Friday, March 18, 2011
The Amount of Radioactive Fuel at Fukushima DWARFS Chernobyl
Science Insider noted yesterday:
And see this.The Daiichi complex in Fukushima, Japan ... had a total of 1760 metric tons of fresh and used nuclear fuel on site last year, according to a presentation by its owners, the Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco). The most damaged Daiichi reactor, number 3, contains about 90 tons of fuel, and the storage pool above reactor 4, which the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC's) Gregory Jaczko reported yesterday had lost its cooling water, contains 135 tons of spent fuel. The amount of fuel lost in the core melt at Three Mile Island in 1979 was about 30 tons; the Chernobyl reactors had about 180 tons when the accident occurred in 1986.
That means that Fukushima has nearly 10 times more nuclear fuel than Chernobyl.
It also means that a single spent fuel pool - at reactor 4, which has lost all of its water and thus faces a release of its radioactive material - has 75% as much nuclear fuel as at all of Chernobyl.
However, the real numbers are even worse.
Specifically, Tepco very recently transferred many more radioactive spent fuel rods into the storage pools. According to Associated Press, there were - at the time of the earthquake and tsunami - 3,400 tons of fuel in seven spent fuel pools plus 877 tons of active fuel in the cores of the reactors.
That totals 4,277 tons of nuclear fuel at Fukushima.
Which means that there is almost 24 times more nuclear fuel at Fukushima than Chernobyl.
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The amount of fuel may dwarf Chernobyl, but what, really, is its potential to cause harm? That is the question ... Any commercial reactor probably has enough fuel to potentially kill everyone on the planet -- if the fuel were distributed widely enough. Just as a common kitchen knife could slit 10 000 throats; the potential is there, but what is the chance of this actually happening?
ReplyDeleteThe important question to ask right now is: If the risk of widespread contamination is so low, why are such extraordinary measures being taken to cool the reactor cores and spent fuel pools? Are worker's lives being risked for nothing (or just economics)? Or is the risk actually great enough to justify such heroics?
The amount of fuel may dwarf Chernobyl, but what, really, is its potential to cause harm? That is the question ... Any commercial reactor probably has enough fuel to potentially kill everyone on the planet -- if the fuel were distributed widely enough. Just as a common kitchen knife could slit 10 000 throats; the potential is there, but what is the chance of this actually happening?
ReplyDeleteThe important question to ask right now is: If the risk of widespread contamination is so low, why are such extraordinary measures being taken to cool the reactor cores and spent fuel pools? Are worker's lives being risked for nothing (or just economics)? Or is the risk actually great enough to justify such heroics?
I wonder what is stopping them from just burying it Chernobyl-style at this point? Do they think there is too much fuel there and that it will eventually heat up too much and burst through the tomb?
ReplyDeleteIt just doesn't seem like there is anything there worth saving at this time, so why do they keep trying these half-measures (dropping water from helicopters, water cannons, etc.)?
Is it pride? Trying to save face? They don't want to admit that this is just another Chernobyl?
I hope they aren't putting the lives of the workers at stake for monetary or superficial reasons.
This article explains why the plant hasn't been buried:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-sci-japan-quake-nuclear-20110319,0,4568019,full.story
I don't think that Michio Kaku is dumb. Reading between the lines of what he has been saying recently, it sounds like he expects this thing to get much worse where burying it is the only viable option.
However, I do understand now why the burying option hasn't been pursued yet -- it could make the situation much worse and there is still a very small chance that the plant can still be brought back under control.
I'm in Cali right now.This is all very worrying.I was lucky to have Potassium Iodide already for another issue I had.You cannot get it here for love or money.Something smells as stores were out before any talk of radiation on the jet stream was brought up!
ReplyDeletehttp://conversationwithcrombette.blogspot.com/
Personally, I think Michio Kaku is a utopian fantasist. Smart? Sort of, I guess. But too many of his thoughts do not live in the real world.
ReplyDeleteWhen that "missile contrail" was sighted off the west coast, Kaku said ballistic missiles can't change directions and can only fly from east to west. He also said whatever it was went "north AND south" simultaneously. That was the moment I decided Kaku was a worthless crank. He's a glib talker/writer, but not much else. It was a bizarre and idiotic remark he made at that time and I'm shocked it hasn't permanently damaged his reputation, such as it is.
Reports of a new massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.floridaoilspilllaw.com/update-3-times-picayune-reports-potentially-massive-100-mile-long-oil-sheen
TURN OFF YOUR TV SET. THE SONS OF BITCHES LIE EVERY TIME THEY OPEN THEIR MOUTHS. NOW LOOK AT JAPAN. LOTS OF TV THERE. GOT IT YET? HOW MANY JAPANESE NUKE PLANTS USING SIEMEN'S EMERGENCY PUMP SYSTEMS FAILED BECAUSE AMERICAN NEOCON AND ISRAELI pinheads INVECTED THEM WITH THE STUXNET VIRUS. ARE YOU ENGINEERS WHO BUILT THESE THINGS GOING TO GET DOWN TO BUSINESS AND START SAFELY CLOSING THESE PLANTS DOWN, OR ARE YOU GOING TO CONTINUE TO MASTERBATE ALL OVER EACH OTHER AND CALL IT PROGRESS? BE THANKFUL THAT I'M NOT IN CHARGE AND MOVE ON IT.
ReplyDeleteI am very sorry Washington's blog is not aware of what it feels like to be in a horrible car accident through stupidity and arrogance. The world will suffer because of self righteous miscreants with too much power and money at hand. Engineers who sell out service the devil for pay, and the devil does not share his toys. That is part of the devil's reward. I quit building these plants in 1975. WE ALL KNEW THIS WOULD HAPPEN. I understood what it meant.
ReplyDeleteI do hope that the situation at the nuclear reactor plants gets resolved. The plant workers should be praised for continuing to work there in spite of the dangers. The explosion was caused by a natural calamity (I know..I know...there were news that it was the builder's fault..). But, there is nothing we can do now but hope that the Japanese, with the help of the experts from other countries can fix or make this situation not too damaging to the people in Japan, the Japanese - and other foreigners.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.AirlineTravelersGuide.com
look at this..
ReplyDeletekids pray for Japan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzbhE_oTtKU
IF you only knew how governments and industries manage to hide the effects of "normal" releases of radioactivity! And its not just radioativity, they also have ways with hiding other toxic materials, from putting it into your food to dumping it into the waters and air.
ReplyDeleteAll nuclear facilties release some radioactivity as part of their normal operations, and it increases as the nuclear “ power” plants age. Nine Mile Point, Indian Point to name a few NY reactors. They release radioactivity in the direction that would be considered upwind of the plant whenever possible by holding some back til the wind is favorable. This allows the stats to show that illness, particularly cancers, , death and infant mortality, mobidity, and retardation are not significantly greater downwind of the plant than upwind!
Fukushima background contamination will set the next standard for backgorund radiation for the world until the next hit. The first background average that was used as a standard for "normal background" was after Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings and after all the nuclear tests in the fifties! Currently the "normal" background includes the remains from Chernobyl accident and the many releases from US and Russian military projects. Add to it other countries bomb testing and nuclear releases and you get the picture.
Gostei!!
ReplyDeleteacessa ae...
http://portal-david.blogspot.com/
EPA RADnet Reports Show Plutonium in US since March 18th
ReplyDeletehttp://lucaswhitefieldhixson.com/epa-radnet-reports-show-plutonium-us-march-18th
You people still don't get it. We need to close these fission plants down. Turn off your TV set, hit yourself in the head with a hammer and eat three tablespoons of dishwashing soap every day until you die and you will understand the inevitable continuing with the insanity of juggling these huge piles of radioactivity like some psychotic mime in the corner juggling 4- 3oz bottles of nitroglycerin. Sooner or later the mime is going to drop a bottle and your insipid self-indulging ass is going to be stuck to the wall. You won't feel sick anymore. Do you understand now? All I can do is lecture. Everything else is I could do is illegal.
ReplyDeletegreat blog http://newzjuice.blogspot.com
ReplyDeleteThe Austrians determined within the first week that the contamination levels around Fukushima, within 20 kilometres, were going to be higher than that of Chernobyl. Furthermore, they could calculate, using their computer modelling, out to what the contamination levels were going to be out to 200 kilometres. Now, this is the Austrians.
ReplyDeleteThe Japanese had much more reliable data and yet they concealed it from the public by their own words. obvious thing is that the contamination has now entered the food chain. It's not only tea, but all green leaf vegetables, the fish stocks off the coast, there's been widespread contamination. I'm not quite sure how, at 300 kilometres, the tea leaves that are being grown there have been contaminated to such a high and dangerous extent.