Don't Look Now, But The Japanese Nuclear Crisis Is Entering A New Phase

[meow mix]

In the latest addition to the ongoing Japanese spiral, officials there are considering evacuating more towns as new "hot-spots" of radiation are discovered farther from the foundering nuclear plant.

The new locations are far outside the 19 mile radius previously imposed.

The Wall Street Journal reports how this new threat illustrates Japan's struggle to determine problems and address them once they have.

It's not the first sign of fresh troubles after a period when we hear little about it.
http://www.businessinsider.com/japan-evacuate-towns-around-fukushima-hot-spots-radiation-2011-6

[Uncle Joe]

1. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, meow mix.

[ixion]

2. They've admitted to at least one melt through

we're in completely new territory here, without a clue how to stop it.

[femrap]

24. Yet Saudi Arabia is planning to

build 16 nuclear plants by 2030 at a cost of $100 billion. What does that tell you?

WASF.

Just give geothermal (dig me a hole) and some solar panels (loan me some money at a great gov't rate).....oops, not smart enough to do this in the US of A, mate.

[ixion]

29. funny you should say that...

I've got solar panels, and am in the process of digging a big geothermal hole. Seriously.


See ya underground! :toast:

[femrap]

45. Can we suggest any books/web sites

that give good hands-on advice about geothermal and solar panels.

You're living my dream!

[ixion]

64. why, thank you for the compliment!

:hi:

Here is a great book for solar stuff. It's titled 'Practical Photovoltaics'. It's well-written, and will tell you everything you want to know about solar panels, from how they work to how to install them.

http://amzn.com/093794811X

For a great example of what you can do with thermal mass, check out the documentary 'Garbage Warrior'. It documents an architect living in New Mexico building what he calls 'Earth Ships'.

http://www.garbagewarrior.com/

This documentary sold me on the concept of incorporating thermal mass into your building concepts. A living roof is a great example.

In any case, hope this helps! :toast:

[femrap]

73. Thanks for the info! nt

[oldbanjo]

55. How is that going to do you any good

if you can't drink the water or eat the food.

[ixion]

60. You have to try...

albeit the attempt may be futile.

[FogerRox]

71. 100 billion, sheese, thats a deal

12 to 15 billion per is a bit more realistic.

They are also installing a 260Mw solar project using Boeings new 39% efficient panels.

[femrap]

74. The number was reported

on ABC Evening News last night.

[Rex]

3. This is a textbook example of what happens when

you let a corporation lie and deceive the people that are the most vulnerable in a crisis event like this one. The Japanese people should be beyond outrage by this point. I don't think I can compare it to the Gulf BP oil spill anymore...this one is far bigger.

[readmoreoften]

13. +1

My sentiments exactly.

[RKP5637]

15. It is, and with invisible dangers. These corps. are such evil entities. I was

lucky to have worked for some excellent ones, but anymore IMO that's the exception. Ha, and I recall well taking business ethics courses, I guess that's buried in the trash today.

[WinkyDink]

18. Yes. We could stop eating Gulf seafood. It's rather harder to stop breathing.

[suffragette]

4. K&R

[no_hypocrisy]

5. Could the entire country become uninhabitable?

[Angry Dragon]

7. I am no expert but I believe anything is possible at this point

Question: Is there really anyone that fully understands the power of nuclear energy and the ways to control it??

[saras]

25. It depends...

If you're religious you could say that God designed an atomic reactor that worked right. It was set up about 92 million miles away from Earth, and it STILL requires a planetary-sized ozone shield to make it relatively safe for life.

I think any reactor design we approve ought to have to be that safe, or safer.

[leveymg]

32. If they build new nuclear plants on the Sun, that's okay with me.

Otherwise, No Nukes On Planet Earth (NNOPE - "Nope")

[izquierdista]

57. Yes, but no one listens to them

There's lots of people like Gunderson who have spent whole careers in the industry and have lots of good recommendations, but those recommendations cut into profits. The October 1971 issue of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists has an article on how siting nuclear reactors far underground would be better than any at-the-surface containment. But has an underground reactor been built in the last 40 years?


A: No.

[oldbanjo]

59. That still wouldn't be safe unless they used a self contained cooling syster otherwise

they could ruin our drinking water.

[izquierdista]

66. We don't drink water from half a mile down.

If you want to learn some science and engineering before making ignorant comments, I can provide you with links to read.

[Rex]

8. I'm still wondering why they are in 'rescue' mode and not 'survival' mode.

Fuck the reactors...total loss, bury the dam things before it is too late! Or is it beyond the 'concrete sarcophagus' stage?

Give the dam thing a root canal!

[Octafish]

14. You may have hit the solution, Rex.

Parts of the cores have breached containment and may be resting at the bottom of a pile of rubble.

The "root canal" approach may be the way to reach all that and scoop it out. Start digging a deep trench a ways from each reactor and then head toward the individual units.

If TEPCO doesn't do something soon, portions of the core may continue down to the water table, where the contamination can go just about anywhere there's water.

Until there are robotic ditch diggers I nominate this fellow to lead the human diggers:



His family has done more in service of Big Oil cough Rockefeller cough Fourth nuclear armed Reich than anybody.

[RKP5637]

16. Yep, he's had lots of experience digging bottomless pits. He had a good

practice on us.

[Rex]

17. Thank you Octafish and let me be the first to second that nomination!

No one has hurt the WORLD more then GWB and his cartel of thugs. Okay I know he has them...BUT WHERE ARE HIS EYES!?!?!

All I see is evil void in those sockets! Yikes!

[Old and In the Way]

19. Someone should photoshop "My Pet Goat" into that picture.

I'd also nominate Dick Cheney to co-lead the operation. He's experienced with underground bunkers.

[damntexdem]

21. Well, at least he could clear brush around the plant.

He's experienced at that, and it may be one thing he's sort of competent at doing.

[leveymg]

33. The problem with trenching is they sited the damned things on the beach. Dig down a few meters, and

the excavation trench floods. They would need to build a series of draw walls of increasing size and depth just to pour the concrete. It would take years, which we don't have.

If the coria burn through the concrete floor, they'll hit water and sand. Count on a continued release of radioactive steam, silica particles, ash, and contaminated water into the surrounding area, and perhaps very far away, for a long time to come.

These things are huge, slow-release dirty bombs, and there's no containing them.

[leveymg]

40. Here's another fundamental problem with encasement: radiation exposure to the workers:

Their concrete plan is to use old people and sick people to dig up the corium and lay a mountain of concrete and steel under and over it.

Robots? What robots? It would take years to build enough big robot construction machines or even to retrofit remote controls to existing equipment. That's time we don't have.

"Volunteers" - just like at Chernobyl. Anyone want to tell me how else they're going to deal with it?

[oldbanjo]

65. Russia didn't have volunteers, that was a lie, they forced prisoners to do the most dangerous work

then they volunteered the rest.

[valerief]

47. + 1 gazillion

[oldbanjo]

61. Russia used miners to dig under their reactor and filled it with cement.

The ground water is already contaminated by them spraying all this water on this reactor. When the core reaches the ground water it will make steam then the steam will rise and travel to the USA. DUCK AND COVER

[MrMickeysMom]

75. That way, we can say he'll have been useful, Octafish

Everybody's good at something, you know.

[JDPriestly]

52. Too close to the ocean. The concrete sarcophages won't work.

[Rex]

79. Ah thanks! That was something I was wondering about.

SHIT. Then what is the next move? Can't bury it or entomb it in concrete...what else can you do to it?

[HopeHoops]

10. That's a "historical" occurence in a book set in the future that I'm working on.

The earthquake and tsunami were part of it, but not the nuclear reactor. Truth can be stranger than fiction - and I'm going to have to revise that section of the book.

[Horse with no Name]

12. I can see that being possible

Japan is about the size of Montana.

What a shame.:(

[madokie]

36. I'm worried to death for the Japanese people

I'm willing to host a family if need be. Hell our yard is large enough to add a trailer and host two families. Nuclear is something we should never have opened the bottle and let that genie out to start with. One of my Dads friends worked on the Manhattan Project and I remember he and Dad discussing the use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes, Nuclear power plants, and he was scared to death of the thought so I've been fearful of using nuclear energy from when I was just a kid, long before I started to school. When I came home from Vietnam PSO was going to build a nuke plant upwind of us and one of the brave ladies of the city of Claremore started a movement to stop that and I was right in the middle of every protest, meeting that I could make, and SHE finally got that project shut down. I'm proud of that fact to. I can hope that we can come up with alternates and could have already if we hadn't gone the nuclear route to begin with. The thing of it is early on President Eisenhower was a supporter of peaceful uses of splitting the atom as it was referred to back then so they could convince the people here that it was safe so they could build more and more of those damn bombs to add to their arsenal. Military supremacy was the goal all along. The powers to be here were so extremely fearful of the Soviet Union that they let their fears drive the decision they made. We have a lot of nuclear power plants that are sited near large population areas and due to their age there's a pretty good chance that we'll have a big bang one of these days here on our own soil to worry with. I say we shut the bastids down and get to work on alternates. We dont' have much manufacturing anymore and I believe that we could do without the 20% or so of nuclear energy that we're getting today without a big impact on our daily lives while we build out these alternates.
:hi:

I'd like to add: My experiences with PSO and getting blackfox stopped let me see to what lengths the industry would go to to achieve their goals, lie and lie when the first one didn't' work and then lie some more all the while obfuscating the truth of the dangers.

[Old and In the Way]

20. I've seen very little about how far the contamination could spread.

There isn't much informed or uninformed speculation on how this will permanently impact this country. Hopefully, this will lead to a world realization that the downside risks are too much for any country to bear and we can start to pursue a new energy technology that is decentralized, environmentally risk-free, and labor inefficient (creates jobs).

[truedelphi]

27. You know, one of the major nuke agencies had advised the

Japanese that in order to keep people safe, they needed to evacuate fifty miles out from Fukushima. This statement was made very early on.

Then they had to revise it, because there is not a single Environmental Impact Statement, or emergency preparedness plan for nuke reactors in the USDA with the means to handle a fifty mile evacuation. I mean, could you imagine New York city evacuating if Indian Point reactor blows a fuse? The traffic jams would be so horrifying that most people couldn't get out in time.

So the decision was made to revise the statement and state that people within nineteen miles of the Fukushima reactors need to be evacuated.

[oldbanjo]

67. Indian Point should be closed

to clear a 50 mile zone would require relocating and feeding 50 million people. IMPOSSIBLE

[CrispyQ]

23. I can't imagine relocating a city the size of Tokyo, much less an entire country. -nt

[Art_from_Ark]

28. The situation is not good, but the radiation hazards are concentrated

in Fukushima Prefecture. It's going to be bad for people in a large part of that 5500 square mile prefecture, and probably for adjacent areas of Ibaraki Prefecture, but most of the rest of the country will continue to be inhabitable. Tokyo, for example, showed elevated radiation levels only for a brief time, and environmental radiation readings in Tsukuba, about 100 miles south of the reactors, have returned to normal levels.

[leveymg]

34. The release will likely go on for months or years. Radiation level in Tokyo may go up over time.

[Art_from_Ark]

35. It may go up over time

but given that the radiation release has been occurring steadily since March, and Tokyo readings have been normal for nearly all of that time, it's doubtful that they're suddenly going to jump up, barring another explosion.

And even here, 45 miles closer to the reactors than Tokyo, ambient radiation levels have returned to normal.

There may be increases in levels when the prevailing winds start coming from the north, some time around November or December.

[leveymg]

37. Levels will go up dramatically if the 200 tons of corium in each reactor burn through the foundation

and start releasing radioactive particles into the air and water in a completely uncontained manner.

Then, we'll definitely see a dramatic increase in radiation levels far from the plant.

[Art_from_Ark]

41. The key word is "IF"

First, the corium has to burn through the containment vessels.

This is the current situation with the "melt-through"

http://img.blogs.yahoo.co.jp/ybi/1/0b/e1/tioga24ft/folder/944603/img_944603_32585822_7?20110608100132
http://blogs.yahoo.co.jp/x_csv/20390810.html

[leveymg]

42. It's all been a series of "IFs". We're reaching the point where "WHEN" is the sole issue.

IF there's a big quake. IF there's a Tsunami. IF the cooling systems get knocked out. IF the rods meltdown. IF the pressure vessels are melted through. IF the concrete outer containment gets burned through - WHEN they do, things will start happening very quickly, and the usual authorities will pretend that it "couldn't happen."

Good luck, and good night with the IFs.

[Art_from_Ark]

43. Are we reaching that point?

The melt-through was believed to have occurred on March 14, and yet the concrete containment seems to be holding. It could give, who knows? But the latest Embassy message, which I received today, makes no mention of the likelihood of containment vessel failure. The suggested 50-mile exclusion zone for Americans still holds, the radiation readings here in southern Ibaraki have stabilized to normal levels, and the reports I have been hearing from people more closely associated with this problem than I have been calling it a tightrope act, but they don't think it will get worse. But they don't think it will get better anytime soon, either.

Given that I'm closer to the reactors than any other DUer, I will be affected by what eventually happens more than just about anyone else here on his board. If I were in Fukushima, or even northern Ibaraki, I would be much more concerned about the potential for increased radiation levels. But it's not too bad here, at least right now. And I know someone who has family in Iwaki, which is a large city on the southern edge of the 30km zone, and he says his family is going about with their daily lives, as are, apparently, the people I saw filling the Iwaki-bound bus tonight. They still have to lead their lives, there in the shadow of the monster.

[meow mix]

50. temperature in reactor unit 3 is increasing along with the temperature in the unit 4 spent fuel pool

doesnt exactly sound contained very well

[leveymg]

53. Each BWR reactor contains 368-800 rods of nuclear material that may have melted through the

vessel. Each assembly contains 64 rods, about 700 lbs of nuclear material. There are 6-14 assemblies per BWR reactor, depending upon the type. That means there may be as much as 12,000 pounds of melted nuclear rod material at the bottom of each of three reactor building where meltdowns have occurred at Fukushima.

Another source gives a higher figure for the amount of nuclear material in each reactor: http://yeswaterisfuel.com/2011/03/18/fukushima-nuclear-meltdown/

Each reactor has 241 fuel assemblies and each assembly weighs 660kg = 160 metric tonnes

6 plants x 160 = 960 metric tonnes of nuclear material

+ 783 used fuel rods (according to a report by NHK news – unconfirmed amount)

Each fuel rod contains u-238 with 3% (u-235) en-uranium-ox
waste product is plutonium, p-239 – because u-238 absorbs neutrons

In addition Reactor-3 has fuel rods with 5% enriched plutonium

There is easily a kilo of p-239 in a single spent fuel rod. A Kilo of p-239 is approximately the size of a golf ball.

Our estimates are that we are looking at approximately 2 – 4 metric tonnes of p-239.

Another source places the cool-down time of these rod assemblies at 11-26 years. That's in storage with proper cooling. http://www.ornl.gov/sci/scale/pubs/152495.pdf

The radioactivity of the nuclear materials themselves are considerably longer-lasting. The half life of U-235 is 700 million years. Natural U-238 is 4.5 billion years. Other isotopes have shorter half-lives, ranging down to 23 minutes for U-239. The commercial rods are about 3 percent U-235 compounded as uranium oxide formed into 3 inch pellets that are stacked inside of tubes made of zirconium alloy. Each tube is about ten feet long, and weighs These things will stay hot for a long time. If the material is still as hot as it was when it melted through the steel container, it's hot enough to burn through a couple feet of concrete, as well. I don't know the specifics of what's going on at the bottom of those reactor vessels. I don't think anyone does.

Here are some more useful facts: http://www.nucleartourist.com/basics/hlwaste.htm.

3. Behavior of radioactivity and thermal power produced as a function of time for fuel discharged from a reactor.

Typically a 1000 MWe reactor will discharge about 2 metric tons of high level waste each refueling. A 1000 MWe reactor has about 100 metric tons of uranium dioxide fuel, of which 3 to 5 tons consist of the fissile U-235. A PWR will discharge 40 to 70 fuel assemblies; a BWR will discharge 120 to 200 fuel assemblies.

The United States' Department of Energy (DOE) has prepared very informative on line annual Integrated Database Reports (IDB96 and IDB97) - that provide detailed information, including tables and figures showing the history and projections of spent nuclear waste generation. These DOE reports dealswith both government (including military) and commercially generated spent nuclear fuel and waste.

The table below, Table 1.4, entitled IDB Reference Characteristics of LWR Nuclear Fuel Assemblies from the 1996 Integrated Database Report provides the following reference data about PWR and Boiling Water Reactor (Fukushima type) fuel assemblies:

Characteristics BWRa PWRb
Overall assembly length, m 4.470 4.059
Cross section, cm 13.9 x 13.9 21.4 x 21.4
Fuel rod length, m 4.064 3.851
Active fuel height, m 3.759 3.658
Fuel rod outer diameter, cm 1.252 0.950
Fuel rod array 8 x 8 17 x 17
Fuel rods per assembly 63 264
Assembly total weight, kg 319.9 657.9
Uranium/assembly, kg 183.3 461.4
UO2/assembly, kg 208.0 523.4
Zircaloy/assembly, kg 103.3c 108.4d
Hardware/assembly, kg 8.6e 26.1f
Total metal/assembly, kg 111.9 134.5

[AtheistCrusader]

63. This is actually my main concern with Fukushima over Chernobyl.

Up to this point, Chernobyl was worse. Way worse. However, since the prompt criticality excursion, and subsequent explosion and fire of the Chernobyl core blew most of the core material out of the core, as vaporized particulate matter, and even solid chunks, there was much less 'hot' material remaining in the core to become corium, and burn downwards.

Since all the fuel is still inside the core at Fukushima, there is a lot more decay heat in the corium to deal with, meaning the bottom of the containment is at much more risk than Chernobyl.

So, if the fuel doesn't escape, we're sitting pretty compared to Chernobyl. If the fuel burns through and escapes, bad times.

[liberation]

70. Also remember that there are more cores compromised than just Chernobyl's single

And there is like 1 order of magnitude more fuel involved.

Unlike Chernobyl these reactors have containment structures, so hopefully they perform better than the Russian design. But the potential is frightening however... luckily right now it is just that: potential.

[liberation]

56. Actually....

... if there has been a melt-through it means the concrete containment is not holding.

Even thought he radiation levels may be low elsewhere, the main issue right now is that there are passing over 4000 millisieverts in some of the reactors, which is a level of radiation which causes serious injury within minutes and it is lethal in less than an hour. That makes the containment work very very difficult if not almost impossible without casualties.

Good luck!

[AtheistCrusader]

62. No, the melt-through is of the steel RPV ONLY.

The reactor pressure vessel. Not the containment. At least, not yet, as far as we know.

The concrete containment cannot influence whether or not the RPV fails, and RPV containment failure is not indicative of the concrete containment not holding.

On the flipside, the water is escaping the concrete containment somehow, so that's bad. Could be a valve. could be a hole or crack from the earthquake. Could be a burn through. Hard to say at this juncture.

[liberation]

68. I hope you're correct

the news I was reading were hinting that the melt though involved the containment structure, not just the pressure vessel, given the high radioactivity levels detected in the structures (although they did not disclose if it was inside or outside the containment structure itself).

In any case, if the fuel is now out of the pressure vessel, it means that the reaction is partly out of control and it is now up to hoping the containment structure was built flawlessly. A very risky position to be in.

[Exultant Democracy]

44. Probably not, but that entire island may.

[oldbanjo]

58. Japan could be first but the answer is yes

if every thing that you drink or eat will give you cancer. Also things could get bad enough that no woman could have a baby, some of Russia is like that now due to their accident.

[spanone]

6. perhaps when it burns thru to the south atlantic, it will get our attention

i hope the entire nuclear community is working to solve this 'situation'

[jillan]

9. Maybe someone should put a pic of Anthony's weiner there and then it would get some coverage.

:eyes:

Afterall, that's all that seems to matter according to the media.

[Rex]

11. The M$M will be the deaths of us all.

We need a news media group in America worried about the state of the nation and not the state of some guys dick!

[leveymg]

38. Give Luke Russert a suit, a shovel, and parachute him in to start digging up the corium.

Russert and GE's ex-CEO Jack Welch, another Bad Karma case, go in first.

[kentuck]

22. How long before it hits America?

Is anybody checking??

[Poll_Blind]

26. Can't even wrap my brain around this enough to give a response so I kick.

:kick:

PB

[CoffeeCat]

39. Those radioactive isotopes are all ready here...

Almost two months ago, there were many reports about cesium and radioactive iodine-131 found in
strawberries, mushrooms, rainwater, drinking water and even milk. These reports were from all
over our country. The isotopes in milk were found in Vermont. PA had isotopes in drinking water.
Many other states had isotopes, including Florida, California, Missouri, Oregon.

This stuff was all over, weeks ago. The EPA was testing, but after these isotopes were found, they
ceased their rigorous schedule of tests and went back to a regular schedule of testing. This means
that it will be a couple of months before the EPA tests again.

Isn't that just swell? In the middle of a global, nuclear disaster worse than Chernobyl, our own
EPA decides that we need to stop testing for radioactive isotopes.

Bottom line, as this crisis was unfolding--people were paying attention and backlash against nuclear power was
growing. The industry was ripe for the public to turn against it. So, what did these corporations order
our government and our media to do? Ignore the crisis, downplay it in the media and saturate the MSM with
bunk articles about how radiation isn't harmful--and similar to an xray.

They've waited for interest to die down. Now, they're releasing the truth--the bad news that we've had
at least three meltdowns. When you tell people that something happened a while ago--it has a less powerful
psychological impact.

People need to read on their own and find information. We are on our own. Our government, TEPCO, the big
energy companies and our media are not interested in our health and survival.

[MoonRiver]

46. If We the People go down, TEPCO, the media and their families

go down. I'm starting to think that most human behavior is totally irrational. :crazy:

[valerief]

48. The uber rich are like video slot machine players. Only instead of playing with

coins, they play with human lives. We are pawns in their loser games.

[Harmony Blue]

69. It happened months ago, but the MSM will try to cover up

The key is to keep yourself up to date, and educate yourself given that we live in some interesting times.

[Art_from_Ark]

30. Nationwide antinuclear rallies in Japan tomorrow

(Map)
http://nonukes.jp/wordpress/

(English explanation)
http://nonukes.jp/wordpress/?page_id=137

[valerief]

49. I'm sure it'll be all over the US news. NOT. nt

[Art_from_Ark]

81. Yeah, why cover something like a nationwide nuclear protest

when you can go on and on and on and on and on about some Congressman's sexting escapades?

American news media are next to worthless. :puke:

[Art_from_Ark]

82. At least it was front page news in Japan

http://www.asahi.com/national/update/0611/TKY201106110405.html

[Odin2005]

31. Yikes!

:(

[sulphurdunn]

51. On the bright side,

the market in credit default swaps (betting that TEPCO will go under) is soaring. If that happens, the insurers will almost certainly default and the Japanese and most likely American people will need to step up and bail out Wall Street again. Have a nice day. :)

[the_chinuk]

54. Don't look now? It's getting so I don't want to look at all! k/r

For my part, I'll be in my basement from now on.

[gateley]

72. I can't believe we are still sanctioning new nuclear plants in this country!

How fucking stupid are we???

Those poor people in Japan - heartbreaking. I know we're ALL affected by it, but nothing like what they're having to deal with. :(

[MrMickeysMom]

76. Answer: pretty damned stupid

Why, we can't even grasp the concept of what Tom Ridge sees as opportunity to get away from foreign oil by FRACKING here in PA.

We dig in the ocean and cause harm.... We mess with nuclear explosions, we contaminate the earth... We fracture shale and pump poison into our water.... it's protected by the legislation of Dick Fucking Cheney.

Yeah, pretty stupid.

[gateley]

80. Blinded by the dollar signs. All rational thought and power of

discernment goes out the window. :grr:

[Kurovski]

77. K&R. (nt)

[avebury]

78. K&R