Japan Quake and Tsunami for USA West Coast

I've read that there are 3 plants with cooling problems.

Yes. There is definitely more than one plant with problems. Last I read. . . 2 were quite serious.

The Daiichi #1 is the most troubling. I was a bit rushed with my last post -> I think things will be much clearer tomorrow evening (Monday morning in Japan). The one thing that is unclear to me is that if the reactor is being pumped full of seawater -> what is happening to that water? Presumably, it is boiling off (thus providing cooling) and then being vented? That vented steam would be slightly radioactive.

On the plus side. . .if the radiation levels are actually dropping as is being reported -> that probably means the reactor is well progressed in cooling down. On the minus side . . . crap. What a mess. Of course, if as Bob said that the control rods may not have been fully inserted -> then things could be really, really bad as the reactor may not be really cooling down. From everything I read, if the reports regarding Cesium being found in the environment are true; then we were well on the path to the worst case scenario.

I am mostly guessing. Are there any Nuclear engineers on the board?
 
It appears that they have confirmed that the nuclear fuel rods are approximately 3 metres above the level of the water in the stricken power station. This was just reported on our government news broadcasting station here.
 
Scott;

I think we have avoided the "worst possible" outcome; since the reactors had 1-2 days to cool down before fuel exposures occurred. Also, on the plus side, evacuations started well before everything went to poo.

But don't get me wrong; this is FAR from the best case scenario. Probably closer to the worst case than the best case. People have gotten serious exposure. There were serious non-radiation injuries from the turbine explosion. Environmental releases have occurred. Reactor #1 is now junk. #3 will probably be junk in the next day.

Well. . . at least the reporters are sounding a bit more educated than they did yesterday.

Have a good night everyone!
 
Another reactor now has failed cooling, this is reactor 3 at Fukushima, which apparantely has different fuel compared to the others. Apparantly it has a fuel known as MOX which has higher amounts of Plutonium.


EDIT: Okay I have just finished watching a media conference held by the Japanese PM's Chief Cabinet Minister. Now I think I can see where all the poor western media reporting is coming from as they are relying on a poor English translation service to translate what is being said. Not only is it poorly translated but then the western media are mixing up the answers the Chief Cabinet Minister has given to Asian media groups questions. So they are applying answers given to the wrong reactors.
I am able to watch CNN, AFN news, ABC Australia, BBC England to get the info.

In essence what was said was that the Japanese Government are admiting to a partial meltdown in the Fukushima reactor #1, they will not know how bad this will get but are hoping to prevent any further progress of the meltdown. The problem with the hydrogen explosion yesterday in reactor 1 was caused when the ventilation system shutdown and became non operational allowing for the gas to build up and the eventual explosion.

Fukushima reactor #3 has lost its cooling system but the ventilation system is still working hence they do not expect an explosion occuring as the hydrogen is being vented atm. The Chief Minister said that at the present time there is no meltdown in reactor #3.

Currently the radiation reading in the compound is at 1557 micro sieverts per hour of exposure.
 
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“Japan's network of 1,200 GPS monitoring stations, operated by the Geographical Survey Institute, shows a maximum springing-out effect of 13 feet (4 meters), with an average displacement of about 8 feet (2.5 meters) along a stretch measuring more than 300 miles (500 kilometers).
Everything that links GPS readings to maps, ranging from driving directions to property records, will have to be changed as a result of the shift, Hudnut told me. "Their national network for property boundary definitions has been warped," he said in an e-mail. "For ships, the nautical charts will need revision due to changed water depths, too (of about 3 feet). Much of the coastline dropped by a few feet, too, we gather."

http://photoblog.msnbc.msn.com/_new...hifted-japan?chromedomain=cosmiclog&GT1=43001
 
Moved the freaking COUNTRY 8 feet to the left and 1 foot down. . .

And one wonders why a few nuclear plants are having problems. . . .

. . .and although I have been posting about the *nuclear problems*; I honestly don't think the nuclear disaster is the biggest one facing the people of Japan - -> oh, it certainly isn't helping a region in serious trouble; but these pictures coming out of Japan are pretty gruesome. Serious devestation. I think it is a testament to the country that things are holding together as well as they are. Gosh darn, after Katrina the U.S. didn't show that level of .. . perseverence. (dang, I need a spell checker)

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as for this Nuclear stuff -> just read that an explosion occured in the Daiichi #3 plant. Same story as the #1 plant -> but this one occured after the seawater flooding move, and not before -> which I take as a bad sign.

I have been learning alot about the care and feeding of these reactors over the last few days. As I suspected in my earlier post -> the sea water being injected into these units DOES vaporize and you MUST vent this steam (or it will vent itself. . .) . And because the fuel rods are periodically getting uncovered, they ARE overheating. And this overheating is what is generating the H2 that blew the roof off of #3 building. The Cessium being detected in the atmosphere (from the venting of the reactors) is also an indication of fuel rods overheating.

What a freakin' mess.

And what nobody has been talking about: Spend fuel pools.

Now, I won't pretend to understand things too much, but at some point, situations in a Nuclear Power Plant like this will stabilize. From one of the press releases I read, a number of reactors have reached the "we be cooled down now: time to get saki" phase.

http://www.nisa.meti.go.jp/english/index.html

The Daiichi #1 and #3, along with one or two others, are not in the category.

The only "plus" here is that these two units are physically next to each other; so the areas affected have a great degree of overlap.

I read that a number of power plants in the US have a similar design. (GE builds for everybody). You KNOW that in about 6 months, EVERYBODY is going to be retrofitting the cooling systems.

It's one thing to have a problem -> its another thing to not learn from other people's problems.

I bet it will involve big water tanks being installed ABOVE the containment buildings, so that after a SCRAM, water can be injected to the cores by gravity without the need for freaking pumps. I bet these systems will probably be 100% independent of other plant systems.

And venting will also have to be addressed. Right now, safety valves and manual vents on the reactor go into the containment building. Presumably, the (slightly radioactive) steam will condense and rain into the building. The non-condensibles (H2) build up pressure. . . and eventually go bang (I think they were trying to vent the buildings in Japan). Great. There has GOT to be a better way. I bet someone will design a relief system to deliberatly condense the water from the vents, and let the H2 and other crap escape the building.

Allowing a "simple" chemical explosion to blow off the roof off (the roof is intended to be the weak point) a containment building during a core meltdown is NOT a good way to go.

Well. . . hopefully, people learn some good lessons from all of this.

- - - -

Let me put some spin on this: You know, if we wouldn't have our undie's so tied up in knots over nuclear power, we wouldn't have to be running plants that are 40 years old. Believe it or not, there has been lots of technical advancement in the last 40 years. I bet if we didn't spend so much money on lawyers, old plants like this could have been replaced by more efficient, and safer, plants 20 years ago.

End of rant.

Continue normal programming.
 
Isn't the big hitch in nuclear power what to do with all the waste. In the last 60 years or so we've dumped it in oceans, buried it in caves, we store on the surface, etc. We got that stuff all over the place, in fact I suspect they don't even know were it all is from the early days.
 
Isn't the big hitch in nuclear power what to do with all the waste. In the last 60 years or so we've dumped it in oceans, buried it in caves, we store on the surface, etc. We got that stuff all over the place, in fact I suspect they don't even know were it all is from the early days.

That is partialy what they were doing when they created the MOX fuel rods from the enriched plutonium from the decommisioned nuclear warheads that has been going on over the past decade.

It is however the biggest issue with nuclear energy. Australia is planning on building a large nuclear waste dump north of Alice Springs in pretty much wasteland country. This is supposed to be for low level waste only but give it time and I think it will be used for all waste.
 
We are out here on the West Coast in Southern Calif and fortunately the Tsunami waves did not really affect us. As a marine biologist I have a pretty good sense of the formation of our Harbors here near LA and south and when the effects started rolling in in Northern Cal if I was monitoring carefully to see if I needed to take our boat out to sea from our Marina and sit in the deep water a couple miles out.

Around 8 am PST as I watched the live shots on TV in the Harbors about 2 hours North of us (Ventura Harbor) it looked like we were going to dodge any serious problems farther south here. Fortunately, though Santa Cruz harbor (just south of SF Bay) got hit with some rollers in the marina and lost a few boats and docks, we really just had a bit of surge and heavy current patterns moving around in our southern harbors here in LA, Seal Beach and Newport area.

Poseidon took a pass on us, but sure beat the heavens out of Japan. Our hearts go out to them.
 
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This pic caught my eye. :wow: . :wow:

24523594675BBB4CBEC3D2F21674AD.jpg
 
Ah. . . I finally understand the cooling problem (or so I think). The reactors are not designed to be cooled by dumping in water- and the emergency vents are too small to pass the steam flow.

If the vents are too small, then the reactor pressurizes to the point where the pumps can't physically get water into the vessel.

I guess this is why it is so important to not let them get overheated in the first place.
 
How much do you think a boat like that weighs? Either one strong building or a good photoshop!

Well, the building was just proven to be able to survive an 8.9 earthquake and a 30 ft wall of water tubing through town . . .

Wow, didn't know the Japan Air Force used Migs...

japan9_20110314_141633.jpg

Although from this angle it does look like a MIG-29, this a two seat F-16.

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In the category of "less than good news", they lost all the pumps on dai-ichi#2, and completely lost water level. Here we go again. Considering how long the reactor has been down, I wonder how bad this news is? At some point, I thought you reach "complete cool down". ( the other reactors are not cooling down, because I suspect every time they lose level they lose ground on the cool down clock)
 
for sale used trawler ,in drydock must be moved immediately.
 

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