Japan earthquake + tsunami + nuclear problems

[r-j]

"setting on fire the zirconium cladding, which keeps the rods together. That fire would spew radioactive fuel far and wide."

I guess somehow, you think that just because only part of a building is on fire, that doesn't mean the building can catch on fire. I'm beginning to see how this works.

 

[Sword_Of_Truth]

Apologies for the quick derail, but I will be starting a thread re: the above topic. I am sick and tired of seeing this strawman and the knee jerk reaction to it. Don't worry SOT, you will be able to add my name to that list as well.

/sent from my phone built out of sticks and mud

Are you going to start this thread soon or are you carving it into tree bark with obsidian arrowheads and delivering it to potential participants via carrier pigeon?

 

[Varanid]

Are you going to start this thread soon or are you carving it into tree bark with obsidian arrowheads and delivering it to potential participants via carrier pigeon?

Here you go.

BTW, original. It's almost like someone already made a joke to that effect. Oh wait, that was me.

 

[JihadJane]

Treated to 99+% and so far only a few children die. A tragedy, but not a catastrophe.

Tragedy definition: A disastrous event, especially one involving distressing loss or injury to life.

Catastrophe definition: A great, often sudden calamity.

I was posting in response to 1337m4n statement:

I've never seen a scrap of evidence that cancer rates in Chernobyl's fallout area ever deviated from the norm by a statistically significant amount.

The point is what is killing more people at the moment ? Oil ? Coal ? Nuclear ? It is definitievly coal followed by oil,
nuclear only last, *even* with chernobyl counted.

What's the point of this point? Our-burning-oil and-coal habit may already have brought about the end of our civilization so being better then either is hardly a recommendation!

I agree with you on that one, if only because the US is getting a minority of oil from middle east. it was something like 10% or 15% ? I am too lazy to fact check but it wasn't that great a number.

Not minimal, anyway.

My point isn't dependent on how much oil the US gets from the Middle East. Additionally, the importance of the Middle East is primarily that it contains the world's only oil swing producers.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

BBC reports they have a power cable run to the plant now. We'll see how many of the pumps and cooling systems are still working.

 

[Aepervius]

Tragedy definition: A disastrous event, especially one involving distressing loss or injury to life.

Catastrophe definition: A great, often sudden calamity.

That remind of that post tragicMonkey made some time ago.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=6907953#post6907953

On a family level you are right this was a catastrophe. But on a country level , with million of inhabitant 9 children dead are nearer from noise than catastrophe.

 

[macdoc]

guess somehow, you think that just because only part of a building is on fire, that doesn't mean the building can catch on fire. I'm beginning to see how this works.

it's not "a" building - it's a reactor with steel and concrete.

The only combustibles are gas bases from water produced hydrogen.

Rapid heating of close to critical rod clusters can be termed a nuclear "fire" - but it's not in the normal sense of burning.

Heat plume can carry radioactive particles into the atmosphere which is what is happening but at a very low level.

 

[mike3]

That can't happen. Technological industrial civilization needs energy first and foremost. As has been pointed out numerous times before, there is sufficient nuclear fuel supplies on Earth to sustain modern civilization for tens of thousands of years at a minimum. Unconventional oceanic uranium can last us for millions of years.

Q: Where are these supplies? What energy-consumption growth rate are you assuming and is it realistic? Or are you assuming a transition to 0 growth (in which case it might be possible)?

And also, nuclear currently only generates electricity. What would be the cost to convert all heavy machinery and all cars and all that that run on liquid fuels to run on batteries or hydrogen or other things that could store the energy from nuclear, or even direct grid connection with electro-motors, before oil has become unusable as an energy source (EROEI hits 1)?

 

[jayh]

Q: Where are these supplies? What energy-consumption growth rate are you assuming and is it realistic? Or are you assuming a transition to 0 growth (in which case it might be possible)?
...

The concern for planning should be the next 100 or 200. By the time that time comes, the equation will be so radically different that current projections will have no meaningful significance (consider how any projections about our technology from 1911 are useful only for entertainment value).

There is a real tendency for people (including scientists) to project by extrapolation. Trying to plan our actions based on such extrapolations are bound to result in very foolish choices.

 

[r-j]

http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2011/03/quake-question-7-what-prevents-a.html?ref=ra

I leaning towards believing Science magazine rather than unscientific claims.

Just repeating something that isn't true, won't make it true. The US top official has repeatedly stated that the fuel rods are burning. They are "on fire".

This raises the possibility that the temperature of the rods, which are still radioactive, could rise, setting on fire the zirconium cladding, which keeps the rods together.

If something is made out of materials, and some of the material catches on fire, and burns, only a fool would keep saying "they can't burn".

You said, and I quote you,

Fuel rods cannot burn....period.

If you can't understand why you are wrong, I don't know what is wrong with you.

Obviously, if some of the material that a fuel rod is constructed from is burning, you are very wrong.

 

[CapelDodger]

Obviously, if some of the material that a fuel rod is constructed from is burning, you are very wrong.

As you say, obviously. Fuel rods include cladding. My house is stone-built but includes wood, and if its ever on fire I don't want the Fire Brigade quibbling about it.

 

[CapelDodger]

Revisiting my early point about nuclear now being policy poison (a better term, I think, than my previous "political poison" since it encompasses more than the political aspect), the pictures and general sense of distrust in the authorities and increasingly desperate measures have surely done their work by now. The nuclear renaissance is still-born yet again.

Please excuse the interruption and return to the rational debate . Reason won't make any difference on the ground. It's over, for at least the next generation.

 

[Sword_Of_Truth]

Q: Where are these supplies? What energy-consumption growth rate are you assuming and is it realistic? Or are you assuming a transition to 0 growth (in which case it might be possible)?

I responded to the question earlier.

Terrapower, who is working with Toshiba to construct the first Travelling Wave Reactors, calculates existing US stockpiles of U-238 are sufficient for 3000 years.

This is Dr. Bernard Cohens 1983 paper on recovery of oceanic uranium. 4.5 billion tons is sufficient for 7 million years of energy production.

Cohens paper is brief. This is a more detailed explanation from a group of Canadian and American researchers.

As did Hindmost:

The link below is the latest information on the nuclear fuel cycle. It provides the answers on uranium supply etc. Turns out, not much work was done on the fuel cycle for the past 30 years or so. This report updates everything. There were some surprising findings on breeder reactors and the use of spent fuel

glenn

http://web.mit.edu/ceepr/www/about/Dec 2010/forsberg oh.pdf

It doesn't matter if our energy usage stays the same of multiplies several times over. Because a supply sufficient to last tens of thousands of years still comes out to a helluva long damn time even if used ten times faster. There's always enough time to develop fusion or go and scrape what we need off the surface of The Moon, Mars or Venus.

And also, nuclear currently only generates electricity. What would be the cost to convert all heavy machinery and all cars and all that that run on liquid fuels to run on batteries or hydrogen or other things that could store the energy from nuclear, or even direct grid connection with electro-motors, before oil has become unusable as an energy source (EROEI hits 1)?

Carbon can be harvested from the air and hydrogen from the water and used to create synthetic analogs of fossil fuels that are carbon neutral. All that is needed is energy to run the process, which nuclear can provide.

There is little need to convert anything but our electrical grid to nuclear.

 

[CapelDodger]

The concern for planning should be the next 100 or 200. By the time that time comes, the equation will be so radically different that current projections will have no meaningful significance (consider how any projections about our technology from 1911 are useful only for entertainment value).

There is a real tendency for people (including scientists) to project by extrapolation. Trying to plan our actions based on such extrapolations are bound to result in very foolish choices.

Who extrapolated the radical shift from charcoal to coal? Nobody, of course . Nor from coal to oil. Certainly not from no energy except human to control of fire in the first place.

Transitions in energy sources do mark radical advances towards our current society, a fact which was extrapolated to nuclear power by some deluded individuals and far more who were concerned solely with the military implications. It has never survived independently and was never going to because it's crap. Natural gas has had more impact as a transitional energy source.

Fusion is fifty years away, like it always is.

The next transition is happening, and it's to solar energy in all its forms. Sun, wind, wave, and we can thank the Moon for tidal. It pours down on us every minute of every day. That's where the future is, and anything spent on nuclear power now is investment in the future thrown away.

 

[Corsair 115]

A question: it has now been a week since the earthquake occurred and the reactors were shut down. Does this amount of time elapsed mean less cooling is needed now to maintain a proper temperature of the fuel rods now as opposed to a week ago?

 

[macdoc]

yes - the rods have residual heat ( substantial )

Look at the brave new climate link

Fukushima – 18 March morning updates, radiation and tsunamis
Posted on 18 March 2011 by Barry Brook

There have been further developments at Fukushima overnight that have, according to the IAEA, made the situation ‘reasonably stable‘ (although it is still serious). Given the state of play over the last week, I’ll take any positive sign I can get.

Other points to note, as of the morning of Friday 18 March:

1. FEPC says the following:

Through visual surveys from the helicopter flying above the Unit 4 reactor secondary containment building on March 16, it was observed that water remained in the spent fuel pool. The helicopter was measuring radiation levels above Unit 4 reactor secondary containment building in preparation for water drops. This report has not been officially confirmed.

your question on the post scram is answered here

http://bravenewclimate.com/

realize initially the company was trying to save the reactor.
Certain control methods kill it all and that's a multi-billion dollar facility.

The interim holding pond was the big issue and remains a risk locally but the hype around the planet is disgusting and largely flat out wrong.

 

[lomiller]

Q: Where are these supplies? What energy-consumption growth rate are you assuming and is it realistic? Or are you assuming a transition to 0 growth (in which case it might be possible)?

SoT's numbers are not realistic at all. See page 67 of the following report for estimates of how long available nuclear fuel will last for various fuel cycles.

http://www.neutron.kth.se/courses/reactor_physics/NEA-redbook2003.pdf

Note that it cites 2 numbers the first is for Proved + inferred reserves, the second is for proved + inferred + speculative resources. Both are more generous then oil/coal companies use, as they only report proved numbers.


Basically there is plenty for the next ~100 years at current electrical generation levels and possibly some room for modest growth. The exception being a move to all fast reactor fuel cycles which could extend the resource several thousand years if growth of nuclear power is modest.

The paper hindmost linked questions the need for all fast reactor fuel cycles on the basis there is plenty of fuel and these reactors will be more expensive. Presumably they mean for current usage levels with modest growth and that 100 years is plenty of reserves.


All this is reasonable, but only if you are looking at only modest growth in nuclear power. Fossil fuels are currently responsible for nearly 10X as much of our total energy production as nuclear and reserve size starts to become one of many issues that arise if you are looking to nuclear to to fully replace the energy produced with fossil fuels.

IOW there is plenty of uranium available for nuclear fuel the idea that we could produce enough electricity from nuclear to satisfy even our current energy demand is a little out there (Fast reactor fuel cycles would allow this for a few centuries though) and the idea that it would allow us to produce as much energy as we need for thousands of years is really out there.

 

[Skwinty]

Executive summary of events at Fukushima.

 

[manofthesea]

Would foaming agents, halon or whatever, help control this type of fire?

 

[macdoc]

Best summary and comparison yet

Is the Japanese nuclear fallout mostly hot air?
date: March 18, 2011 |

There has been massive coverage of the Fukushima nuclear reactor following the 8.9-magnitude earthquakes that hit Japan, including a Wikipedia page that seems to be evolving by the hour (sometimes by the minute).

Various anti-nuclear groups have used this incident as an opportunity to pronounce that nuclear energy is unsafe. This is consistent with the populist scare campaign tactics of many anti-nuclear groups in the past.

Rather than engage in the hysterical rhetoric, we’re looking forward to seeing the data on this disaster.

Japan has 50 nuclear plants. Four nuclear plants were shutdown automatically. The surrounding areas were evacuated. The containers which house the reactors did not breach. Despite the devastating impact of the earthquake, safety plans and systems triggered and executed as planned. The accident has been recorded at Level 4 on the International Nuclear Events Scale, meaning that there are local consequences only (the scale goes up to 7). For reference, Three Mile Island was a Level 5 and Chernobyl was a Level 7.

A very good, simple and accurate explanation of the Fukushima Nuclear Accident can be found here.

Contrast this with the fires at the oil refineries, which were “burning out of control up and down the coast.” Earthquakes of this magnitude have a devstating effect on any energy infrastructure. Gas lines rupture, oil tanks ignite, hydro dams burst.

Based on the video footage we have seen, we would hazard a guess that Japan’s oil and gas facilities caused far more damage and loss of life than Japan’s nuclear facilities.

There are decades-worth of data available on the overall human and environmental cost of different power sources. One way to compare energy sources is to look at Deaths per TerraWatt-hour:

Energy Source Death Rate (deaths per TWh)
Coal – world average 161 (50% of electricity)
Coal – China 278
Coal – USA 15
Oil 36 (36% of world energy)
Natural Gas 4 (21% of world energy)
Biofuel/Biomass 12
Peat 12
Solar (rooftop) 0.44 (<0.1% of world energy)
Wind 0.15 (<1% of world energy)
Hydro 1.4 (about 2500 TWh/yr)
Nuclear 0.04 (5.9% of world energy)

(source)

It’s easy to forget how many are injured and killed in the exploration, extraction, processing, and combustion of fossil fuels. Just a few months ago, one small coal mine in New Zealand killed more people than the entire Japanese nuclear fleet ever has. As of today, the number of deaths caused by the Fukushima plant is zero. Renewables are not immune either, in fact the solar industry has incurred more deaths than nuclear, because occasionally someone falls off a rooftop.

And what about the environmental cost? We have not yet seen any anti-nuclear article acknowledge how many megatonnes of greenhouse gases Japan’s nuclear plants have stopped from going into the atmosphere.

The media are getting great headlines by vilifying the nuclear industry in Japan. The condemnation of nuclear will always sell newspapers. Like most issues in the energy and carbon space, the signal is getting lost in the noise.