Discussion of Nuclear Power and Safety

[chownah]

There hasn't been a nuclear explosion. There isn't even a chain reaction in the core.

Mawkish1983,
If there is not a chain reaction in the core then the core would not be generating so much heat that massive cooling efforts are necessary.....is that right?.........seems like there in fact IS a chain reaction going on....at least by commonly held definitions of chain reaction...of course a physicist might try to spin the topic by choosing some esoteric definition for chain reaction........of course I don't think that you would do that........
chownah

[mikenz66]

Detectors showed 11,900 microsieverts of radiation three hours after the blast, up from just 73 microsieverts beforehand, Kinjo said. He said there was no immediate health risk because the higher measurement was less radiation that a person receives from an X-ray. He said experts would worry about health risks if levels exceed 100,000 microsieverts.

I don't find this logic particularly convincing, because how long are you exposed to X-rays for when you go for an X-ray?

Alternatively if 11,900 microsieverts is the 'ambient environment', it's a continuous exposure over time.

Metta,
Retro.

You're right. Sieverts is a dose, not a dose rate.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sievert

Perhaps he means microsieverts per hour.

11,900 microsieverts is 12 millisieverts, which, using the figures from the link, is about 5 times the dose you'd get in one year from ambient sources (if you didn't fly or do X-rays, etc). So if it's that dose per hour then it's not wise to hang around, but not impossible to work (for short times and/or with protection).

Note that the US tends to still use the rem unit, which is 100 times smaller...


Mike

[Kim O'Hara]

... don't forget that renewable technology is in its infancy and is gaining both in technical efficiencies and economic efficiencies....while nuclear is pretty much topped out for fission...let's hope that fusion is cleaner....we already know that it will be safe...seems like the best bet is to promote development of renewables for the next 30 years and then see if fusion is acceptable.....just skip further fusion development altogether....too many long term costs and uncertainty with fusion I think....
chownah

Indeed.
Fusion is now only ten or fifteen years away - but then again, it has been 'only ten or fifteen years away' for about the last forty years.



Kim

[Annapurna]

Sorry, renewable technology is NOT in it's infancy!

Perhaps for nations who have difficulties to fulfil the Kyoto protocol, or refuse to, like USA and China, but not for those who can fulfil them!

Green tech is effective and working, it is just NOT YET being installed in some lands, because another one is already running!

You simply don't invest money into another energy in a financial crisis, when you try to avoid bankruptcy and when you hold stocks of nuke plants!

Example:

Germany will phase out of nuclear energy. The exit dates were set under the Green goverment,.

When the conservative government took over, they delayed the exit times, and told us we CAN'T get out now, because we would get energy shortages!

Now, after Japan, and before elections, with 60 % of the People vehemently demanding an exit as son as possible, they put their delay plans on ice for 3 months and suddenly tell us now, that they will turn off at least one nuclear plant in Southern Germany, probably a few more, because now, all of a sudden, they are not safe enough anymore!

Huh??? In a high-tech- land such as Germany???


And SUDDENLY; we will not get an energy crisis through turning it off...!!

Aha....!


Odd?

No, TRANSPARENT, when you study the matter in depth and over years.

Fact is, that the companies which run nuclear plants had top grade stocks, and politicians got hold of a few!

Google greenpeace.

Btw, NOW all the nuclear experts Germany and Greenpeace have are being invited by the news channels to tell us more, and now, everybody listens and is waking up to reality.

Medium radioactive waste will radiate 15 000 years, uranium 200 000 years.

Where is Japan's nuclear waste stored?

What happened to it during the earthquake?

What will happen to ours?

We also get earthquakes, and what, if a plane falls onto a plant, or is being flown ionto it?

What , if a hacker virus messes the electronis up??

If our ancestors had begun with nuclear energy at Buddhas times, we would still be dealing with the waste today and for another 2500 years minimum!

Isn't it insane to even start something like this????

It is crazy!

AS CRAZY AS SAMSARA!

And just as hard to wake up from...

[Annapurna]

PS:

I won't have as much time as I would like to have to participate here, but besides holding more than one job, I am also engaged in a fund raising project for Japan.

I need to spend more time there than here, where some minds appear to be made up anyways...

[chownah]

... don't forget that renewable technology is in its infancy and is gaining both in technical efficiencies and economic efficiencies....while nuclear is pretty much topped out for fission...let's hope that fusion is cleaner....we already know that it will be safe...seems like the best bet is to promote development of renewables for the next 30 years and then see if fusion is acceptable.....just skip further fusion development altogether....too many long term costs and uncertainty with fusion I think....
chownah

Indeed.
Fusion is now only ten or fifteen years away - but then again, it has been 'only ten or fifteen years away' for about the last forty years.



Kim

Kim O'Hare,
I edited my post....you might want to go look but you have given a good reply to the post as it was...just for your info the current fusion scientific community is thinking that it will be about 30 years before a fusion electric power generating system will be built and then it would be ready to deploy for real world generation. For those interested google "iter"...it will return the address for the Iter web site...Iter is the international project to develop the next level of fusion machines...it is being built in France....my opinion is that there is a good chance that this machine will prove the feasability of fusion and from the data collected from running the Iter machine it is hoped that a demonstration electric power generating fusion machine can be designed and built. There is a long enough history now of fusion development that when the progress is viewed it seems pretty clear that this new machine has a good chance of proving the concept but of course nothing is certain....
chownah

[Kim O'Hara]

Hi, Chownah,
I'm not 'perturbed by [your] edit' at all.
I think your preferred strategy - no more fission, develop renewables until fusion is ready to go - is perfectly reasonable. I do have less faith in ITER than you seem to, since it could well turn out to be just the latest iteration of that unrealised promise of fusion just around the corner, but so long as we do push for renewables asap, it won't matter if ITER falls down.
BTW, Kim is 'he' not 'she' - my name is ambiguous but my gender isn't. I sing bass, grow a beard, etc.


Kim

[Annapurna]

Interesting.

[Jhana4]

Japan braces for potential radiation catastrophe
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110315/wl_ ... apan_quake

Japan faced a potential catastrophe on Tuesday after a quake-crippled nuclear power plant exploded and sent low levels of radiation floating toward Tokyo, prompting some people to flee the capital and others to stock up on essential supplies.

[christopher:::]

I just found this, from 2004. Moret predicted what has just happened almost perfectly. Let's hope the rest of her predictions are less accurate.

Japan's deadly game of nuclear roulette
By LEUREN MORET; Japan Times, Sunday, May 23, 2004

excerpt:

After visiting the center a few kilometers from Hamaoka, I realized that Japan has no real nuclear-disaster plan in the event that an earthquake damaged a reactor's water-cooling system and triggered a reactor meltdown.

Additionally, but not even mentioned by ERC officials, there is an extreme danger of an earthquake causing a loss of water coolant in the pools where spent fuel rods are kept. As reported last year in the journal Science and Global Security, based on a 2001 study by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, if the heat-removing function of those pools is seriously compromised -- by, for example, the water in them draining out -- and the fuel rods heat up enough to combust, the radiation inside them will then be released into the atmosphere. This may create a nuclear disaster even greater than Chernobyl.

If a nuclear disaster occurred, power-plant workers as well as emergency-response personnel in the Hamaoka ERC would immediately be exposed to lethal radiation. During my visit, ERC engineers showed us a tiny shower at the center, which they said would be used for "decontamination' of personnel. However, it would be useless for internally exposed emergency-response workers who inhaled radiation.

When I asked ERC officials how they planned to evacuate millions of people from Shizuoka Prefecture and beyond after a Kobe-magnitude earthquake (Kobe is on the same subduction zone as Hamaoka) destroyed communication lines, roads, railroads, drinking-water supplies and sewage lines, they had no answer.

Last year, James Lee Witt, former director of the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency, was hired by New York citizens to assess the U.S. government's emergency-response plan for a nuclear power plant disaster. Citizens were shocked to learn that there was no government plan adequate to respond to a disaster at the Indian Point nuclear reactor, just 80 km from New York City.

The Japanese government is no better prepared, because there is no adequate response possible to contain or deal with such a disaster. Prevention is really the only effective measure to consider.

Leuren Moret is a geoscientist who worked at the Lawrence Livermore Nuclear Weapons Laboratory on the Yucca Mountain Project, and became a whistle-blower in 1991 by reporting science fraud on the project and at Livermore.

[Mawkish1983]

I just sincerely hope I am not proven wrong, but it is looking more and more likely

[christopher:::]

I just sincerely hope I am not proven wrong, but it is looking more and more likely

Would *love* for you and poto to be right here.

[Annapurna]

Mawkish, I do hope you are right too....

[nathan]

Hmmm, pretty quiet thread now. I suppose the pro nuclear folks have all flown to Japan to roast hot dogs over the fire now blazing in reactor #2. Bon appetite.

edit: Scratch that, it's #4 that is on fire now. Have to hurry with roasting the hot dogs though as one will absorb 500 times the yearly allowable radiation in seven minutes.

[octathlon]

It's so awful how one thing leads to another which leads to another... Now a fourth reactor that wasn't even in operation is involved, with stored spent fuel burning and releasing radiation. I've seen conflicting reports that the fire was put out but it's on fire again, or else it is a new fire going on now... The workers staying behind at the plant and working to control it may die or suffer severely as a result. Thanks to them for their efforts! May they survive and be well!

Back to the thread topic, I saw this article today. I feel more strongly than the author but I think this agrees with my view pretty well (except for his line towards the end "Perhaps there is no other way").

[christopher:::]

Listening to the news right now it sounds like things are going from bad to worse...

BREAKING NEWS: Japan spokesman: Workers unable to continue at nuclear plant due to radiation risk AP

[christopher:::]

Japan nuke plant workers stop work due to radiation surge

And...

Japan reactor design caused GE engineer to quit

[phil]

Speaking as someone living in the midst of a nuclear crisis, I still say any thought of discontinuing nuclear power is a pipe dream that won't stand up to economic reality once this blows over (for the rest of you, it won't blow over for Japan.) No matter what people say, alternative sources of power will not come anywhere close to meeting demand so getting off nuclear power in the short run would lead to global economic collapse. Eventually, gradually, yes, let's continuing moving in the right direction, in that sense it's akin to Dhamma, no belief in sudden breakthroughs to enlightenment for those of us who understand Dhamma.

[chownah]

I just sincerely hope I am not proven wrong, but it is looking more and more likely

Since you are a phsicist and I'm a rice farmer I would appreciate your views on my assertion that there actually is a chain reaction going on in the reactors and this is why they need to be cooled...

also....do you consider nuclear's contribution to US electrical production to be insignificant since it is less than 20%?

chownah

[mikenz66]

Since you are a phsicist and I'm a rice farmer I would appreciate your views on my assertion that there actually is a chain reaction going on in the reactors and this is why they need to be cooled

Hi Chownah,

It's a chain reaction if the activity (number of nuclei disintegrating) is increasing. That's what you need for an atomic explosion.

If I understand the reactor design correctly, without the water to slow down the neutrons (so that they can be absorbed by other nuclei, which subsequently disintegrate, producing more neutrons...) activity will decrease. (But there are other ways of doing this "moderation" of the neutrons, so what I say in this paragraph may not be technically correct.)

But though the activity is decreasing, the rods will still be heating up and will melt if they are not cooled, which is the problem...


Mike