Japanese N-Plant Explosion

[adoucette]

Units 3 and 4 "dangerously hot" officials' fear of meltdown grows. Heightened radioactivity recorded. condition of reactors considered desperate.

Actually:

IAEA Briefing on Fukushima Nuclear Emergency (18 March 2011, 14:00 UTC)

On 18 March 2011, Graham Andrew, Special Adviser to the IAEA Director General on Scientific and Technical Affairs, briefed both Member States and the media on the current status of nuclear safety in Japan. His opening remarks, which he delivered at 14:00 UTC at the IAEA headquarters in Vienna, are provided below:

1. Current Situation

As I reported yesterday, the situation at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plants remains very serious, but there has been no significant worsening since our last briefing.

The situation at the reactors at Units 1, 2 and 3 appears to remain fairly stable.


And

UPDATE AS OF 8:00 P.M. EDT, FRIDAY, MARCH 18:

Tokyo Electric Power Co. continued spraying water into the reactor 3 used fuel pool that began early Friday morning. Another water spraying operation into the pool was conducted around noon EDT.

Operations to connect external power to reactors 1 and 2 are expected to continue through the weekend. TEPCO confirmed that electricity can be supplied to the reactors now that a new line has been connected from the off-site power system near the facility. Additional cabling and switchgear are being prepared to provide electricity to reactors 3, 4, 5 and 6.

TEPCO said it planned to supply electricity for recovery efforts reactor 2 first, followed by reactors 1, 3 and 4 because reactor 2 is expected to be less damaged. TEPCO plans to check pumps and other equipment and restore those items most vital to the cooling function.


These operations couldn't be being performed if radiation wasn't within tolerable limits.

http://nei.cachefly.net/newsandeven...anese-earthquake-and-reactors-in-that-region/

http://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/tsunamiupdate01.html

California air quality officials said on Friday they saw no elevated radiation levels on the U.S. West Coast from Japan's nuclear power plant disaster.
"At this point we're unable to verify if there are any elevated levels," said Ralph Borrmann, a spokesman for the Bay Area Air Quality Management District in San Francisco. "We're not seeing it on our live data in California."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/us_japan_quake_ctbto_radiation

Arthur

 

[ElectricFetus]

I get my information from various sources. I don't think I've said anything that's been proven wrong throughout this crisis. Perhaps you might like to show me where, EF.

Well for example Adoucette sources contradict yours, and he has citations, you do not.

I even showed your ridiculous prediction that radiation would not turn up in America was wrong, so perhaps you'd like to check your own sources, mine are good.

They never said what they detected, if it was below 0.4 uSv you can't say it was not background radiation. More so I was not predicting I was suggesting.

Oh, but you're relying on wiki. Haahaaha!

Wiki who sources are linked to and therefor I can find.

 

[ULTRA]

I prefer to go to the internatonal atomic energy agency direct, or world nuclear news, but hang on. Why should I give you decent sources? If you look through this thread you will see multiple sources. it just proves you've not read them. You only want to support Arthur because he's the only one who supports your ridiculous position. And he said there'd be no meltdown, and I showed (with sources) that there had been, in FACT, a partial meltdown. In FACT, The IAEA say there was a 5% meltdown. So don't talk to me about sources.

 

[ULTRA]

"TEPCO has connected the external transmission line with the receiving point of the plant and confirmed that electricity can be supplied," the plant's operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) said in a statement on Saturday.

Further cabling inside was under way before an attempt to restart water pumps needed to cool overheated nuclear fuel rods at the six-reactor Fukushima plant in northeastern Japan, 240 km north of Tokyo. ~ al Jazeera

 

[ULTRA]

Honestly, if they weren't getting too hot, why not just leave the plant and go home. EF, what the hell do you think they're doing there? Having a bloody holiday?

 

[ElectricFetus]

Further cabling inside was under way before an attempt to restart water pumps needed to cool overheated nuclear fuel rods at the six-reactor Fukushima plant in northeastern Japan, 240 km north of Tokyo. ~ al Jazeera

Yeah we know they overheated days ago, that part is not news. They need to be kept cool that what they been doing with all the pumping in sea water, so we can already assume they have cooled them and are actively keeping them cool by one ad hoc means after another, or else they would have been having more problems like a full meltdown by now.

I prefer to go to the internatonal atomic energy agency direct, or world nuclear news, but hang on. Why should I give you decent sources? If you look through this thread you will see multiple sources. it just proves you've not read them.

I want a source for what your said just a few post ago, not many pages ago.

You only want to support Arthur because he's the only one who supports your ridiculous position.

Yawn, ad hominium.

And he said there'd be no meltdown, and I showed (with sources) that there had been, in FACT, a partial meltdown.

Partial meltdown being the operative term here. Meltdown could mean many things, it could mean the reactor went supercritical, melting a hole straight down through the earth (china syndrome), which did not and will not happen here, at least not with those reactors. it could mean melting of the fuel rods and reactor container due to decay heat, which did not happen but could have happen, even so the containment vessels the reactor is in was design to handle such a contingency and contain all the material aside for what escapes as vapor. Anything less then the above scenarios is called a "partial meltdown", the fuel rods melted, no big deal, like Three Mile Island, which harmed no one.

In FACT, The IAEA say there was a 5% meltdown. So don't talk to me about sources.

That again is a "partial meltdown".

 

[ULTRA]

A "partial" meltdown is exactly what I said it was. Your point?

 

[adoucette]

"TEPCO has connected the external transmission line with the receiving point of the plant and confirmed that electricity can be supplied," the plant's operator Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) said in a statement on Saturday.

Further cabling inside was under way before an attempt to restart water pumps needed to cool overheated nuclear fuel rods at the six-reactor Fukushima plant in northeastern Japan, 240 km north of Tokyo. ~ al Jazeera

Overheated does NOT mean they are melting.

There is a difference.

And it is important to keep them from overheating which is why they are need to keep cooling them, but at this point the rods, like the rods in the Spent Fuel Ponds don't generate enough heat to actually melt anymore.

But at temperature FAR BELOW the melting point of UO2, they do start releasing other radioactive elements with long half lives, and that's what they are working at.

Arthur

 

[ElectricFetus]

A "partial" meltdown is exactly what I said it was. Your point?

The statement "there'd be no meltdown" is true depending on what definition is used for the term meltdown, and is true without contention if your arguing that there was a "partial meltdown", hence not a "meltdown" and thus the statement was true that "there'd be no meltdown". Now if he had said "there'd be no partial meltdown" he would be wrong.

 

[ULTRA]

The authorities are still very worried a further partial meltdown will occur, particularly in reactor 4. You'd better go over there Arthur and tell them they're worrying over nothing. You evidently know far more than the folks on the ground.

 

[ULTRA]

The statement "there'd be no meltdown" is true depending on what definition is used for the term meltdown, and is true without contention if your arguing that there was a "partial meltdown", hence not a "meltdown" and thus the statement was true that "there'd be no meltdown". Now if he had said "there'd be no partial meltdown" he would be wrong.

Bull.

 

[ElectricFetus]

Bull.

That is not a counter argument, if you disagree explain how so, if you can't explain how then its assumed you can't make a valid argument against it.

 

[adoucette]

You only want to support Arthur because he's the only one who supports your ridiculous position. And he said there'd be no meltdown, and I showed (with sources) that there had been, in FACT, a partial meltdown. In FACT, The IAEA say there was a 5% meltdown. So don't talk to me about sources.

I said there would be no meltdown after the injection of seawater on the 14th.

Since there has not been a complete LOC situation since then, so there is no possibility for the fuel to have melted SINCE I made that statement.

As to the 5% meltdown, I just came back from the IAEA site and didn't see this claim anywhere, so SOURCE for this claim?

Arthur

 

[adoucette]

The authorities are still very worried a further partial meltdown will occur, particularly in reactor 4. You'd better go over there Arthur and tell them they're worrying over nothing. You evidently know far more than the folks on the ground.

Ultra,

There is no fuel in Reactor 4, so NO, there will be NO MELTDOWN.

Arthur

 

[ULTRA]

No, thats right. I was thinking of the pond that dried out.

TEPCO President Masataka Shimizu said in a written statement that he was taking "very seriously" the increase in level of seriousness. "We sincerely apologize to all the people living in the surrounding area of the power station and people in Fukushima Prefecture, as well as to the people of society for causing such great concern and nuisance," he said.

TEPCO Managing Director Akio Komiri, upon leaving a news conference in Fukushima at which exposure levels were discussed, burst into tears.

Poor bastard. He must feel so low just now.

 

[ElectricFetus]

No, thats right. I was thinking of the pond that dried out.

TEPCO President Masataka Shimizu said in a written statement that he was taking "very seriously" the increase in level of seriousness. "We sincerely apologize to all the people living in the surrounding area of the power station and people in Fukushima Prefecture, as well as to the people of society for causing such great concern and nuisance," he said.

TEPCO Managing Director Akio Komiri, upon leaving a news conference in Fukushima at which exposure levels were discussed, burst into tears.

Poor bastard. He must feel so low just now.

Again no citation, not that it matters what he does. At least I have read what you are saying before.

http://translate.google.com/transla...=en&u=http://www.tepco.co.jp/cc/press&act=url

 

[adoucette]

The authorities are still very worried a further partial meltdown will occur, particularly in reactor 4. You'd better go over there Arthur and tell them they're worrying over nothing. You evidently know far more than the folks on the ground.

You really need to read these reports more carefully.

The problem at Reactor 4 is they took all the fuel rods out of the reactor last November and stored them in the Spent Fuel Pool.

Now these fuel rods weren't spent, they were taking them out to do an inspection, and so they generate more heat for longer than spent rods do.

Which is why they boiled the water, and also the reaction with the hot cladding created a lot of Hydrogen once the cooling stopped. It was this hydrogen which blew the sides of the building off. They have been adding water to the pool via hoses, and yes they are concerned about it, but the good news is the hoses seem to be working, though they have spent more time getting water to the SFP in 3 than in 4 because unlike your previous assertion, overflights showed that there was still water in SFP 4.

Arthur

 

[ULTRA]

Yes, Arthur. Reactor 4 has been a concern for just those very reasons. But decay heat in reactors 1 and 3 in particular is not going to suddenly drop off or go away. If the emergency cooling fails, there is still enough heat to do damage, and there will be for months, as I said before. Now, if the electricity can be restored to reactors 1-4 that would allow the proper cooling to take place. Reactors 5 and 6 have diesel pumps working at present, and they don't seem in too much danger. I think it's unlikely that we'll get any more melting of the rods, but it can't be ruled out.

 

[adoucette]

Yes, Arthur. Reactor 4 has been a concern for just those very reasons. But decay heat in reactors 1 and 3 in particular is not going to suddenly drop off or go away. If the emergency cooling fails, there is still enough heat to do damage, and there will be for months, as I said before.

Actually if you will look at the chart I posted earlier (post 290), at this point you won't get any melting of the fuel rods even without cooling. That doesn't mean you won't get radiation release if you don't continue the cooling though, and that's why they will continue to do so.

That's OBVIOUS from what happened at TMI.
In that case, they were at the top of that chart for 16 hours with no cooling and still only 1/2 the fuel melted, or in other words, by the time 16 hours were up the drop of evolved heat had gone down such that the melting of fuel had essentially ceased on it's own. We are now a week into this event, and evolved heat rates are now less than 1/3 of what they were after those 16 hours at TMI and continuing to go down such that it would take a LONG time for the rods to anywhere near 2,865 C, but as they heated up towards that temperature the energy per unit of time would continue to drop. I'm not sure exactly what temp they would stabilize at, but it would certainly be below the melting point of UO2. So since there is only a very small percent of the heat being evolved that was needed to melt the rods at TMI, like the rods in the SFP, even if uncovered, they can no longer melt.

If that doesn't convince you, how about the fact that in none of Reactors 1, 2 or 3, are the fuel rods covered with cooling water. Each of them has about a meter or more of fuel rods exposed, and yet they are not only in no danger of melting, while exposed like that, they aren't even hot enough to create H2.

Now, if the electricity can be restored to reactors 1-4 that would allow the proper cooling to take place. Reactors 5 and 6 have diesel pumps working at present, and they don't seem in too much danger. I think it's unlikely that we'll get any more melting of the rods, but it can't be ruled out.

Reactors 4, 5 and 6 ONLY involve Spent Fuel Ponds, not the reactors.

You have still not provided a source to your claim that there was 5% Meltdown.

Arthur

 

[Trippy]

"If you ever see fit to address one of the issues I raised, beyond repetition of the irrelevancies already posted, I'll be happy to continue the discussion as it progresses."[sup][citation needed][/sup]