Japan quakes

[josh1980]

Here's an article that explains in simple terms what's going on in Japan and why it's not like Chernobyl. It's even accurate! It explains the loss humanity will face if the Generation 3 reactors aren't approved because of public panic of the unknown.


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...680697248.html

[MrToad]

Here's an article that explains in simple terms what's going on in Japan and why it's not like Chernobyl. It's even accurate! It explains the loss humanity will face if the Generation 3 reactors aren't approved because of public panic of the unknown.


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...680697248.html

Thanks for that again

I do have a little dilemma... OK, I accept that nuclear reactors do come with risks, and until subduction is viable as disposal method also with "garbage" that's difficult to get rid of, but... realistically (in the sense of "viable and available in the foreseeable future") what are the alternatives?

A more conscious use of energy (education, education...) would help alleviate the problem, but is not going to make it go away altogether...

Renewables at this point in time don't seem to make up for the requirements (although don't get me wrong, every Kw/h that comes from them matters).

So what else? Burning more fossil fuels? That looks counter-intuitive...

There was some "independent expert" today in ITV news criticising Japan for using nuclear reactors when their country is so close to a fault line and therefore prone to geological instability... Great, but how are they supposed to produce their electricity? By using horses spinning a dynamo?

[Kallenator]

I know japan is doing some electricity production from waves, but it has not come far enough yet. So it's not like their not trying, similar to many other country's and like you say they have the same issue as everywhere else that there is a demand that must be met.
Japan is similar to USA as far as fossile/renewable energy production.

As far as I have read coal isn't very clean either as far as radioactive waste goes. However this claim is from wikipedia and even though I have tried discussing it with professors at school I have not come up with another source on it.

[generics_user]

another blast at reactor no.2 in fukushima 1, radiation over normal limits


the Torus inside of the reactor containment seems to be broken (water is leaking from it) according to kyodo news - things are getting worse and worse...

[Buckeye]

Just a question here.

So they are pumping lots and lots of sea water into the reactor. That water is converted to steam. I assume that steam is being vented and how radioactive is that steam ?

Is that water coming into direct contact with the core itself ?

Sorry Josh, so much to read through here.

Reason I ask is lots of talk on news today about this but they say nothing that I have heard about what is happening with this sea water besides its being pumped into the reactors.

[BrowncoatGR]

What a tragedy. May those affected find the strength to overcome this terrible burden
Josh thanks for all the information you have provided. That last article seems to be quite biased and downplaying the possible negative effects as much as some news agencies seem to exaggerate them.

[Biker]

Number two reactor explosion:

"The explosion appears to be related to a fault with the suppression pool at the very bottom of the containment vessel. When it is functioning normally, steam is brought down to the pool and is used to cool the reactor."

There is speculation that there is a containment vessel breach in the pool area...

Grim news if true

[generics_user]

all they can do now is keep pumping water in there and hope that they are able to inject more water than they loose through the breach to stop the reactor core from melting through the steel hull (which could lead to significant leak of radiation into the ground due to the broken containment)

[G H Z]

I doubt they can pump any more water in there if the rods have been exposed for this long already. There are now three reactors that have had serious failures, there needs to be some careful thinking about what went wrong and how to address these problem in the future.

[josh1980]

@ MrToad -

That's precisely why energy is such a problem. It's either cheap and dirty or clean and expensive. Everyone wants cheap AND clean. You don't get it both way(at the moment anyway). The problem I see is that nuclear fission is a viable power source right now. Japan uses it because it is extremely potent. They don't have alot of land. That makes solar and wind out of the question, likely forever. The have to maximize their land to energy production, and the best way to achieve that is nuclear. Nuclear could be improved with the new designs. But since the public is so against the current designs they have forced their government officials to stick their heads in the sand and just claim that all nuclear power across the board must be dangerous and could explode. That's simply not true but it also means MUCH less money is spent on new designs that use new materials for the 21st century. It's a classic "chicken or the egg" scenario.

@Buckeye

The steam will contain some radiation. If the fuel hadn't melted, the steam would only be radioactive for a few days. But since some of the fuel has melted, the long lived radioisotopes can be in the steam. How much depends on how much the fuel has been damaged. I'm sure that the operators in Japan are using the amount of isotopes in the steam to figure out just how bad they think the fuel is damaged.

@BrowncoatGR

We'll just have to agree to disagree. The problem I see is that the dangers are so blown out of proportion by the media with no facts to back them up that anyone reading the real facts think it's being downplayed because of how far apart the truth is from the media. It's hard to believe the media is so full of crap, even from my angle. You always talk about how incompetent the media is, but I guess I never saw how completely ignorant they really are.

@Everyone

The reactors in Japan use a torus system. Unfortunately, I know very little about it. I know there are more than one "pools" of water that sit in the bottom of the containment building that are supposed to condense any steam that might be in the containment building(thereby preventing overpressurization). Aside from that I don't know much more. I'll try to ask a few friends at work tomorrow. But if a Torus is cracked or leaking, that's not very good news. I haven't been looking on the news the last few hours since I was playing with my crunchers(got network booting up and running! wee! I've been trying for months to get it to work).

The name of the game is staying up to date with the facts at hand. There's alot of confusion over there. I trust that the people over there are trained as well as here, so I'm confident things will pull through. Let's just hope nothing bad suddenly happens . For instance, if the containment building were to suddenly collapse(I don't know how that could happen since the building just withstood a major earthquake but it might be damaged and we don't know it) then that would turn to very bad news very quickly.

I just ask people keep an open mind and 6 months from now when this is all over step back and look at how "bad" it really was. I hope we'll all be able to agree that it really wasn't as bad as we think it is right now.

[STEvil]

Someone correct me if i'm wrong here, but are there not two cooling loops? Loop 1 (direct core contact) is sealed (and can only be vented if required) while loop 2 uses a heat exchanger to cool loop 1 to eliminate contamination (assuming no faults).

So which loop is it that exploded and is now open to the atmosphere? If it is the core loop then I dont see why they arent just shutting things down forcefully to minimize radiation escaping?

[josh1980]

Someone correct me if i'm wrong here, but are there not two cooling loops? Loop 1 (direct core contact) is sealed (and can only be vented if required) while loop 2 uses a heat exchanger to cool loop 1 to eliminate contamination (assuming no faults).

So which loop is it that exploded and is now open to the atmosphere? If it is the core loop then I dont see why they arent just shutting things down forcefully to minimize radiation escaping?

There's only one loop for that reactor design but the reactor is now isolated so it's just a giant teapot sitting in the containment building.

[killerxp100]

Someone correct me if i'm wrong here, but are there not two cooling loops? Loop 1 (direct core contact) is sealed (and can only be vented if required) while loop 2 uses a heat exchanger to cool loop 1 to eliminate contamination (assuming no faults).

So which loop is it that exploded and is now open to the atmosphere? If it is the core loop then I dont see why they arent just shutting things down forcefully to minimize radiation escaping?

You are correct. The Sea Water they are using to cool the reactor does not make direct contact, meaning it will be no more irradiated then the surrounding area when they dump it back into the ocean.

[BeepBeep2]

So which loop is it that exploded and is now open to the atmosphere? If it is the core loop then I dont see why they arent just shutting things down forcefully to minimize radiation escaping?

Radiation of 8,217 μSv (82.2mSv) / hour have been reported outside of reactor 2 for a short period after the explosion.
To put this into perspective, 3.5 to 5 mSv is a normal dose of radiation accumulated by an average American in one year.
An acute (less than one hour) dose of 100 mSv is estimated to increase cancer risk 0.8%.

To shut down water completely could cause vaporization of water into radioactive hydrogen/oxygen and a full core meltdown could occur.

Anyone feel free to correct me if my conversions are wrong.

Sources (Wikipedia), (Kyodo News)

[dctokyo]

Getting worst here

Japan PM: Radiation leaking from damaged plant
Kan urges people within 30 kilometers of Fukushima Dai-ichi to stay indoors

[Vapor]

Let's keep the fighting amongst each other off the forums...cleaned up this thread enough times already

Bans are being handed out too, paired with permanent removals from the News Section. Gotta follow the rules guys....

[saaya]

I just ask people keep an open mind and 6 months from now when this is all over step back and look at how "bad" it really was. I hope we'll all be able to agree that it really wasn't as bad as we think it is right now.

well what do you think is better?
being too cautious or not being cautious enough?
when it comes to nuclear power, isnt option one the obvious choice?

the direction of the wind is changing now...
and hearing of us army vessels that got exposed to high enough levels of radioactivity off the coast of japan that they had to clean and decontaminate the vessel and crew, plus things getting worse in fukushima, plus the wind changing, plus me being only ~2000 miles away seriously got me thinking what my options are IF things get worse and the wind blows towards taiwan...

id rather have people laugh and call me an idiot and a whimp for taking a 2 weeks vacation from taiwan for no reason, than staying here and hey, who knows, in 20 years i develop cancer... maybe for no reason, maybe cause of some fallout from fukushima... if things get worse, and if the wind changes and blows this cr4p over here... theres a high chance i might pack my bags and take a vacation...

its easy to sit at home or work half around the world and say everything is fine and theres no need to worry...

the pressure of the suppression pool of reactor2 has dropped to 1bar... which means its at the same pressure as the atmosphere, which means there is not pressure, which means it has been compromised...

The Tokyo Electric Power Company has admitted for the first time that partial meltdown could be underway
Kyodo reported there had been damage to the suppression pool of the containment vessel – increasing the risk of a significant release of radioactive material.
Earlier officials had admitted the reactor could be in partial meltdown and warned the situation was "even worse" than in the other two units with cooling problems.
"Although we cannot directly check it, it's highly likely happening," Yukio Edano, the chief government spokesman, told reporters.

but yeah, everything is fine... dont worry...

come on, we all know how this goes... in these situation the gov always claims all is well to prevent mass hysteria and panic... im not saying sht will go down, but anybody who trusts the gov officials at this point is naive or stupid... a healthy dose of skepticism is worth gold in times like these :P
what was the quote again? the paranoid survive?

and heres another reason why the people in charge do their best to keep infos from getting out:

Bloomberg reported that the value of shares in Tokyo Electric Power Co, Asia's biggest power generator, was set to plummet by as much as 14 percent after the company confirmed a third explosion at its nuclear plant in Fukushima, north of Tokyo.

greed...

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano, the chief government spokesman, said there were signs that the fuel rods were melting in all three reactors

:S
they were melting, but thats when they pumped in sea water to cool them down and radiation levels have since gone down...
i dont think the rods will fully melt and burn through the outer walls... but they dont have to... from my understanding as long as the outer walls crack under the temperatures and pressure, that will release a nice dose of radioactive material already...
sure, this probably wont be as bad as chernobyl... but that doesnt mean its not serious... even 1/10 of chernobyl is enough for me to take a vacation and get out of the way of fallout...

[BeepBeep2]

Let's keep the fighting amongst each other off the forums...cleaned up this thread enough times already

Bans are being handed out too, paired with permanent removals from the News Section. Gotta follow the rules guys....

...
...
...

well what do you think is better?
being too cautious or not being cautious enough?
when it comes to nuclear power, isnt option one the obvious choice?

the direction of the wind is changing now...
and hearing of an us army vessel that got exposed to high levels of radioactivity in the open ocean, plus things getting worse in fukushima, plus the wind changing, plus me being only ~2000 miles away seriously got me thinking what my options are IF things get worse and the wind blows towards taiwan...

id rather have people laugh and call me an idiot and a whimp for taking a 2 weeks vacation from taiwan for no reason, than staying here and hey, who knows, in 20 years i develop cancer... maybe for no reason, maybe cause of some fallout from fukushima...

anybody not taking this seriously is just an idi0t imo...



the pressure of the suppression pool of reactor2 has dropped to 1bar... which means its at the same pressure as the atmosphere, which means there is not pressure, which means it has been compromised...


but yeah, everything is fine... dont worry...

come on, we all know how this goes... in these situation the gov always claims all is well to prevent mass hysteria and panic... im not saying sht will go down, but anybody who trusts the gov officials at this point is naive or stupid... a healthy dose of skepticism is worth gold in times like these :P
what was the quote again? the paranoid survive?

and heres another reason why the people in charge do their best to keep infos from getting out:

greed...


:S
they were melting, but thats when they pumped in sea water to cool them down and radiation levels have since gone down...
i dont think the rods will fully melt and burn through the outer walls... but they dont have to... as long as the outer walls crack under the temperatures and pressure, that will release a nice dose of radioactive material already...
sure, this probably wont be as bad as chernobyl... but that doesnt mean its not serious... even 1/10 of chernobyl is enough for me to take a vacation and get out of the way of fallout...

...
saaya, your tone is outrageous and offending imho.

[zir_blazer]

@josh1980
As you seem to be the only guy that I may readily talk to get some reliable technical info about this matter, here are some questions for you, as I has been in an intense debate in some other forum (Where, sadly, I got heavily bashed) that made me need some solid facts to continue the discussion, and you could provide me that insight.


Basically, I'm zealotously complaining about the fact that if TEPCO was already planning to vent slighty radioactive gases (That according to most professional sources, is totally inofensive in practice) from around the moment that the pressure in reactor I was reported to be 1.5x times normal operating pressure not too much later than the cooling issues started, they should have done so instead of letting many hours slip by until it was reported that it reached 2.1x before they finally vented the gases (Though little time after that the reactor building exploded). I stated that they should have done at the very beginning the gas venting, and got bashed for doing so.
So far, with what I could research with current analysis wandering on the Internet, is that venting gases to lower the pressure is a pretty much standard practice during emergencies and that there doesn't seem to be any real negative impact on doing so considering that the radiactive gases are harmless, reason why I don't understand why if they were already considering the venting option from the very first moment as a way to lower the pressure, they take soo long to do so, considering the possible risk that something else breaks (Incluiding a possible downwards spiral to meltdown) if pressure could get higher. Does the venting of gases got any other nasty consequences to not have doing so from the first moment? If so, why wouldn't they do it?
Something similar could also be said about using sea water to cool some of the reactors, because I heared that at least Fukushima Reactor I was going to be decomissioned very soon, so contaminate it in order to cool it down shouldn't really matter a lot, yet still they seem to have done so as a last resort measure that also looks like if it could have been implemented earlier. What considerations am I missing?


I'm also dissapointed about the data that was provided by TEPCO and/or the japanese goverment about the issue. If there is something that a Hardware enthusiast should know the most, is noticing when something is a candidate to go though a chaotic downward spiral at the moment that you start to see either big silences or many consecutive reports of "minor issues" that acts as a early warning of what could become not soo much time later a big issue, delay, or whatever. Applying the same logic to this, I was speculating that they know that they could be facing a meltdown, though pretty much they at first fully negated it, downgraded the severity of the current issues at the time, and also looked a bit overconfident about the control that they had over the situation, and all those things were making it look like if they just were holding to tell the truth to not cause public panic.
Due to the lack of solid enough data, is really hard to draw any sort of conclusions, speculations, or have any idea about how they are handling the emergency. For example, only recently I started to read around that the reason about why backup diesel generators "failed" was due to the tsunami washing them and not due some other mechanical or human failure, and also, you have the big silences, like when they reported that there were, if I recall correctly, 5 reactors with issues, yet still the only one that data was available from was from Fukushima Reactor I while no one said anything about the others until Fukushima Reactors II and III also got in a critical situation, and still didn't hear about the other 2 that had issues.
This also applies to some contradictions that I read about if the reactor core was suffering a meltdown or not, that looked like a ping-pong of yes and no until finally they settled on partial meltdown. So, what is your opinion on this? Do they are fully aware of the severity of the situation and were downplaying to not cause public panic, or what? People usually got in high regard japanese engineers skills yet still they make me feel uneasy due to the lack of data, besides that TEPCO was involved in some cover up scandals about accidents before that doesn't make me really believe in them.

[stangracin3]

@josh1980
As you seem to be the only guy that I may readily talk to get some reliable technical info about this matter, here are some questions for you, as I has been in an intense debate in some other forum (Where, sadly, I got heavily bashed) that made me need some solid facts to continue the discussion, and you could provide me that insight.


Basically, I'm zealotously complaining about the fact that if TEPCO was already planning to vent slighty radioactive gases (That according to most professional sources, is totally inofensive in practice) from around the moment that the pressure in reactor I was reported to be 1.5x times normal operating pressure not too much later than the cooling issues started, they should have done so instead of letting many hours slip by until it was reported that it reached 2.1x before they finally vented the gases (Though little time after that the reactor building exploded). I stated that they should have done at the very beginning the gas venting, and got bashed for doing so.
So far, with what I could research with current analysis wandering on the Internet, is that venting gases to lower the pressure is a pretty much standard practice during emergencies and that there doesn't seem to be any real negative impact on doing so considering that the radiactive gases are harmless, reason why I don't understand why if they were already considering the venting option from the very first moment as a way to lower the pressure, they take soo long to do so, considering the possible risk that something else breaks (Incluiding a possible downwards spiral to meltdown) if pressure could get higher. Does the venting of gases got any other nasty consequences to not have doing so from the first moment? If so, why wouldn't they do it?
Something similar could also be said about using sea water to cool some of the reactors, because I heared that at least Fukushima Reactor I was going to be decomissioned very soon, so contaminate it in order to cool it down shouldn't really matter a lot, yet still they seem to have done so as a last resort measure that also looks like if it could have been implemented earlier. What considerations am I missing?


I'm also dissapointed about the data that was provided by TEPCO and/or the japanese goverment about the issue. If there is something that a Hardware enthusiast should know the most, is noticing when something is a candidate to go though a chaotic downward spiral at the moment that you start to see either big silences or many consecutive reports of "minor issues" that acts as a early warning of what could become not soo much time later a big issue, delay, or whatever. Applying the same logic to this, I was speculating that they know that they could be facing a meltdown, though pretty much they at first fully negated it, downgraded the severity of the current issues at the time, and also looked a bit overconfident about the control that they had over the situation, and all those things were making it look like if they just were holding to tell the truth to not cause public panic.
Due to the lack of solid enough data, is really hard to draw any sort of conclusions, speculations, or have any idea about how they are handling the emergency. For example, only recently I started to read around that the reason about why backup diesel generators "failed" was due to the tsunami washing them and not due some other mechanical or human failure, and also, you have the big silences, like when they reported that there were, if I recall correctly, 5 reactors with issues, yet still the only one that data was available from was from Fukushima Reactor I while no one said anything about the others until Fukushima Reactors II and III also got in a critical situation, and still didn't hear about the other 2 that had issues.
This also applies to some contradictions that I read about if the reactor core was suffering a meltdown or not, that looked like a ping-pong of yes and no until finally they settled on partial meltdown. So, what is your opinion on this? Do they are fully aware of the severity of the situation and were downplaying to not cause public panic, or what? People usually got in high regard japanese engineers skills yet still they make me feel uneasy due to the lack of data, besides that TEPCO was involved in some cover up scandals about accidents before that doesn't make me really believe in them.

josh is banned...

[saaya]

saaya, your tone is outrageous and offending imho.

i already removed it before i saw your quote.
and hows it outrageous?
its my opinion, but its provoking which is why i removed it...

oh, i see, you think you got a chance to get rid of me in the news section with this huh?
hah, come on...

and yeah, why did josh get banned?
he seemed calm and doesnt he work at a nuclear reactor and has a lot of inside knowledge?

[Biker]

It is possible that the venting option was not available until it was too late...

Remember a lot of equipment was damaged which may have included the venting controls...

Sadly we just do not know.

Edit:

New quote from Kyodo news:

"Radiation is 400 times the annual legal limit near Fukushima's reactor 3, the Kyodo news agency reports"

If so then definite breach...

...and also great quote from the BBC live updates:

"It is difficult to make rational decisions when we aren't getting honest and accurate information from the Japanese officials or news stations."

So true but this applies globaly...

[zir_blazer]

josh is banned...

When I started the Post (I thinked what to write around 30 mins), everything was fine and no one was banned. Seems that a reactor gone blow in this very Thread.

[BeepBeep2]

oh, i see, you think you got a chance to get rid of me in the news section with this huh?
hah, come on...

No, I found your post offending to not only josh but anyone who reads it. BTW, no need to put thoughts in my head or words in my mouth.




As for Japan, many many people are still in shelters with no adequate food, water and electricity. Keep them all in your thoughts and prayers, they are suffering enough already without worrying about the nuclear plants.

[G H Z]

and yeah, why did josh get banned?

Yes he had a lot to add to the thread but he also defied staff and basically did whatever he wanted, not gonna fly here. Again there is enough stress on the people living through and watching this situation, we dont need to add to it here.