Japan quakes

[MirageSys]

Any1 got any ideas how long it'll really take to get the reactors/core cooled down assuming no other issues turns up?

I have limited knowledge of the internal workings of the reactors at the site, but in general, stopping a sustained reaction can take weeks to effectively cool.

They are pumping sea water into the cooling system, hopefully indirectly. The sea water then goes into the containment vessel, mixed with boron (to retard and slow the process further). The sea water then splits into its base elements, and is exhausted into the surrounding air. This is the source of the two hydrogen explosions. If the rods are exposed, its possible they are venting large amounts of radiation. If they are not exposed, or the sea water is not being directly used to cool the reactor, the radiation would dissipate fast and pose little risk to people in the area.

For one reason or another, this episode reminds me of Union Carbide's plant at Bhopal India. There should have been more redundant backup systems online and able to resolve the problem. Hopefully, and perhaps unfortunately, they were disabled by the earthquake and not by human stupidity and greed.

[MirageSys]

Yes, it will make contact interior of the reactor and thus it will be contaminated. I guess they will have to dump it back into the sea, at least parts of it as they are likely to need huge quantities of water to cool the reactor properly.

At this stage, they are likely not condensing the superheated steam, and are just exhausting it into the air. Normally the cooling system will recirculate water or whatever they are using for coolant.

Normally:

Reservoir of coolant --> reactor where it is turned into steam --> turbines ----> cooling system where it condenses ---> back to reservoir

This case

Sea Water ---> Reactor ----> exhausted steam into atmosphere

[josh1980]

a reactor can´t explode? where do u live? ever poured water on a 500°C hot surface? the fuel rods reach around 2000°C when they´re not cooled.
how much data do u think is recorded when all ur instruments are blown away by a hydrogen/oxygen explosion?[/B] and that´s no bs, they admitted, that they have no data of what´s going on inside the reactor. when a reactor can´t stand a plane crash, they really can´t, no nuclear powerplant on earth can, how do u think it can stand such a heavy explosion?

by what u wrote i can see that u strongly believe in how safe nuclear power is and how US experts know what they do and can help the japanese experts. that´s what i call bs...
right now u see that it is impossible to safely shut down a damaged nuclear power plant no matter what kind of expert u are.

You must want to be a journalist with the garbage you post...

I already discussed this here. Don't sit here and ask me if I know what electrolysis is when it is completely obvious you couldn't even read my posts before posting. Don't spout your garbage if you aren't even making an attempt to be informed on the situation. You have shown your complete ignorance to the situation and have shown you are glad to be in the dark.

You're right. The USgovernment has never run tests to determine how much crap a containment building could with stand. To sum up the video, the narrator states that the "jet was atomised" on impact with the containment building. There's even better videos of planes being destroyed by the containment building, but I couldn't find the one I really wanted to show you.

As for the Japanese not knowing what's going on inside of the reactor, they probably have alot of instrument failures because the earthquake was 7 times more powerful than what they had designed the plant for. The fact that any of the buildings are still standing is a testament to the engineering skill and safety of plants that are 40(yes, forty) years old. If a 40 year old plant is still standing, imagine what the newest generation could do.

As for the reactor not being shutdown, that's complete FUD. The reactor was shutdown withing seconds of the earthquake. When you pump boron into a nuclear reactor, which the Japanese goverment has said they have been doing, that's called "poisoning the reactor" for a reason. They have said that they want to ensure it stays shutdown. So it looks to me like it's shutdown and definitely won't start-up again. Ever.

So stop with the FUD, quit taking what is being said out of context, and read the forum before you start spouting off garbage like you just did. If you don't want to believe it, then don't. But don't go around spreading your BS because you THINK you're entitled to post on a forum when you haven't tried to do your homework.

On another note(and NOT directed at the person quoted above), some friends and I were discussing the Internet the other day before the earthquake. In particular, whether the internet is good or bad. The arguement was being made by one of my friends that the internet can be very bad. Thanks to the internet some high school dropout with no education can log into a forum and post a bunch of BS and other people that don't know what's going on will think that his post is filled with facts. Some people just shouldn't be allowed to have their opinion expressed in an open forum such as the internet.

[ProStock]

Japan Earthquake: before and after

Source: Google And ABC News


http://www.abc.net.au/news/events/ja...eforeafter.htm

[MrToad]

On another note(and NOT directed at the person quoted above), some friends and I were discussing the Internet the other day before the earthquake. In particular, whether the internet is good or bad. The arguement was being made by one of my friends that the internet can be very bad. Thanks to the internet some high school dropout with no education can log into a forum and post a bunch of BS and other people that don't know what's going on will think that his post is filled with facts. Some people just shouldn't be allowed to have their opinion expressed in an open forum such as the internet.

On this particular respect we disagree, but I can't discuss the matter as is completely off-topic. So we'll have to agree to disagree

However, I do appreciate your efforts to illustrate the situation and help us understand what's going on.

Without the knowledge you've share we'd be at the mercy of the media, which as we've already established is not always the best informed source (to put it mildly).

So although I empathize with your frustration I'd ask you not to give up, because if those with the knowledge leave the thread it's going to be rather dark in here...

[p2501]

snip.

Thanks a lot for not giving up on educating people and not losing interest either.

I'm imagining it like this: first, fill up the pressure vessel with sea water/boric acid to keep fuel rods under water. Second, flood the whole containment building with sea water to cool down the outside of the pressure vessel, and keep it flooded. Steam from this step will enter the atmosphere with little effects on the surroundings.

But, why is boric acid so essential in the shutdown process? Why is it "poisoning" the reactor?

[josh1980]

Thanks a lot for not giving up on educating people and not losing interest either.

I'm imagining it like this: first, fill up the pressure vessel with sea water/boric acid to keep fuel rods under water. Second, flood the whole containment building with sea water to cool down the outside of the pressure vessel, and keep it flooded. Steam from this step will enter the atmosphere with little effects on the surroundings.

But, why is boric acid so essential in the shutdown process? Why is it "poisoning" the reactor?

Your imagination is pretty close to what they should be doing. My worry is that someone somewhere that doesn't understand the emergency plans are trying to not flood the containment, trying to minimize the amount of water they put in the core, and trying to minimize the amount of steam they release. It's almost like putting a pressure cooker on the stove and trying to let it get as hot as you can with as much water as you can, but try to minimize the release of steam. I get the distinct impression that whomever is making the calls at the top of the Japanese governentment(or the operator), it is purely politically motivated and not in the best interest of the plant. Perhaps they are trying to keep everything inside the reactor vessel and minimize relying on the containment building as the final layer of protection against releasing large amounts of contamination to the environment. I have no solid information to backup my "gut feeling". I'm not completely informed as to why Monday night the fuel was found to again be melting. In my opinion, the only cause for additional core melting would be operator error(but could be due to instrument failures the operators were relying on).

Boron(main component of boric acid) absorbs neutrons. Neutrons are necessary for fissioning of Uranium fuel. It's literally a liquid control rod. Boron is very corrosive and will bond to just about everything in the reactor. Boron literally eats neutrons and in very large quantities. In the hypothetical event that control rods break, melt, or are otherwise not able to be inserted into the reactor boron can be injected. In the case in Japan, all of the rods are inserted(if there is a problem with the control rods Japan isn't talking about it) but boron can be injected as a safety measure to make sure that if the rods are damaged that the core cannot restart itself. Injecting boron into a nuclear reactor effectively makes that core unusable, forever. Yes it "could" be cleaned up and the reactor vessel could be reused. But given the age of the plants and the condition of all of the auxiliary systems for the reactor, there wasn't much chance the reactor would have been restarted anyway. The boron was injected only as a preventative measure to make sure that the core doesn't restart. The boron injection is "just to be on the safe side". The core is effectively "dead" because of the boron, hence it's called "poisoning the reactor".

I'm not sure if boron has ever been injected into a previously operable reactor before, so I'm sure alot of people will want to see how damaging the boric acid will be. The nuclear industry likely will be interested to see the effects boric acid had on the equipment. The nuclear industry is very interested in learning from other's mistakes. Japan is in a situation that is typically only planned for and hopefully never executed. There will be alot of dissecting of the plant going on when it is finally dismantled to see what all was wrong and the effects on the plant.

[[XC] gomeler]

XS is not a forum to discuss the 'karma of this happening'

Keep those discussions elsewhere (YouTube and Facebook seem to be happy hosting it), at best it's off-topic and at worst it's flamebaiting/trolling.

Let's keep this thread for information (josh1980's informative posts are GREAT) as well as discussing what's going on with the XS members in Japan (Team Japan, Miah, dctokyo, et al).

EDIT: there is absolutely no Freedom of Speech on this forum, that's made clear by the rules. End of discussion, NEOAethyr and BoredByLife.

Ffffrrrrreeeeeeedddddooooommmmmmm!!!!

Thanks a lot for not giving up on educating people and not losing interest either.

I'm imagining it like this: first, fill up the pressure vessel with sea water/boric acid to keep fuel rods under water. Second, flood the whole containment building with sea water to cool down the outside of the pressure vessel, and keep it flooded. Steam from this step will enter the atmosphere with little effects on the surroundings.

But, why is boric acid so essential in the shutdown process? Why is it "poisoning" the reactor?

While the control rods should have stopped any further uranium fission from occurring(by absorbing any neutrons that just happen to be hanging out in the area), the engineers on the scene want to make sure the reactors stay dead. Neutron moderators(water is one of them) slow down the fast neutrons from a fission reaction in order for those neutrons to be able to fly into and be captured by fellow uranium atoms for future fission reactions. Neutron absorbers(boron is one of them) just suck up neutrons. By 'poisoning' the core they are insuring that it won't ever ramp up again by injecting enough boron into the core that any neutrons that just happen to bounce around slam into some boron instead of some uranium.

[xVeinx]

Your imagination is pretty close to what they should be doing. My worry is that someone somewhere that doesn't understand the emergency plans are trying to not flood the containment, trying to minimize the amount of water they put in the core, and trying to minimize the amount of steam they release. It's almost like putting a pressure cooker on the stove and trying to let it get as hot as you can with as much water as you can, but try to minimize the release of steam. I get the distinct impression that whomever is making the calls at the top of the Japanese governentment(or the operator), it is purely politically motivated and not in the best interest of the plant. Perhaps they are trying to keep everything inside the reactor vessel and minimize relying on the containment building as the final layer of protection against releasing large amounts of contamination to the environment. I have no solid information to backup my "gut feeling". I'm not completely informed as to why Monday night the fuel was found to again be melting. In my opinion, the only cause for additional core melting would be operator error(but could be due to instrument failures the operators were relying on).

Some of the reports are suggesting damage of the pumps that are responsible for filling the core with seawater, which is why they are struggling to keep the cores filled.

Prayers and best wishes to those in Japan.

[p2501]

Okay boric acid is very corrosive but atm very welcome to ensure the fuel status because it effectively turns the whole pressure vessel into a moderator. BUT this begs the question of what is happening now since this already by age, radiation and maybe partial fuel meltdown weakened pressure vessel is contacted by boric acid. It's like what, 20-30cm thick? Will that hold up?

Edit:

Some of the reports are suggesting damage of the pumps that are responsible for filling the core with seawater, which is why they are struggling to keep the cores filled.

Couldn't they plumb different pumps into the system to ensure water level? Or should we assume that by the earth quake and tsunami the whole equipment is that damaged that any change to it will just add to the possibility of total breakdown of control?!

[xVeinx]

Okay boric acid is very corrosive but atm very welcome to ensure the fuel status because it effectively turns the whole pressure vessel into a moderator. BUT this begs the question of what is happening now since this already by age, radiation and maybe partial fuel meltdown weakened pressure vessel is contacted by boric acid. It's like what, 20-30cm thick? Will that hold up?

Edit:



Couldn't they plumb different pumps into the system to ensure water level? Or should we assume that by the earth quake and tsunami the whole equipment is that damaged that any change to it will just add to the possibility of total breakdown of control?!

It's an issue of getting the right equipment into the area, much less powering the equipment. The pumps are large and not something that can be assembled simply. With the deterioration of the surrounding roads and infrastructure, I imagine that needed parts would have to be either airlifted or driven over in special vehicles, if it's even possible. Not an easy task in any case.

EDIT: Re-plumbing is dangerous, and the excessive heat and pressure is working against the pumps. if those get too high, I imagine it would blow through the pumps and destroy them, pretty much ensuring that things go out of control.

[generics_user]

i think that another huge problem is that access to the plant might be very difficult due to destroyed streets and infrastructure...

[G H Z]

Not to mention you're walking into a contaminated area that could also blow up at any time.

[p2501]

It's an issue of getting the right equipment into the area, much less powering the equipment. The pumps are large and not something that can be assembled simply. With the deterioration of the surrounding roads and infrastructure, I imagine that needed parts would have to be either airlifted or driven over in special vehicles, if it's even possible. Not an easy task in any case.

EDIT: Re-plumbing is dangerous, and the excessive heat and pressure is working against the pumps. if those get too high, I imagine it would blow through the pumps and destroy them, pretty much ensuring that things go out of control.

Okay, so forget new pumps and try to keep power to the old ones to inject water into the vessel, check. But the problem of getting replacement pumps or proper large scale equipment to the place is exactly why I feel that the comparison with Three Mile Island is not right, there they had at least working infrastructure to try to keep up with the situation. In Japan just about _everything_ is fubar atm. The people at the plant really are trying to fix the situation with close to nothing in their hands. Without knowing if they have a home to return to. Or if the people close to them are still alive.

[josh1980]

Okay boric acid is very corrosive but atm very welcome to ensure the fuel status because it effectively turns the whole pressure vessel into a moderator. BUT this begs the question of what is happening now since this already by age, radiation and maybe partial fuel meltdown weakened pressure vessel is contacted by boric acid. It's like what, 20-30cm thick? Will that hold up?

Boric acid is not a moderator, but a neutron absorber . I think you meant to say neutron absorber, but said moderator.

[NEOAethyr]

Air lifting its probably the only option, probably with some big 2x rotor heli's.
Replacing the pumps is probably not gonna work as it was mentioned, back pressure.
So maybe plugging extra pumps in the water loop, but that's probably not even possible, they probably don't have the valves and hookups for that.

As for power, they can air lift in some gas generators, each providing a kw or more.
Enough to power those pumps I would hope...

All we can do is wait and see though anyways ^^.
We'll find out once it's all said and done, just as josh1980 said, people will want to know the details.
Then again if there's something that went amiss because of politics, then expect a coverup maybe.

[p2501]

Boric acid is not a moderator, but a neutron absorber . I think you meant to say neutron absorber, but said moderator.

*cough*

But concerning my question, the boric acid is an emergency plan which has never been executed before, right? They must at least have simulated on what the effects on materials used in the reactor would be, question now is if the reactor will fall apart first or they manage to cool it down enough to dismantle it. Which will be anywhere in the next few months... there is a really frightening time ahead of us it seems.

[Buckeye]

Lets stay on topic here please.

No need to drag all that into this.

[josh1980]

*cough*

But concerning my question, the boric acid is an emergency plan which has never been executed before, right? They must at least have simulated on what the effects on materials used in the reactor would be, question now is if the reactor will fall apart first or they manage to cool it down enough to dismantle it. Which will be anywhere in the next few months... there is a really frightening time ahead of us it seems.

I'm sure testing has been done. But when it comes right now to it nothing beats a little operational experience. The nuclear industry isn't going to go injecting boron into a multi-billion dollar reactor just to "see what happens". We have expected information, but there will be little nuances that might help us improve in the future. FYI, the reactor water is kept acidic for a reason. Some reactor designs even us boric acid normally. This isn't some kind of "no-mans land". The industry knows what to expect, but it's also informative to see how things will pan out based on the emergency procedures and how they are executed. The industry might realize that there's a few ways they could improve.

In my opinion, the worst is behind us. Unless a very small handful of equipment fails catastrophically, I think it's only going to only get better from here on out. It's just being sensationalized because that's what the press does. They just gotta show the pictures of the explosions, gotta show the pictures of the general public being examined for radiation, gotta mention "nuclear reactor" and "meltdown" and "10000+ people died" in the same paragraph just because they can. Next thing you know people think that a nuclear reactor melted down and killed 10000+ people. That's all that's going on.

[G H Z]

Only going to say this once, this situation is bad enough, we don't need any added conflict. The people who's only apparent purpose here is to stir things up will be removed from this section going forward. Please respect the people who are living through hell right now and be thankful you are not one of them.

[MrToad]

On a much more lighthearted note: Lady GaGa releases a Japan Earthquake Relief wristband.

No comment

Source

[h0bbes]

Not a big fan of lady gaga but that's a good idea.

Some more updates from BBC:

Apparently the reason why the water wasn't at the desired levels in one of the reactors (reactor 2?) is possibly because of a leak but the officials say that they dont think there is a danger of an imminent disaster.


Some interesting twitter links:
http://www.undispatch.com/must-follo...uake-in-japan#


Something else :
AT&T and Verizon are temporarily making calls to Japan free (except on prepaid phones), AT&T until end of March, Verizon until April 10 (according to a twitter page)

[xenolith]

If you want to help with a donation:

American Red Cross - Japan Earthquake and Pacific Tsunami Fund

Save the Children - Japan Earthquake Tsunami Children in Emergency Fund

[r0lfi]

Japan's Nuclear Situation - stop panicking please
In the aftermath of the recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan, two nuclear power stations on the east coast of Japan have been experiencing problems. They are the Fukushima Daiichi ("daiichi" means "number one") and Fukushima Daini ("number two") sites, operated by the Tokyo Electric Power Company (or TEPCO). Site one has six reactors, and site two has four. The problematic reactors are #1, #2, and #3 at site one, which are the oldest of the ten and were due to be decommissioned this year.

Read more here:
http://forums.somethingawful.com/sho...readid=3396817

[MrToad]

If you want to help with a donation:

American Red Cross - Japan Earthquake and Pacific Tsunami Fund

Save the Children - Japan Earthquake Tsunami Children in Emergency Fund

Already did with the Red Cross, but thanks for the links all the same

Just saw footage of thousands of displaced people on refugee camps and also people trying to make it out of the affected areas on foot as road access is not possible...

First it came as a shock, my mind would refuse to associate what I was seeing with Japan.

I suppose I still hadn't taken in the true scale of the disaster.

The spring equinox is in a week's time, wish it brings feelings of hope and rebirth to the people of Japan and helps heal the wounds that have opened in the past few days.