.

Monday, May 30, 2011 06:05 +0900 (JST)


Am praying as I type




Boiling temps:

Monday, May 30, 2011

Pump failure nearly brings No. 5 to a boil

Tepco installs backup unit 15 hours later for halted reactor
By REIJI YOSHIDA

The seawater pump in the cooling system for the Fukushima power plant's No. 5 reactor broke down Saturday evening, prompting repair crews to install a backup pump 15 hours later on Sunday afternoon, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said.

Tepco discovered the pump had stopped at 9 p.m. Saturday but didn't announce it to the public until Sunday morning.

The beleaguered utility said it notified the local and central governments of the situation on Saturday evening.

The seawater pump was set up after the reactor's original pumps were knocked out by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. It was part of the critical Residual Heat Removal System that was later used to safely ease the reactor into a cold shutdown on March 20...

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20110530a1.html



15 hours later. Conditions must be absolutely brutal and then imagine if any of the emergency work has to be done at night. I read in one of these that they didn't do the work overnight confident that the temps wouldn't rise that much higher by morning. Yikes!



High radioactivity level at No. 2 reactor

The operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant says the radioactivity level and humidity are high in the Number 2 reactor building, which will make internal operations hard. Workers entered the building last week to measure humidity and to gauge levels of radioactive substances in the atmosphere.

The results show the Number 2 reactor building's radioactive cesium level is twice as high as the cesium level in air not purified in the Number 1 reactor building. Steam is filling the Number 2 building, and humidity has reached 99.9 percent.

The high humidity means an air purification unit cannot be used to lower the level of radioactivity. In order to cool the spent fuel storage pool that's causing the steam, TEPCO will put in place a heat exchanger on Tuesday to serve as a cooling system.

But TEPCO does not know how effective the system will be, so it will be a while before it can install the purifier to lower the radioactivity level.

Monday, May 30, 2011 07:04 +0900 (JST)

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/30_07.html



Hope things don't change again between now and Tuesday.

As it is, it will be a while before they can lower the radioactivity level according to the above.



rdb

[PearliePoo2]

1. And your hearing about this on CNN???

fuckers....:thumbsdown: