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Tue Mar 15, 2011 by Meteor Blades Original Article
Fukushima Dai Ichi Nuclear Plant/Image by www.digitalglobe.com
For those confused, troubled, irritated and worried about the media reporting of what's happening with the Japanese electricity-generating reactors affected by last week's earthquake and ensuing tsunami, rest assured you're not alone. Here's Clive Cook at The Atlantic:
Coverage of the nuclear emergency is probably as informative as it can be under the circumstances—but still I find it frustrating. Purportedly analytical accounts are muddled; obvious questions are left unresolved or unaddressed; there are inconsistencies all over the place. Much of this is unavoidable, I know, but the problem is compounded by the journalistic propensity to glide around what you don't know or have failed to understand. From the start of this calamity I have wanted to know, "What is the worst that can happen at these nuclear sites? Suppose everything that could go wrong does go wrong: what then?" I still don't know the answer. In what I have read so far--dozens of articles--nobody who knows what he is talking about has spelt this out carefully.
My father, who retired many years ago, was a mechanical engineer in the British nuclear power industry. He worked on the designs of several new reactors, specialising in the handling of fuel. I vividly recall his telling me decades ago that the thing that concerned him most about nuclear power was not the reactors but the storage of spent fuel.
A three-hour fire in a spent-fuel pool at one of the reactors was what caught the attention of many expert analysts Monday. The subsequent rise in radiation detected near the reactors and in lesser amounts as far away as the skies over Tokyo sparked a government warning to Japanese up to 30 kilometers away from the plants to stay indoors.
That stirred CNN International Security Analyst Jim Walsh, who is usually reasonably accurate, to remark that the Japanese keep spent fuel in water-filled pools on-site, but the United States buries its spent fuel. As anyone who has heard of Yucca Mountain knows, that is not the case. Low-level and mid-level radioactive wastes are buried. But spent fuel is ferociously radioactive, and dealing with it has yet to be fully resolved. Japan would like to reprocess its spent fuel at its Rokkasho facility owned by Japan Nuclear Fuel Limited. But, two-and-a-half years ago, scientists said the Rokkasho plant is built above a fault that could generate a magnitude 8 earthquake. JPNL has said an earthquake of more than 6.5 is unlikely and the plant could withstand a 6.9 quake. One could laugh if the tears weren't getting in the way.
It's shoot-from-the-lip commentary like Walsh's that muddies understanding of an issue that most people have very little knowledge of to begin with.
Such botchery aside, the situation remains grim, with the ultimate outcome purely speculative this stage other than to say that the nuclear energy renaissance that we've been told is nearly upon us is certain to be delayed at the first least.
What is happening in Japan?
Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies, who founded the blog ArmsControlWonk, writes:
FEPC has released another statement that confirms the spent fuel at Reactor 4 burned for about three hours before they were able to put it out. This is very bad news — yesterday, I noted this was the wildcard scenario. The radiation release was very large — detectors recorded a measurement of 400 millisieverts per hour. Milli, not micro. People can stop with the comparisons to airline flights or X-rays, unless you get your X-rays performed at DARHT.
If you are scoring at home, most folks I know seem to think we are at INES 6 now, heading for 7 (and the Ch-word) unless TEPCO catches a break.
Translation:
The FEPC is the Federation of Electric Power Companies, an Japanese organzation. An X-ray of your spine will give you a dose of 1.5 millisieverts. A CT scan of your stomach and pelvis will give you 15 mSv. INES is the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale, which runs one-seven. It set the Three Mile Island event of 1979 at five. Chernobyl was a seven.
The Institute for Science and International Security in the United States has issued a statement:
This event is now closer to a level 6, and it may unfortunately reach a level 7. A level six event means that consequences are broader and countermeasures are needed to deal with the radioactive contamination. A level seven event would constitute a larger release of radioactive material, and would require further extended countermeasures. The international community should increase assistance to Japan to both contain the emergency at the reactors and to address the wider contamination. We need to find a solution together.
Meanwhile, one of the Chernobyl clean-up experts has slammed the Japanese response.
The Guardian has a continuing status report on the situation with Japan's at-risk nuclear reactors that is regularly updated. As of 6 p.m. UTC (that's 11 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time), this was the situation:
6pm: The latest news on the state of each of the reactors in the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant: • No 1: Cooling failure, partial melting of core, vapor vented, hydrogen explosion, seawater pumped in.
• No 2: Cooling failure, seawater pumped in, fuel rods fully exposed temporarily, vapor vented, damage to containment system, potential meltdown feared.
• No 3: Cooling failure, partial melting of core feared, vapor vented, seawater pumped in, hydrogen explosion, high-level radiation measured nearby.
• No 4: Under maintenance when quake struck, fire caused possibly by hydrogen explosion at pool holding spent fuel rods, pool water level feared receding.
• No 5: Under maintenance when quake struck, temperature slightly rising at spent fuel pool.
• No 6 - Under maintenance when quake struck, temperature slightly rising at spent fuel pool.
Here at Daily Kos, several participants have put together a mothership and rotating live-blogs to keep abreast of new information. You can find the current live blog here.
Among Kossacks offering expert hands-on experience are samer, Richard Cranium and kbman. Be forewarned, the latter two strongly disagree with each other.
Whatever else can be said about Fukushima's nukes, diarist akmk is absolutely right to describe as heroes the 50-70 workers on the front-lines, absorbing big doses of radiation. Like first-responders everywhere, they're "just doing their job," they say, but that doesn't lessen their heroism.
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