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Merged nuclear power safe?

PhantomWolf said:
It would if you had an inkling about what was going on.

Some of the products of Uranium based Fission are gases, such as Xenon-137 and Krypton-90. These can escape the fuel rods and be in the atmosphere of the reactor. When the pressure gets to much and they vent it, these gases get out with the steam and cause spikes that force evacuations. They also have very short halflifes, so decay quickly via Beta emmision, Xenon into Caesium-137 and the Krypton into Strongtium-90. Both of these are Beta emitters as well. Further you have the likes of these gases and Iodine-131 from the spend fuel pool rods as they have reacted due to the lower water levels, this further adds to the contamination about the area.

The levels of radioactivity measured at the boundry of the plant are from the contaminants in the area where the reading is being taken, in other words, most of what is measured there tells us approximately how much combined Xe-137, Kr-90, Cs-137, Sr-90, and I-131 is in the air and on the ground within a dozen or so metres of that area. It's not messuring gamma radiation being fired out of the plant 500m away.
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I suppose this answers my question, then ? :p
 
r-j said:
It's pretty amazing. Some people, if I were to believe them, would have me thinking that no matter what, radiation just isn't that big a deal. A reactor can melt down, explode, burn it doesn't matter, because it just isn't that dangerous.

Other people think it is.
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Careful, now. You were also pretty convinced that milk couldn't contain caesium-137...
 
r-j said:
Thanks for that! I can see that 6000 inches of air reduces gamma by half. So 500 meters of air certainly reduces the gamma radiation, so distance isn't the only factor at play.
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Distance from a point source follows the inverse square law, so every time you double the distance, the radiation drops by a factor of 4. From a reasonable distance the reactor will act like a point source. This is the reason most plants are place out in the country.

glenn
 
I was working from the outside back in. Every time you halve the distance, the amount goes up by 4 times.
 
r-j said:
Yeah, what is this talk of radioactive dust?
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Analogy...you approach a barn and smell the poop...that is radiation...step in the poop and that is contamination. (can't smell radiation, but it is analogous) If there is radioactive waste that is where you don't want it, it's contamination. Essentially radioactive dust I am assuming would be concrete or soil with radioactive waste stuck to it and possible being blown around.

glenn
 
elgarak said:
One thing I want to add.

I have not watched or read a single report in the mainstream media outlets that correctly reported what has happened. Not - a - single - one. That includes mainstream media from the US and Germany (which are the only ones I followed closely).

The only way to get reasonable information was via the web. I had to hunt down the sites that do report well. Even so, I needed a lot of critical thinking (and reading up on my rusty nuclear physics) to separate the wheat from the overwhelming chaff.

If there was meltdown, it was a meltdown of mainstream media reporting.
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Same here in Canada. I was visiting my parents about a week back and they were talking about the nuclear situation. Hell, even I could tell that it wasn't true, but the problem is that people trust what journalists tell them, because they assume they do their homework.
 
Where is the radioactive material coming from? That seems to be the question everybody is asking. That nobody can answer it, it seems most strange.

Cesium and Iodine were detected right away after the first explosion. Where did it come from?
 
Hindmost said:
You seem to have become a nuclear expert very quickly... You can't take a generation II plant and convert it to a generation III plant. It just isn't possible and I don't think you know what upgrades could be done either.
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Of course. Java Man seems to think that they should've dismantled as soon as they had better options available. He seems to miss the fact that sometimes there are monetary concerns involved. We already pay a good deal of taxes for public services. If we had to replace everything as soon as we had something better I don't think I'd have much money left in my pockets.
 
Belz... said:
That's because you're not reading the thread. Phantomwolf seems to have answered it.
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Are you being funny? If you read where Phantomwolf explained it, why not just say the answer?

Also, how does he know when nobody else does?
 
r-j said:
Where is the radioactive material coming from? That seems to be the question everybody is asking. That nobody can answer it, it seems most strange.

Cesium and Iodine were detected right away after the first explosion. Where did it come from?
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It is from the damaged fuel...when uranium 235 fissions, there a bunch of different fission products, most are radioactive. Some are useful, most are just waste. There are different yield for different elements...see link below. Some of the highest yields are iodine and cesium...so they are likely to be found if fission products escape. Plus they are dangerous due to their interaction in the body. Strontium 90 is also a problem as it is a bone seeking element...any radioactive element that head for bones are bad as it damages marrow. That is the problem with plutonium. However, if you swallow plutonium, it really isn't any more dangerous than any heavy metal. It will go through you and end up in the toilet. Plutonium is only a problem if inhaled--small amounts are dangerous. Chelation does work however and can reduce the associated risk.

glenn

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fission_product_yield
 
I meant, how is radioactive material from either the reactors, or the spent fuel rods, how is it ending up in California?

When they are "venting" radioactive steam, that isn't putting matter into the air, is it? Where is the metallic radioactive elements coming from? And how are they leaving the plant?
 
I mean, when I read something like the following:

It occurred in a holding vessel around reactor three at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi plant, and forced engineers to consider releasing more radioactive material into the atmosphere. A similar tactic produced explosions during the early days of the crisis.

Officials warned that a release of radiation this time would be larger than in previous releases because more nuclear fuel had degraded.

They said the process could involve the emission of a cloud dense with iodine, as well as the radioactive elements krypton and xenon.
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...ear-crisis-Fukushima-50-face-new-setback.html

Why is there radioactive material in the pressurized system they have to vent? Why is it in steam? And what caused this?
 
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