Published: September 11th, 2012 at 10:28 am ET
|
Title: One and half years after Fukushima accident
Source: NHK WORLD English
Date: Sep. 10, 2012
[...]TEPCO has been testing the spent fuel rods in the No.4 reactor pool over the past 2 months. The building structure at the No.4 reactor became fragile after the explosion and possibly unsustainable to more earthquakes in the future.
TEPCO is preparing to remove the rods from the pool in December next year. But the debris scattered in the pool could hamper workers from taking them out.
[...]
Watch the report here
Published: September 11th, 2012 at 10:28 am ET
|
Seriously, "groundwat er", think, pacific ocean, tides, twice daily......
sending...
They are preparing to remove the rods but….
SP: Time to realize cleanup technology does not exist to stop the madness of a runaway nuclear plant. It has taken on a new life emulating some of the destructive forces of mother nature.
Japan has unleashed the true dangers of nuclear energy and they don't have any fixes. What a cruel twist of fate that a country defeated with the first use of nuclear bombs undertook the same technology and has bombed itself into a path to extinction.
We are all worried downwind 5,000 miles about our own survival. I can only imagine the sorrow of the intelligentsia in Japan who know how bad the situation has become.
Doomsday time and without a single missile fired.
Learn well Nations of the southern hemisphere and any country contemplating electricity too cheap to meter. When you start down the nuclear road you will never come home again.
Report Comment
Sickputer: "…it has taken on a new life…" Yeah: Godzilla!
Report Comment
Japan has unleashed the true dangers of nuclear energy and they don't have any fixes. What a cruel twist of fate that a country defeated with the first use of nuclear bombs undertook the same technology and has bombed itself into a path to extinction. that is an understatement of grand proportion. this is technological hubris at its worst.
Report Comment
Maybe they could build the world's largest aquarium around building #4. After the fuel was out they could stock it and turn it into an marine park…for the children! Hard to imagine how anyone could build something so inherently dangerous, without knowing how to fix it, when it breaks
Report Comment
Indeed, saltyfishlvr, hard to imagine. The last sentence says it all for me. Btw, write that mayor with your aquarium idea. Maybe it could help him open his eyes a little.
Report Comment
Remove the fuel in December of next year??? The few comments we get make it more clear daily that the fuel can not be easily moved, or can ever be moved?
Report Comment
Sounds like you're correct. No current technology for extracting Unit 4 spent fuels in such a damaged condition.
Possibly the same story at Units 1-3. Those super hot unapproachable hellholes await much longer confirmation.
So under these circumstances a smart and prudent policy would be to remove from the island as soon as possible the spent fuel rods that are at the huge Common Spent Fuel Pond and at Units 5 and 6.
That way the chain reaction from a spent fuel pond disaster at any of Units 1-4 would miss having those rods to burn up also.
Possibly life would survive in Europe although Japan and America will be wiped out.
Unfortunately nobody has witnessed any signs of prudent or smart attributes for the nucleocrats. Delay until we all die seems to be their idea of expediency.
Report Comment
Use a reactor, and risk loosing your country.
Report Comment
japan and TEPCO needs to bury those things today. as others have pointed out, the technology just does not exist to fix those broken and destroyed reactors at fukushima dai-ichi.
Report Comment
Pool 4 is not to most irradiating place of Fukushima R1.
Why can't they just get in there with loads of chainsaw and remore the stuff? What's the problem?
They bring trucks loaded with water and put the pieces one by one in there as the bars and their pieces get removed.
Report Comment
dka: I hear your frustration. But there may be better ideas out there. Mine would be to make a mobile steel overhead crane, like those that lift ships in and out of the water.
http://www.mooneyboats.ie/Yard-Facilities/Boat-Lifting/
Build it larger than Buildings1,2,3,&4. Mount the crane on the top rails. Remote controlled. Empty SFP4, then move the crane to empty SFP1,2,&3.
Common SFP, plus SFP5&6 should already be empty. Let's go, TEP.gov. Shake a leg. Time is short.
Report Comment
You can't expose it to air or it burns imediately. You can't cut it up or it falls to the bottom and fissions. Spent fuel is only out of the water for a very brief time. This is why the SFP's are located where they are, almost right next to the PCV's top opening. To minimize the time they are exposed to air.
Report Comment
Decommission all NPPs now. TEP.gov is out of answers. Very soon, they may also be out of time. Suggestion: double or triple your manpower.
Report Comment
PuN sez…
"make a mobile steel overhead crane, like those that lift ships…
Build it larger than Buildings1,2,3,&4. Mount the crane on the top rails. Remote controlled. Empty SFP4, then move the crane to empty SFP1,2,&3."
SP: Great idea even if the price is enormous. But I'm afraid they can't grasp the danger to humanity and by the time they do…it will be too late. Building a massive dome could prevent extinction level air releases if it can be built before a spent fuel pond catches on fire.
That won't solve the other issue of ocean water contamination from the cores in the ground, but I would settle for that poison versus a nuclear winter in the atmosphere.
Report Comment
@Sickputer – i think you said it with "But I'm afraid they can't grasp the danger to humanity and by the time they do…" Their need to believe in themselves and their technology is probably stronger and more urgent and more illogical than ever. These people saw themselves, perhaps even fancied themselves as the leaders of humanity into a golden age of endless energy. That's a whole lot of self delusion to give up. It's always hard to go from believing you are the best and the brightest to realizing just how incredibly dumb you actually are in the larger scheme of things. Pride will be one of the hardest obstacles to overcome for these folks. Once they do that, maybe they can start getting down to developing some ways to deal with their mess once they see just how serious it really is.
Report Comment
When i was in the business we were shown a number of video's from Three Mile Island. Some were public, some were private. One I saw showed the process they used for removing the fuel there. It took several years to do it although only about 30% of the fuel melted. And since it was a PWR all they had to do was load it into the transfer canal, and not remove it completely. Every area in the core that had any melted fuel had to be cut apart piece by piece. It was a very difficult process, but the conditions for the work were optimal since it was in a closed containment that had been decontaminated.
This job at Fukushima will be much, much harder. The Japanese know how to move fuel but for any detailed technical underwater work they call in General Electric. And right now they are apparently refusing any outside help.
Report Comment
The fact they don't call in help suggests to me that the situation is such that outside 'help' would only work against them. It would potentialy reveal to the world that what some of us here already think, we are already a day late and a dollar short…….
Report Comment
TEPCO – summary: "The SFP is so fragile it cannot withstand another earthquake. Giving the utmost urgency of this matter we'll begin decommissioning it in 15 months."
I mean, what's the rush ? Seriously, what are the chances of having another earthquake in Japan in 15 months ?!? Basically null, right ?
Report Comment
International help and expertise urgently needed.
Put all the rest of the politcal bullshit aside.
Report Comment