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The freezniks are going to come out of their mommie's closet that they've been in since the 1980's claiming that nuclear power (once the salvation of mankind) will kill us all... again.
A freak disaster and suddenly, it's Malthusian Time! Break out the Pinwheels, Mirrors and Moonshine! It's time to wear hemp and live in grass huts while hunting and gathering again.
Its' not a "freak" disaster, sport.
It was an earthquake in a place where earthquakes are a well known, well understood and completely NORMAL event.
Obviously the safegards put into place to deal with this earthquake and Tsuami just weren't good enough.
The solution isn't
Break out the Pinwheels, Mirrors and Moonshine! It's time to wear hemp and live in grass huts while hunting and gathering againMake those safeguards better.
it is to make even better safeguards.
It might behoove mankind NOT to put nuclear plants in active eathquake zones, too, don't you think?
I actually agree that building nuclear reactors in earthquake zones is not such a great idea. However, how bad an idea is likely to be known soon. So far Japanese authorities seem confident that the containment building will be the big problem, not a Chernobyl type problem. Given the catastrophe they are operating under, if they are correct, I expect nuclear power will become more prevalent not less, outside of earthquake zones.
I take it they have not restored the cooling systems yet? Does anyone know?
Residents near nuclear plant told to evacuate
Updated Sat Mar 12, 2011 12:32am AEDT
Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant
An emergency core-cooling unit has reportedly been activated at Fukushima nuclear plant (GreenPacks.org)
* Related Story: Japan ablaze after quake; no radiation leaks
* Related Story: Earthquake largest ever to hit Japan
* Related Story: Key facts: Earthquakes in Japan
Authorities have urged 2,000 residents living near a nuclear power plant in Fukushima to evacuate after the biggest earthquake in Japan's history hit the region.
The prefectural government issued the evacuation advice for residents in a two-kilometre radius of the No. 2 reactor of the Fukushima No. 1 plant operated by Tokyo Electric Power Co.
Kyodo News reported earlier that an emergency core-cooling unit had been activated at the plant after a power failure.
The World Nuclear Association, the main nuclear industry body, said it understood the situation at Japan's Fukushima was under control, and water was being pumped into its cooling system.
The association said a back-up battery power system had been brought online after about an hour, and begun pumping water back into the cooling system, where the water level had been falling.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) earlier said they had received information from Japan that there is a "heightened state of alert at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant".
"The IAEA is seeking further details on the situation at Fukushima Daiichi and other nuclear power plants and research reactors, including information on off-site and on-site electrical power supplies, cooling systems and the condition of the reactor buildings," it said.
Japan's prime minister Naoto Kan had already declared a state of atomic power emergency.
But Mr Kan said no radiation leaks have been detected at or near nuclear power plants, and the declaration is so authorities can easily implement emergency relief measures...
Japan now passing out iodine, which is apparently an indication that there has been a radiation leak.
Iodone can be used to protect against radioactive exposure
* Japan told IAEA it is checking condition of reactor core
(Adds quotes, background)
VIENNA, March 12 (Reuters) - Japanese authorities have told the U.N.'s atomic watchdog they are making preparations to distribute iodine to people living near nuclear power plants affected by Friday's earthquake, the Vienna-based agency said.
Iodine can be used to help protect the body from radioactive exposure.
In Japan on Saturday, radiation leaked from a damaged nuclear reactor after an explosion blew the roof off in the wake of the massive earthquake, but the government insisted that radiation levels were low.
Japan's Jiji news agency later said three workers suffered radiation exposure near the Fukushima nuclear plant.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the U.N. nuclear body, said Japanese authorities had informed it of the explosion and that they were "assessing the condition of the reactor core".
Japan expanded the evacuation zone around the plant, Fukushima Daiichi, and also that of the nearby Fukushima Daini nuclear power plant.
"The authorities also say they are making preparations to distribute iodine to residents in the area of both the plants," the IAEA said in a statement.
"The IAEA has reiterated its offer of technical assistance to Japan, should the government request this," it said. (Reporting by Fredrik Dahl; Editing by Louise Ireland)
I worked as an investigator for the Presidential Commission on the Accident at Three Mile Island, 32 years ago, and a few months studying the plumbing TMIs Unit 2, which is actually younger than the errant Japanese reactor, gives me a very healthy respect for the danger in Japan.
That Japanese reactor shut down automatically within seconds of the earthquake, the idea being that dropping the thermal load (stopping the nuclear reaction and cooling-down the reactor) would minimize risk overall from a huge plumbing system that was likely compromised and vulnerable. Radiation and the passage of time conspire to make pipes brittle and aftershocks make brittle pipes break. Not good.
The 10 other reactors behaved as expected, but this unit didnt. Once the reactor was no longer making steam to drive a turbine and generate electricity the plant was supposed to fire-up diesel generators to make the power needed to keep coolant pumps running. Only the diesels wouldnt start. It can take up to seven days, you see, to get such a reactor down to where it can survive without circulating coolant. With the diesels out (under water perhaps?) the plant relied on batteries to run the pumps batteries good for only eight hours.
Tokyo Electric Power Company isnt saying much. Utilities tend not to and Japanese utilities are notoriously secretive. But we got a clue to whats happening from U. S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, of all people, who remarked that the U. S. military was delivering coolant to the stricken reactor.
Coolant? wondered aloud all the CNN and Fox News nuclear experts looking for a lede for their stories. What is she talking about, coolant? This is a boiling water reactor and the coolant is water. The U. S. Air Force isnt needed to export water to Japan.
This shows the limits of cable news experts and maybe experts in general, because Hillary isnt the kind of person to choose the wrong words. She said coolant and she meant coolant. Though she may not have known she was saying so, she also meant the reactor was dead and will never be restarted.
A boiling water reactor does just what it sounds like it boils water to make steam that drives a turbine generator. This is as opposed to a pressurized water reactor that uses the nuclear reaction to heat a coolant that never really boils because it is under high pressure, then sends that coolant through a heat exchanger which heats water to make steam to drive the generator. Boiling water reactors are simpler, cheaper, but generally arent made anymore because they are perceived as being less safe. Thats because the exotic coolant in the pressurized water reactor can contain boric acid which absorbs neutrons and can help (or totally) control the nuclear reaction. You cant use boric acid or any other soluble boron-laced neutron absorbers in a boiling water reactor because doing so would contaminate both the cooling system and the environment.
Thats why the experts didnt expect it because they are still thinking of how the plant can be saved, but it cant be.
Though the boiling water reactor has already been turned off by inserting neutron-absorbing control rods all the way into the core, adding boric acid or, more likely, sodium polyborate would turn the reactor off-er more off than off which could come in really handy in the event of a subsequent coolant loss, which reportedly has already happened. But thats a $1 billion kill switch that most experts wouldnt think to pull.
Im guessing the US Navy delivered a load of sodium polyborate from some nuclear aircraft carrier reactor supply room in the Pacific Fleet. Its use indicates that the nuclear threat is even worse than presently being portrayed in the news. Tokyo Electric Power Company has probably given-up any hope of keeping those cooling pumps on after the batteries fail. Eventually theyll vent the now boron-laced coolant to the atmosphere to keep containment pressures under control.
Sodium polyborate, by the way, is something you might use around the house, since it is the active ingredient in most flea and tick treatments.
An earthquake with such loss of life is bad enough, but Japan has also just lost 20 percent of its electric generating capacity. And Ill go out on a limb here and predict that none of those 11 reactors will re-enter service again, theyve been so compromised.
yes yes... not a freak disaster. 9.1 earthquakes, plus tsunamis and dozens of aftershocks that are solid earthquakes unto themselves happen every few months.The freezniks are going to come out of their mommie's closet that they've been in since the 1980's claiming that nuclear power (once the salvation of mankind) will kill us all... again.
A freak disaster and suddenly, it's Malthusian Time! Break out the Pinwheels, Mirrors and Moonshine! It's time to wear hemp and live in grass huts while hunting and gathering again.
Its' not a "freak" disaster, sport.
It was an earthquake in a place where earthquakes are a well known, well understood and completely NORMAL event.
Obviously the safegards put into place to deal with this earthquake and Tsuami just weren't good enough.
The solution isn't
Break out the Pinwheels, Mirrors and Moonshine! It's time to wear hemp and live in grass huts while hunting and gathering againMake those safeguards better.
it is to make even better safeguards.
It might behoove mankind NOT to put nuclear plants in active eathquake zones, too, don't you think?
They are probably having a water leak, not a meltdown. Water is only used for heat exchange, not for reactor control
That said, a major water leak from one of those places is not a good thing. The water from one of these places is very poisonous.
...
That said, this is nothing like Chernobyl. And they will be doing their best to get power back to the place to keep the pumps moving water until things stabilize.
Most of the news I see on this is from usual freaks being freaky. People in the know are busy
yes yes... not a freak disaster. 9.1 earthquakes, plus tsunamis and dozens of aftershocks that are solid earthquakes unto themselves happen every few months.The freezniks are going to come out of their mommie's closet that they've been in since the 1980's claiming that nuclear power (once the salvation of mankind) will kill us all... again.
A freak disaster and suddenly, it's Malthusian Time! Break out the Pinwheels, Mirrors and Moonshine! It's time to wear hemp and live in grass huts while hunting and gathering again.
Its' not a "freak" disaster, sport.
It was an earthquake in a place where earthquakes are a well known, well understood and completely NORMAL event.
Obviously the safegards put into place to deal with this earthquake and Tsuami just weren't good enough.
The solution isn't
Break out the Pinwheels, Mirrors and Moonshine! It's time to wear hemp and live in grass huts while hunting and gathering againMake those safeguards better.
it is to make even better safeguards.
It might behoove mankind NOT to put nuclear plants in active eathquake zones, too, don't you think?
No, this was a FREAK OCCURRENCE. Those plants have survived hundreds if not thousands of earthquakes already. That being said, this is a horrible accident that will have big repercussions on Japanese infrastructure and economy (positive and negative). Now that the windows are smashed people can be hired to fix them.
I think some of you are being silly to pretend the nuke problem is a "natural" tragedy...that is like blaming nature for wiping out your house that you choose to build on a river.
That's a gross oversimplification. It's more like losing your house on the shores of the river after you've built it in such a way to survive a 100 year flood... and then a 500 year flood comes around and only damages it partly.I think some of you are being silly to pretend the nuke problem is a "natural" tragedy...that is like blaming nature for wiping out your house that you choose to build on a river.
I think some of you are being silly to pretend the nuke problem is a "natural" tragedy...that is like blaming nature for wiping out your house that you choose to build on a river.
A natural disaster is the root cause of the problems, and in your second example it is still a natural event that caused the event. Leave it to the lawyers the wisdom of building on a river bank.
Chernobyl and TMI were not natural events in any way, shape or form. The problems at the Japanese reactors were caused by the effects of an earthquake, which, unless i forgot to power down the earthquake-o-tron9000 in my basement, is a natural disaster.
No earthquake, no tsunami, no current plant failure.
No nuclear plant in an earthquake zone, no nuclear emergency.
There is no failsafe precaution one can take to protect a house built on a river but one: not building on the river.That's a gross oversimplification. It's more like losing your house on the shores of the river after you've built it in such a way to survive a 100 year flood... and then a 500 year flood comes around and only damages it partly.I think some of you are being silly to pretend the nuke problem is a "natural" tragedy...that is like blaming nature for wiping out your house that you choose to build on a river.
It's a tragedy, yes. Your family's home got ruined in part and Servpros are going to be out there fixing a lot of damage that can be fixed. But that doesn't change the fact you took every precaution you thought necessary to deal with the crisis and probably were mocked for overbuilding by people who's houses now washed away.
So I have to reject your base premise.
There is no failsafe precaution one can take to protect a house built on a river but one: not building on the river.That's a gross oversimplification. It's more like losing your house on the shores of the river after you've built it in such a way to survive a 100 year flood... and then a 500 year flood comes around and only damages it partly.I think some of you are being silly to pretend the nuke problem is a "natural" tragedy...that is like blaming nature for wiping out your house that you choose to build on a river.
It's a tragedy, yes. Your family's home got ruined in part and Servpros are going to be out there fixing a lot of damage that can be fixed. But that doesn't change the fact you took every precaution you thought necessary to deal with the crisis and probably were mocked for overbuilding by people who's houses now washed away.
So I have to reject your base premise.
There is no failsafe precaution one can take to protect a house built on a river but one: not building on the river.That's a gross oversimplification. It's more like losing your house on the shores of the river after you've built it in such a way to survive a 100 year flood... and then a 500 year flood comes around and only damages it partly.
It's a tragedy, yes. Your family's home got ruined in part and Servpros are going to be out there fixing a lot of damage that can be fixed. But that doesn't change the fact you took every precaution you thought necessary to deal with the crisis and probably were mocked for overbuilding by people who's houses now washed away.
So I have to reject your base premise.
And don't build by trees---one could fall on your house.
Nature can be brutal. Where are you going to build your house to be "safe" ?
