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... not Russel! Registered Member #1
Joined: Thu Jan 26 2006, 12:18AM
Location: Tempe, Arizona
Posts: 1052
Ash Small wrote ...
I'm speculating a bit here, Chris, but as I understand it, spent fuel requires 'processing' before it is safe and can be stored without being cooled. I assume the 'processing' involves 'diluting or dispersing' the waste in another medium, and recovering the plutonium and uranium. I believe there is only one 'processing plant' in the UK, at Sellafield. I understand that after processing it is stored deep underground.
I thought so too, but looking around a bit, spent fuel from US PWRs and BWRs is allowed to be either removed from the reactor and cooled in a spent fuel pool, or stored above ground in concrete caskets filled with an inert gas.
Ah, here we are. According to an article by Time magazine:
Because of the unavailability of off-site storage for spent power-reactor fuel, the U.S Nuclear Regulatory Commission has allowed high-density storage of spent fuel in pools originally designed to hold much smaller inventories....It has been known for more than two decades that, in case of a loss of water in the pool, convective air cooling would be relatively ineffective in such a “dense-packed†pool. Spent fuel recently discharged from a reactor could heat up relatively rapidly to temperatures at which the zircaloy fuel cladding could catch fire and the fuel's volatile fission product, including 30-year half-life Cs, would be released.
So, initially the fuel assemblies were designed to be safe even if all the water in a spent fuel pool boiled away. However, because long-term storage and transport of nuclear fuel has been a difficult prospect, the NRC has allowed fuel pools to be densely packed, to the point that they will now readily catch fire without cooling.
Fantastic. I have no words for how I feel about this.
Registered Member #543
Joined: Tue Feb 20 2007, 04:26PM
Location: UK
Posts: 4992
Shall we ever learn the whole unvarnished truth? Probably not.
Even when British Nuclear Fuels Ltd (BNFL) were found to have been systematically falsifying quality control data on MOX supplied to Tokyo Electric Power Company, no-one has ever been found responsible. Nor has anyone been found responsible for Tokyo Electric Power Company's own falsification of safety data:
see BNFL MOX business in serious doubt as Japan's biggest nuclear firm confesses massive safety cover up
... not Russel! Registered Member #1
Joined: Thu Jan 26 2006, 12:18AM
Location: Tempe, Arizona
Posts: 1052
I just don't understand why one would intentionally short-circuit a very important safety mechanism. It's truly mind-boggling to consider that the collective chain of thought must have gone something like: "Okay, now we can safely store fuel from the reactor for several years. We don't have long term storage facilities built yet, but there's no sense building them 20 years before we even need them. Now let's build some reactors!" *cut to 20 years later* "Wow, nobody wants a long term storage facility anywhere near them. We could build storage facilities anyway, and we really should, but that would be politically unpopular. Oh well, let's just densely pack the fuel. What are the odds that a fuel pool will ever lose cooling? Besides, someone else will solve this problem in the future." *cut to 20 more years later* "Well crap, the fuel pool is on fire."
Edit: to be fair, the original builders probably expected that a significant portion of the spent fuel would be reprocessed after chilling in the pool, rather than sent to long-term storage facilities.
Registered Member #3414
Joined: Sun Nov 14 2010, 05:05PM
Location: UK
Posts: 4245
Reuters- Dropping boric acid from helicopters was attempted in Chernobyl but proved to be ineffective as it was hard to drop it precisely considering the conditions. As reported later, almost 100% of material have missed the epicenter.
Latest news- There is another fire at No. 4 reactor.
Registered Member #2390
Joined: Sat Sept 26 2009, 02:04PM
Location: Milwaukee Wisconsin
Posts: 381
Ash Small wrote ...
Reuters- Dropping boric acid from helicopters was attempted in Chernobyl but proved to be ineffective as it was hard to drop it precisely considering the conditions. As reported later, almost 100% of material have missed the epicenter.
Latest news- There is another fire at No. 4 reactor.
Latest. Pilots returning from humanitarian missions being treated for radiation sickness. Explosion at reactor number 4 claims 5 lives and releases 400 foot plume of radioactive smoke and particulate. Radioactivity released directly into the atmosphere has dramatically spiked in levels. Level 5 emergency. 50 workers are left at the plant when a normal operating staff required to maintain the reactors safely is 600 or more.
Pardon the french but this shit is starting to get really deep. The U.S. is starting to claim on local and national news that the Japanese government is not releasing the true details of the situations true details. Not a good thing for anybody, we are safe here in the us for now but the news is saying clouds of radiation are headed twords korea.
edit: Well within 2 mins of writing this, now at a level 6 emergency. News is saying pushing a level 7 chernobyl type incident rapidly. Again, gettin deep, get out the hip waders.
Registered Member #89
Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 02:40PM
Location: Zadar, Croatia
Posts: 3145
I'd be very interested to see the data on residual power output/residual activity activity vs. time both of the reactors after shutdown (which would, ofcourse, depend on how long did the reactors run with the particular filling before shutdown), as well as of the spent fuel itself. In other words, how long would they have to keep everything actively cooled in order to stop things melting through and catching fire? Months? Years? If there are like several spent fuel dumps in the pool of the reactor 4, and they are still so active that they spontaneously combust without active cooling after several years there, what chance they have of controlling it anyway, considered how well they managed for the last few days?
If they really have no way of restoring active cooling quickly I'd admit the situation looks very grim indeed, more than I was convinced at first. No footage or photos of the plant seem to have been released at all since the second explosion, and the last satellite pic showing the (rather badly wrecked) reactor 3 smoking. I wonder what's with the spent fuel stored within it? Has it been scattered around, or perhaps the white smoke is coming from it being on fire?
What is the last resort plan anyway if reactors start melting through and/or spent fuel fire goes out of control and radiation level gets way too high for anyone to get close? A mass attack on the plant by radio controlled bulldozers in attempt of buldozzing it into sea?
PS. just saw the news and the upper post. Perhaps detonating several small nuclear weapons on strategic places to move the whole plant into sea would result in lower radiation release?
PS2. Finally a halfway clear looking pic of the reactor 4.
The mangled ruin in front of it seems to be the third reactor, and they still seem to be hiding what happened to the 2'nd. The plant seems to have been abandoned completely by now.
... not Russel! Registered Member #1
Joined: Thu Jan 26 2006, 12:18AM
Location: Tempe, Arizona
Posts: 1052
Marko wrote ...
I'd be very interested to see the data on residual power output/residual activity activity vs. time both of the reactors after shutdown (which would, ofcourse, depend on how long did the reactors run with the particular filling before shutdown), as well as of the spent fuel itself. In other words, how long would they have to keep everything actively cooled in order to stop things melting through and catching fire? Months? Years? If there are like several spent fuel dumps in the pool of the reactor 4, and they are still so active that they spontaneously combust without active cooling after several years there, what chance they have of controlling it anyway, considered how well they managed for the last few days?
I don't know the precise specifics, but the reactors take several days to reach a cool down state. With the control rods fully inserted, the core should eventually become cool enough to not need active cooling. The spent fuel takes years to cool down. Since it has been stored in such a way that convection cannot cool it, the fuel pools need to be constantly cooled; it'll be several years before they can be allowed to go without active cooling.
Marko wrote ...
If they really have no way of restoring active cooling quickly I'd admit the situation looks very grim indeed, more than I was convinced at first. No footage or photos of the plant seem to have been released at all since the second explosion, and the last satellite pic showing the (rather badly wrecked) reactor 3 smoking. I wonder what's with the spent fuel stored within it? Has it been scattered around, or perhaps the white smoke is coming from it being on fire?
What is the last resort plan anyway if reactors start melting through and/or spent fuel fire goes out of control and radiation level gets way too high for anyone to get close? A mass attack on the plant by radio controlled bulldozers in attempt of buldozzing it into sea?
It seems we were all lied to about the state of the plant; it was several days before it became clear the reactors were badly damaged very early on, and a lot of options for containing this mess that seemed to be on the table were, in fact, not possible.
Should the spent fuel burn out of control, the radiation release will dwarf Chernobyl. Other than dropping water, boric acid, etc. by helicopter, it's tough to say what a last resort plan would entail to prevent all the radiation from escaping. Probably pouring cement over everything.
Marko wrote ...
PS. just saw the news and the upper post. Perhaps detonating several small nuclear weapons on strategic places to move the whole plant into sea would result in lower radiation release?
Marko
Probably not possible. It has been decades since project plowshare looked into earth-moving with nuclear weapons. IIRC fallout levels were very high and results were not satisfactory. Who knows, though. At this point probably nothing is completely off the table.
Registered Member #543
Joined: Tue Feb 20 2007, 04:26PM
Location: UK
Posts: 4992
Japan earthquake: Japan warned over nuclear plants, WikiLeaks cables show
By Steven Swinford, and Christopher Hope Telegraph.co.uk 15 Mar 2011
Extract from longer article
Warnings about the safety of nuclear power plants in Japan, one of the most seismologically active countries in the world, were raised during a meeting of the G8's Nuclear Safety and Security Group in Tokyo in 2008.
A US embassy cable obtained by the WikiLeaks website and seen by The Daily Telegraph quoted an unnamed expert who expressed concern that guidance on how to protect nuclear power stations from earthquakes had only been updated three times in the past 35 years.
The document states: "He [the IAEA official] explained that safety guides for seismic safety have only been revised three times in the last 35 years and that the IAEA is now re-examining them.
"Also, the presenter noted recent earthquakes in some cases have exceeded the design basis for some nuclear plants, and that this is a serious problem that is now driving seismic safety work."
The cables also disclose how the Japanese government opposed a court order to shut down another nuclear power plant in western Japan because of concerns it could not withstand powerful earthquakes.
The court ruled that there was a possibility local people might be exposed to radiation if there was an accident at the plant, which was built to out of date specifications and only to withstand a "6.5 magnitude" earthquake. Last Friday's earthquake, 81 miles off the shore of Japan, was a magnitude 9.0 tremor.
However, a cable from March 2006 reported that the court's concerns were not shared by the country's nuclear safety agency.
It says: "Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency believes the reactor is safe and that all safety analyses were appropriately conducted."
The Government successfully overturned the ruling in 2009.
Another cable reported to Washington local concerns that a new generation of Japanese power stations that recycle nuclear fuel were jeopardising safety.
The cable, quoting a local newspaper, reports: "There is something precarious about the way all electric power companies are falling in step with each other under the banner of the national policy. We have seen too many cases of cost reduction competition through heightened efficiency jeopardizing safety."
The cables also disclose how Taro Kono, a high-profile member of Japan's lower house, told US diplomats in October 2008 that the government was "covering up" nuclear accidents.
He alleged that the government was ignoring alternative forms of energy, such as wind power.
The cable states: "He also accused METI [the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry] of covering up nuclear accidents, and obscuring the true costs and problems associated with the nuclear industry." He added that the Japan's "extensive seismic" activity raised safety concerns about storing nuclear material.
Mr Kan was not in office at the time the nuclear warnings were made. He became science and technology minister in 2009 and prime minister in June 2010.
Registered Member #3414
Joined: Sun Nov 14 2010, 05:05PM
Location: UK
Posts: 4245
Ash Small wrote ...
The Japanese government is considering using military helicopters to drop water onto the spent fuel pools using the same techniques they use for forest fires, but even if they get a 'direct hit', won't it all just splash back out (like putting a cup under a tap and turning it on fully), taking the fuel rods with it?
Well, they tried it, and abandoned the plan immediately as radiation levels shot up as white vapour (steam) was seen rising from No.4 reactor. The pilots are now being treated for radiation sickness and further fires have broken out.
NHK reports from people in the evacuation zone in Myagi Prefecture that they are not receiving supplies, and are being told no buses can come to evacuate and that they feel they are being left to die.
EU energy chief says Japan reactor "out of control"
Breaking News: IAEA head says core damage at units 1-3 of quake-hit plant confirmed.
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Nuclear events taking place in Japan.
