Japan earthquake + tsunami + nuclear problems

[Ziggurat]

QUESTION:

Does anyone know what happens to the surrounding area of the plants going by the current situation? Will they become non-habitable for many years, and how big this area will be?

Shouldn't be too much of a problem.

Direct irradiation from the plant isn't an issue past the time of exposure. The larger risk is from the release of radioactive material. Unless you have something like Chernobyl, then virtually no uranium or plutonium should escape the reactor. In fact, there shouldn't be significant amounts of any of the heavier fission byproducts which escape. But there are some gaseous fission byproducts which have been released. The noble gasses aren't a long-term problem because they disperse and are not biologically active, but iodine-131 is. That's perhaps the most significant biological risk, and with Chernobyl, it was linked to an increase in thyroid cancer in children (iodine collects in the thyroid).

But the levels of iodine-131 release here are far below that of Chernobyl. And it's got a half-life of about 8 days, which means that after a year, it's basically all gone. There's a longer-lived isotope which also gets produced by fission, iodine-129, but that's so long-lived (17 million years) that it's not much of a radioactivity threat.

The area will be habitable again very soon. For some period of time (maybe a few months, certainly less than a year), they will want to be very careful about any food coming from the region because of possible iodine-131 contamination, but that will go away too.

If I lived there, I'd be much more worried about contamination from ordinary chemicals because of all the buildings that just got washed away, as well as stuff like mold which might start spreading among all the wrecked, soaked debris.

 

[Ziggurat]

"But when the Pirates of the Caribbean ride breaks down, the pirates don't eat the tourists!"

No, they ransom them.

 

[macdoc]

Common sense on radiation......and an excellent pie chart...

Why I stay in Tokyo
僕が東京にとどまる理由

[This commentary contains footnotes and links that allow you to verify what I am saying.]

Thousands have left Tokyo recently in a panic about the perceived radiation threat. If you ask any one of them to precisely articulate what the threat consists of, they will be unable to do so. This is because they actually don’t know, and because in fact there is no threat justifying departure, at least not from radioactivity (*).They flee because they have somehow heard that there is a threat – from the media, their embassies, their relatives overseas, friends, etc. These sources of information, too, have never supplied a credible explanation for their advisories.

But they have managed to create a mass panic,

http://bravenewclimate.com/2011/03/20/why-i-stay-in-tokyo/

 

[CapelDodger]

So you're guessing he only exaggerated by 200 or 300 percent? I guess I could go with that.

[sidebar] If it were 400% 3bodyproblem would regard it as significantly different.[/sidebar]

If you're running many thousands, or even millions, of vending machines there's a great incentive to make them as efficient as possible. On the face of it, I just don't buy these figures (but I could be wrong).

Then again, a Japanese home is usually not a house, and would be regarded by many North Americans as a utility room. There's a whole load of imprecision to deal with here .

 

[CapelDodger]

There is more oddity to this mix. Home rooftop generation (impractical as it is) only works in [eco shudder] suburbia. When you get people out of private free standing homes and pack them close to public transportation for car-free living, the roof to inhabitant ratio gets much worse.

The exposed surface ratio gets less as well, reducing heat-loss. I live in a terraced house so I'm gaining heat from central-heating systems on both sides of me.

 

[CapelDodger]

QUESTION:

Does anyone know what happens to the surrounding area of the plants going by the current situation?

From what I've read it's an agricultural province. If radiation levels in the food produced gets too high (and that isn't very high) it'll be condemned.

Friends in Singapore tell me that people are already rejecting Japanese-sourced food. Irrational, obviously, but that's people for you.

 

[CapelDodger]

Um... no. I think you're thinking of the Mycenaean Civilisation, which was Bronze Age. The Greeks used iron weapons. As early as 900BC virtually all weapons recovered from graves in the Aegean and Greece are iron.

I stand corrected . Mycenaean Greeks, not classical.

By 900BC they were history. If they'd taken to iron maybe they wouldn't have been.

 

[CapelDodger]

IWhat I don't understand is why it's taking over a week to get power to the cooling pumps.

The electricity company in Christchurch, after deciding they couldn't repair the infrastructure in the eastern city, linked in power by building a new 3km overhead line in 2 1/2 days (a feat that would normally take 6-7 weeks).

From what I've read, the problem is in the internal distribution of power to the cooling-system because of damage caused by explosions. That would mean it's not just a question of getting power to the site but of getting it to the pumps and such-like once it's there.

 

[CapelDodger]

Wind mills require lots of copper and iron to build. If we need hundreds of thousands, or millions, of them, I don't think it'll be a good thing for our reserves.

There's no shortage of iron, and copper is mostly used in dynamos and distribution, which is no different for nuclear stations.

As for coal plants, I seem to remember that our oil reserves are finite, and that we might want to keep as much of our alternative oil ressources as possible. We DO use it for a LOT of things.

Agreed, but if the discussion is about nuclear versus renewable (and I'm sure we can all agree that coal and oil for generation is not sustainable for much longer) then it's really not relevant.

Not sure I follow you. Wind isn't very reliable, and the cost of constantly repairing mills damaged by strong winds or other factors will certainly be astronomical.

Windmills are designed to be no more easily damaged than nuclear power stations. Any installed technology requires maintenance, and it's likely to be cheaper and easier for windfarms and solar farms than for nuclear. The technology is simpler to start with, and the protective clothing required would be familiar to any sailor.

 

[CapelDodger]

But you can't guess if it will ever be good enough for the task. All you can know is what we have NOW.

Would it be reasonable to go all Sylvia Browne and assume we know how it will change ? That doesn't sound right to me. We know there will be some change but no real grasp of what that will be, so naturally we go with what we know. It's not good planning otherwise.

Predicting how things are likely to change is not simply "guessing" or tarot-reading, and planning on the basis that there will be no change is not recommended. Except regarding death, taxes, and human nature, of course.

In nuclear, there's talk of thorium reactors and various "next generations", none of which are visible yet. In the meantime renewable generation is already making strides in development and implementation.

I don't think my prediction is unreasonable, and time will test it in the medium-term. Providence willing, we can compare notes on the other side .

 

[CapelDodger]

What about the resources needed to maintain our renewable energy infrastructure?

I think the term 'renewable' is a bit of fudge to be honest because while the energy sources might well be renewable the steel, copper, rare earths and other materials needed to build the things aren't. And these things have lifespans like everything else.

As you say, "like everything else", so unless we go with nothing else it's not relevant.

 

[jayh]

The exposed surface ratio gets less as well, reducing heat-loss. I live in a terraced house so I'm gaining heat from central-heating systems on both sides of me.

Heat, yes somewhat. Electrical power, no.

 

[Kuko 4000]

From what I've read it's an agricultural province. If radiation levels in the food produced gets too high (and that isn't very high) it'll be condemned.

Friends in Singapore tell me that people are already rejecting Japanese-sourced food. Irrational, obviously, but that's people for you.

The main news here in Finland just showed a clip from the agricultural area near or in Fukushima and left a strong impression that the stuff the farmer was growing was contaminated and not good, or at best, very suspicious. Anything more accurate on this issue?

I've found this:

http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/RS-Food_samples_show_raised_radiation-1903114.html

The limits are based on the amount of food concerned, assuming that these amounts would be consumed throughout a person's entire life, Edano said. He stressed that the radioactivity measured from the samples poses no immediate threat to health. In the case of the milk samples, even if consumed for one year, the radiation dose would be equivalent to that a person would receive in a single CT scan. The levels found in the spinach were much lower, equivalent to one-fifth of a single CT scan.

The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, as well as the prefectural governments, will continue to monitor and analyse food samples and determine the exact location where contaminated samples are found. Edano said that, assuming the higher radiation levels found in food are associated with emissions from the Fukushima plant, the Japanese government will consider taking necessary actions. These could include a ban on the shipment of foodstuffs or setting limits to the intake of such foods.

Another question:

How many state of the art windmills would it take to cover the energy of one state of the art nuclear plant?

 

[gambling_cruiser]

The main news here in Finland just showed a clip from the agricultural area near or in Fukushima and left a strong impression that the stuff the farmer was growing was contaminated and not good, or at best, very suspicious. Anything more accurate on this issue?

I've found this:

http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/RS-Food_samples_show_raised_radiation-1903114.html




Another question:

How many state of the art windmills would it take to cover the energy of one state of the art nuclear plant?

5-10MW per windmill.
Full-power hours about 3800 per year for off-shore windparks, means you need two MW windmill for one MW nuclear power.
1 MW windmill means about 1 Million Euro investment.
To replace 1000MW nuclear power you need 2000MW wind power.

 

[jayh]

5-10MW per windmill.
Full-power hours about 3800 per year for off-shore windparks, means you need two MW windmill for one MW nuclear power.
1 MW windmill means about 1 Million Euro investment.
To replace 1000MW nuclear power you need 2000MW wind power.

huh?

At 5Mw, you would need 20 windmills running full cap (hence perhaps 40 or more altogether) to 'replace' a single 1000MW reactor (most generating stations have more more than one).

The problems still being:

one needs a location with consistent wind (not that common)

when the wind dies down (it always does), ALL the mills drop precipitously (as I remember the energy recovered is proportional to the cube of the wind speed)

 

[macdoc]

Typical actual power available on a windmill is 22% and then there is no guarantee it's anywhere near rated output and no ability to meet demand as required.

A nuke is on 97-99% for 50 years at full rated power.

start here

http://bravenewclimate.com/2009/10/18/tcase4/

This perhaps closer to the truth

This question is dependent on a number of factors including, which power units are in question because the generating capacity of nuclear power stations and the power generating capacity of wind turbines differs significantly among models, how windy it is where the wind generating site is located and how efficiently maintenance is managed for both types of power units. Wind turbines produce from a less than 1 MW to around 5 MW per unit in commercial models. Nuclear reactors used for power production range from around 600 MW to around 1300 MW. However, in order to provide some idea of the differing scales of single units consider that Exelon's Quad Cities Power Plant Unit 1 is capable of producing 866 MW of power. If you were to compare Quad Cities Unit 1 to a fairly average 2 MW commercial wind turbine it would take about 433 wind turbines to equal the nuclear plant's capacity if the wind was to blow all the time 24 hours a day 7 days a week. However because the wind will only blow to its full capacity 25% of the time for a good wind location, even if you had 4 times the number of wind turbines, 1700 wind turbines, it would still not constitute a reliable industrial power source for a developed country without up to another 866 MW of peaking power backup from either hydroelectricity, which is unlikely because of scarcity, or gas turbines which can be quite expensive depending on current natural gas prices.

Read more: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_...ower_as_a_nuclear_power_station#ixzz1HEQ1gdFN

 

[Belz...]

There's no shortage of iron

Of course not, since we're not building millions of wind turbines.

and copper is mostly used in dynamos and distribution, which is no different for nuclear stations.

Except that you have only one nuclear plant, not thousands.

Agreed, but if the discussion is about nuclear versus renewable

Coal plants are pretty much nuclear's only true competitor, energy-wise, with the exception of hydro, but you can't build that everywhere. I think it's useful to discuss it.

Windmills are designed to be no more easily damaged than nuclear power stations.

I seriously doubt that. If I remember correctly, many are damaged BY WIND, or by birds flying into them (of course, they tend to damage the birds more).

Any installed technology requires maintenance, and it's likely to be cheaper and easier for windfarms and solar farms than for nuclear.

Again, ONE nuclear reactor equals how many wind mills ? With moving parts. Surely you need to work on a few of them quite regularily.

Predicting how things are likely to change is not simply "guessing" or tarot-reading, and planning on the basis that there will be no change is not recommended. Except regarding death, taxes, and human nature, of course.

In nuclear, there's talk of thorium reactors and various "next generations", none of which are visible yet. In the meantime renewable generation is already making strides in development and implementation.

I don't think my prediction is unreasonable, and time will test it in the medium-term.

We can expect all technologies to improve somewhat. What I have a gripe against is expecting so much improvement that it will essentially be a new technology, without evidence, and then using that prediction to claim that "renewables" will become preferable to nuclear, as if the latter won't improve as well.

 

[Belz...]

huh?

At 5Mw, you would need 20 windmills running full cap (hence perhaps 40 or more altogether) to 'replace' a single 1000MW reactor (most generating stations have more more than one).

Don't you mean 200 ?

 

[technoextreme]

There are the resources available to make the transition over the next few decades. We will end up using renewables, and doing a loop through nuclear power on the way just delays the process.

So explain to me how you plan to implement technologies that whose resources are either rarer or just as high demand as oil is.

Is there a power source/ are there power sources that would have prevented that - given the climate, the size of the affected area and the loss of infrastructure in the wake of this earthquake and tsunami?

One of the oddest things to realize throughout the whole aftermath for me was the incompatibility of power grids in South Western vs North Eastern Japan.
I hope standardization will be one of the issues tackled.

Actually, the incompatible grid is the bigger problem than the nuclear reactors going down. Namely because even if there wasn't a nuclear disaster power transmission would still be a huge problem. I've also heard some bizarre and werid statistics stating that the vending machines draw enough power to power a house which either I'm underestimating how power efficient Japan is, the size of a Japanese house, or their infatuation with funky vending machiens.

Wind power isn't in its infancy. It's many centuries old. It's not advancing at a rapid rate anymore. Solar is newer than nuclear, but not by that much.

Yeah but solar pretty much stopped advancing for a while. No one anticipated that the demand for silicon would skyrocket to absurdly high levels so research pretty much stagnated for a long time.

 

[jayh]

Don't you mean 200 ?

oops