From World Nuclear News:
All four units at the Fukushima Daini nuclear power plant have now achieved cold shutdown – where coolant water is at less than 100ºC – with full operation of cooling systems, Tepco reported. All the reactors shut down automatically during last week’s earthquake and have remained safe. While unit 3’s shutdown went as expected, damage to the emergency core cooling systems of units 1, 2 and 4 led to the announcement of emergency status. These three reactors were prepared for potential pressure release, but this was never required. Unit 1 announced cold shutdown at 1.24 am on 14 March and unit 2 followed at 3.52 am. Tepco has now announced that unit 4 achieved cold shutdown at 7.15 pm on 15 March. Water levels are now stable in all four reactors and offsite power is available, the company said.
One down, one (Daiici) to go.
Which is great news if you’re able to bracket out the sad reality that your dream for a countryside peopled by mutant teenage ninja cheerleader zombies all but dies with cold shutdown.
And by “your,” I of course mean “my”.
(h/t Joe)
I suppose this means no vagina bubbles from hell, either.
it’ll be a bummer for shemp if this thing is resolved and he has to go back to counting the bodies washing ashore and no looting. sh*t ” i could dat from nyc” says shemp.
i don’t think that this type of “diversity” is wanted by the mbm. no good mayhem to show.
Blake, the vagina bubbles from hell was awesome. Arigatou gozaimasu, TaiChiWawa.
There are still problems at some of the nearby plants. http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/ But I am not getting upset over a lack of nuclear disaster.
That’s teenage mutant ninja midget cheerleader zombies… cause nothing says WINNING like enjoying 6 inch cheerleaders blowing hot air through megaphones standing in a forest of pubes worshiping phalli. Except on Japanese pron of course.
It’s not a dream. From what I’ve seen lately at the malls it appears that most teenagers are mutant zombies. [sigh] And I’m beginning to sound like my grandmother.
That’s all good, but what’s up with the spent fuel at #4? Tell me that’s under control and I’ll feel a lot better.
The people who’ve been wrasslin’ this mess are incredible studs. God bless ’em.
fox news sux: between hannity and shemp talking about nosense:
hey we have vid of shit blowing up!!11!!
“Tell me that’s under control and I’ll feel a lot better. ”
1/2 million japs in shelters don’t care
1/2 millions japs in shelters? Voluntarily? Shit, why all the noise about Korematsu?
MegaPalin has spoken.
About the $4.00 gas and lack of energy policy. I haven’t seen a comment on facebook, but she tweeted on the Japanese crisis. Then some fool took offense for her labeling it “turbulent times.” :eyeroll:
Yeah, I get that. But there’s still pretty big stakes behind whether or not they lose containment here. I’ll like it a lot better if they don’t.
>There are still problems at some of the nearby plants.<
Like what? The site you link to, and nothing I've heard and read says anything of the kind. There is a fire at one of this plants multiple units. Are you sure you're not misinterpreting multiple _units_ as multiple _plants?_
Anyway, you'll know what will happen though, the greenies and the doomsayers will say it's all a lie and then spend the next 60 years trying to prove every cancer death in the area as being caused by radiation.
Update: It's starting already. Some dumbass came on O'Reilly just now and played up all the supposed 'skepticism' that things are under control. Skepticism = greenie disappointment. Oh, he brings up being a "veteran" of Three Island Mile. Like that means crap. What, because you covered TMI you're a nuclear expert now? Bad example anyway, as the doomsayers and "skeptics" were proven spectacularly wrong that TMI was a disaster. Other than financially it was a total non-disaster.
#6
They sell those in vending machines… the pom poms are a nice upgrade and worth the extra $$$.
Or so I’ve heard.
“But there’s still pretty big stakes behind whether or not they lose containment here. I’ll like it a lot better if they don’t.”
the spent fuel rods and the reactors are 2 different concerns.
Way OT. In which one of my liberal FB friends demonstrates the value that educated liberals bring to political discourse.
U.S. Stung By Latest Undercover Sting
reason.com
Exposing the truth about Barack Obama’s presidency
http://reason.com/archives/2011/03/15/us-stung-by-latest-undercover
#
Warren XXXXXXXX: Beautiful.
47 minutes ago · LikeUnlike
#
Jason XXXXXXXX: Gonzo journalism?
38 minutes ago · LikeUnlike
#
James XXXXXXXXX: how is this a hoax? I think it’s called getting elected.. sorry you don’t like him, get over it
27 minutes ago · LikeUnlike
#
[Benedick]: Jim. It’s satire. Take a deep breath.
27 minutes ago · LikeUnlike
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James XXXXXXXXX: sorry, with the way the right-wing spin/smear machine is it’s hard to tell sometimes.. personally I prefer the onion & south park for my satire..
8 minutes ago · LikeUnlike
#
[Benedick: Well it’s good to hear the machine is firing on all cylinders. For what it’s worth I generally prefer NPR for my satire.
>That’s all good, but what’s up with the spent fuel at #4? Tell me that’s under control and I’ll feel a lot better.<
By 'spent fuel' you mean what exactly? There is no spent fuel. The only problem at #4 is a fire. The fire is around an area of a *spare* fuel tank, but there is no leak and I'm once whatever radiation is around it dies down they will go in there and put it out.
Of course, fires do make good fodder for the haters. 'OMIGOD, A FIRE! WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!'
By ‘spent fuel’ you mean what exactly? There is no spent fuel. The only problem at #4 is a fire. The fire is around an area of a *spare* fuel tank, but there is no leak and I’m sure once whatever radiation is around it dies down they will go in there and put it out.
Of course, fires do make good fodder for the haters. ‘OMIGOD, A FIRE! WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE!’
As for any damaged fuel rods, it’s irrelevant right now because they are still within their containment fields and the reactors are in shutdown.
#4 reactor isn’t operational. That is where they were storing the spent fuel rods from the other containment covered reactors. Since they were using it’s cooling pool for storage, it doesn’t have the same containment covering on it. The fire there is not in a spare fuel tank, but in a spare reactor acting as a cooling pool for used fuel rods. The used fuel rods got jiggled around in the EQ and the coolant pool is now losing water as steam. The lack of water over the idle spent rods is a problem. A bigger problem as it doesn’t have the candy shell to prevent the chocolate from getting on your hands.
“sorry you don’t like him, get over it.”
Tell this guy, “Right, you mean like how liberals got over Bush being elected twice?”
Sorry, when Obama got elected with the help of illegal funds, fraud and lies I refuse to “get over it.”
His comment about a “right wing/spin machine” is the adult equivalent of a child sticking his/her fingers in their ears and screaming when they don’t want to hear something unpleasant.
Admit it “James”, your sacred liberal cows were busted being assholes. It’s the libs like you who claim otherwise who are doing the spinning.
“There is no spent fuel.”
yes there is:
“Update at 8:44 p.m. ET: There’s growing concern that the spent fuel rods at the No. 4 reactor at the Daiichi plant could reach “criticality” again and restart a nuclear chain reaction. Tokyo Electric Power Co. now says it might use helicopers to drop boric acid on the exposed fuel rods outside the plant, which was offline before Friday’s earthquake and tsunami. During normal operations, boron rods are used to control the nuclear reactions inside a reactor.”
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/ondeadline/post/2011/03/new-fire-reported-at-fukushima-reactor-no-4/1
I’m following the Reuters live feed. More of a pajamas feel to it, with none of the moronic talking heads.
Yes, they are. Both have implications.
“Yes, they are. Both have implications.”
sure but the spent fuel is at atmospheric press. and needs water circ. while the reactor is pressurized and needs venting. effin’ electricity for pumps is helpful.
i wonder why generators are not on site at this time to power the pumps to cool these units down. this is the problem. and don’t tell me about plugs that don’t fit: splice them idiots.
The wirings and stuff were probably damaged/corroded in the sea water infused tsunami as I read somewhere that the designers put the electrical stuff in some stupid low lying location that would be prone to flooding.
fail: greta/fox lead: tsunami vid talk over RADIATION CRISES then to shemp.
internet not pr pukes
“The wirings and stuff were probably damaged/corroded in”
cut cable “a” device, cut cable “b”device. join cable a to cable b easy peasy. this stuff ain’t global warming.
Um, no. I’m looking at “Spent Fuel Integrity” and seeing “SFP level low, injecting water”. I think I’m more worried about containment right now than I have been since this started. I’ll feel a lot better when I know they’ve got the containment pool full and cooling at #4.
They did. The indigenous stuff got swamped by the tsunami. They’ve been playing catch up, very fucking admirably, ever since.
Plus, it’s not like they can choo-choo the backups down there or send a long haul trucker with the parts. The choo-choos aren’t running much at all (subject to blackouts and only to just north of Tokyo where the tracks got washed out) and the roads aren’t exactly in solid condition.
Could they fly them in by copter? Hell if I know, but the no fly zone keeps expanding and if they did, they have to land somewhere outside of ground zero and then the backups would still need to be lifted, carted and placed which they may not have the heavy machinery on location to do. Guess they could chopper in some loaders and stuff though they would need the big Russian copters to do it. Would you volunteer to man that flight?
“They did. The indigenous stuff got swamped by the tsunami.”
yes of course. my thought were to why new back ups were not being brought to the site. logistics in an emergency.
Choo-choo from a vending machine takes a platinum card
I love the smell of gyros. Burnt Goat? Not so much.
“Could they fly them in by copter? ”
yes they could at this time. and there is a carrier group positioned off shore to take an existing generator(S) to the site. they may be doing this but i don’t know. just positing available choices
“Would you volunteer to man that flight?”
@ 12,000 miles, it is not about me. rather try to rectify the problem. you ready for apollo 13?
oh just want to say that in a 1st world culture like japan there is a redundancy built in that only needs some thought about where such things are located. you can move those chips up to eliminate a pressing problem.
They ruled out choppering in the water to put out the fire (think California wildfires) as too hazardous for the choppers and crews. The area fit for landing that is close enough to the reactors is too close for a blast wave if they go boom again. I think they don’t have the proper loading equipment on site to move anything from very far away as it was damaged/swept out in the tsunami.
And yes there is a carrier group just offshore, but they have been repositioning to stay out of the radiation. You really think O is gonna give the go ahead to actually use one of their choppers (which are probably not large enough anyways – Sarcovski’s or whatever they are called are BFDs) and have it deliberately move into the radiation zone? LOL
By tomorrow, the USS Tortuga, along with the rest of the Essex Amphibious Ready Group, will be arriving on station off of Japan to take part in the aid mission already underway.
Part of their aircraft complement are MH-53E Super Stallions, awesome indeed among US whirlygigs…
If I recall, their payload capability is on the order of 15 tons…
That covers a vast range of items.
“Apparently” it’s back to “we’re all gonna die” status.
(And by “we”, I of course mean “them”. And by “all” I mean maybe some Japanese dude will get crushed by another crane, or fall in a hole, or something.)
Still, Kyodo News is saying the situation has “worsened considerably”. And a Washington think-tank of some sort is saying “level 7 disaster, all the way baby!” or some such.
Word out of Tokyo is that Shep Smith has put on his best frowny-face. Reports of radioactive, cannibalistic rape-gangs are as of yet unconfirmed. But we’ll report ’em anyway!
And the Navy has already been flying missions for the last few days; the crews and their aircraft have been “cleaned up” (NBC protocal) once arriving back on board the carrier. But the Essex ARG has much larger helos than are currently on station…
That was part of my point, Bob. The usual complement on a Carrier is not large-ass mechanized haulers.
Yes, they have been flying helo missions, but they are mostly operating in the Sendai and points north areas – well north of the reactors at any event. They spent part of the first two days just ferrying shit from Okinawa to Japanese bases farther north just to reposition staff and supplies for the search and rescue and humanitarian ops. Those were mostly Hueys from what I could tell.
“The area fit for landing that is close enough to the reactors is too close for a blast wave if they go boom again.”
the boom is from the reactors not the cooling ponds. it helps if (no slam on you) people know what the eff they are talking about.
The reactors contain cooling ponds do they not? Isn’t the cooling pond supposed to keep the rods covered in water inside the containment pod and thus cooled? And when the water turns to steam from heat buildup the pond evaporates and needs an… infusion of water to keep the rods covered and thus cooled.
Excuse me, but this might help… http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/world/japan-nuclear-reactors-and-seismic-activity/ It even includes pictures.
The diagrams call the cooling ponds suppression pools. Distinction without a difference. Point being… shit around the area right now has a nasty habit of going boom and they don’t want copters even near the boom possible zone trying to add water to stuff located inside the actual boom zone.
How many people have died in the NUCLEAR FUCKING MELTDOWN???? How many people have died on vanishing high speed rail? I can’t be the only person to have noticed this. Surely, someone in the media…
Ruh roh.
From the Reuters live link, above…
I thought it was that only 50 were left. Out of the original 800.
See tweet: http://twitter.com/andylevy/statuses/47852031679004672
What’s the core root of 50? From the NYT’s description of the ones left behind, I’ll bet none of them would leave if any were staying.
“shit around the area right now has a nasty habit of going boom and they don’t want copters even near the boom possible zone trying to add water to stuff located inside the actual boom zone.”
maybe military people should be exposed to “war like” CONDITIONS. go back to the golf “game”. ease your hysteria.
More cross translation confusion. Or cross posting confusion. Or the press got it wrong confusion. Or the PM is not up to date confusion.
Sure am glad that Jeffy is running OMG updates above the comment bar each time something is Eleventied!!1!! to the 11th degree by one of us. It’s almost like he cares about having the most up to the second reporting – accuracy and screechyness be damned.
Cause cautious reporting is just not what a good man would do.
what is the half life of a steam/hydrogen explosion from a cooling tank?
what “radioactive” substances are released?
What fucking hysteria on my part?
This informational post that the ‘spare fuel tank’ description like it’s some kinda gas storage unit that someone mentioned was wrong. Or my subsequent posts that attempted to piss on your parade that the Japanese Aren’t! Doing! Enough! and should like get some stuff in there STAT!!!! and fix it. The doofuses!!!!!!
Go suck on a blowfish. You’ve done nothing but make pronouncements on what they should be doing and making suggestions that a quick call to the supplier to FEDEX shit off their shelves and voila crisis averted.
to the point: what are you talking about?
Seems not all is well in Obamaland. Even the pollsters are getting the willies.
“The fire there is not in a spare fuel tank, but in a spare reactor acting as a cooling pool for used fuel rods.”
there ain’t no “spare reactor” here get up to speed on cooling rod storage,
link
Back on the job…
I’ll sleep on that.
Umm. This.
I have no hysteria. I seriously doubt the folks in charge in Japan would not be exploring every option and have much better knowledge of on the ground “logistics” (your word) capacity and am not the one shooting solutions out my pie hole to cream the faces of the poor government over there cause they aren’t doing the “logistical” steps as outlined by you. Which you then add the comment that “you’re just positing the available choices” seems to imply their acumen ain’t up to your level of acceptability as far as cribbing out their options and such.
“Which you then add the comment that “you’re just positing the available choices” seems to imply their acumen ain’t up to your level of acceptability as far as cribbing out their options and such.”
no war gaming from 12,000 miles away. while you are thinking that
“but in a spare reactor acting as a cooling pool for used fuel rods.”
stupid thoughts about the actual situation. stick to golf dear.
I am up to speed on the particulars of how THIS particular plant is/was storing their particular spent fuel rods. We are past the theory and proof designs posted on Science sites and are in real world what is on the ground reality.
Their fucking spent fuel rods are in an inactive reactor (#4) and that was the current on the ground scenario AT THIS PARTICULAR FACILITY at the time of the EQ and tsunami. That inactive reactor was acting as a storage facility for fuel rods.
Geez. What part of theories on paper are often not reality don’t you understand. Are you in some kind of Socialist stupor whereby theories work 100% in practice and contact with human failings has no adverse effect on the models?
it helps to keep the words to mean something like “reactor” and “cooling pond” or “19 hole”
http://bravenewclimate.com/2011/03/16/fukushima-16-march-summary/
“What part of theories on paper are often not reality don’t you understand. ”
cooling ponds and reactors. know the difference. then let us talk.
Why hover your helicopter crews dropping mere buckets of water one at a time when you can get sustained streams on it from ground level?
“Their fucking spent fuel rods are in an inactive reactor”
they have been there for some time dear. years. stick to your golf.
yea now might be the time to review: COOLING POND BASICS over to you shemp
They may have been trying to actually save some of the reactors so they could be repaired in the near future. It is hard to see the real story of what is going on.
I do find it funny that no MSM network has brought up the idea of finally storing some of our more hazardous nuclear wast at he site in Nevada. If they aren’t going to us it then Harry should have to give all the money back that went to its construction.
Why do you think the Japanese media are referring to #4 as a “spent fuel pool?” Link
stupid thoughts about the actual situation. stick to golf dear.
Usually I’d say it’s hard for a jackass to go off half cocked, but then you must be used to working with subpar equipment.
“They may have been trying to actually save some of the reactors so they could be repaired in the near future.”
that is a problem when you don’t know that these reactors would be shut down within 6 months because they have reached their 40 year limit.
There was media reportage earlier in the day (NPK reporting via Sky News) referring to #4 as a storage unit that was offline when the EQ hit. It was not being used to generate power, but to ‘store’ spent fuel rods. The earlier reportage also indicated the possible increased severity of the problem in #4 was due to the fact that since it was not being used to generate power, some of the containments around found around 1,2 and 3 are not currently in place in #4 and thus the possibility of containment was less than it was for 1,2 and 3.
“Why do you think the Japanese media are referring to #4 as a “spent fuel pool?”
why do you link to an english source saying that the fire isn’t in the fuel rod pool?
also:”That inactive reactor was acting as a storage facility for fuel rods.”
no there is a reactor. there is a cooling pond. 2 different things. stay with golf.
“(NPK reporting via Sky News) referring to #4 as a storage unit that was offline when the EQ hit. It was not being used to generate power, but to ‘store’ spent fuel rods. ”
go get ’em jourNOlist majors. ezra klein says that’s old
“The earlier reportage also indicated the possible increased severity of the problem in #4 was due to the fact that since it was not being used to generate power, some of the containments around found around 1,2 and 3 are not currently in place in #4 and thus the possibility of containment was less than it was for 1,2 and 3.”
you got that from shemp smith right? also which plant at Fukushima?
Try this if it hasn’t been linked yet.
nr – you may be right. I know that some of the plants had been upgraded, but could not find details. Our own plants have been operating past their retire dates, and also working more efficiently.
On a side note – Shemp is my second favorite Stooge. Please no comparisons.
What part of
indicates I said it was “in the pool?”
I said it was not as dref reported (spare fuel tank) and I was careful to designate it as a spare reactor acting as a cooling pool for storage.
If you want to parse further, I never indicated where, in the spare reactor housing, the fire was located. Last I saw, they weren’t sure about the fire’s source. Now they are indicating a floor level and other more specific points. The speculation I had seen earlier was that the lack of water in #4 cause the stored rods to produce enough heat to ignite something in the building. I actually didn’t note that as it was ‘speculation.’
My parsing has been to distinguish the reactors as to what they are/were at the point of the EQ. 1,2 and 3 were not like 4. 1,2 and 3 were being used as and acting as ‘reactors’ in the normal usage of the term – and were on line and active. Unit 4 was a different animal and was being used as and acting as a ‘storage facility’ – which coincidentally doesn’t have the same protections as 1,2 and 3 and thus inactive as far as power production.
According to reporting on Sky News (not shemp), some of the reactors had been upgraded, but I don’t remember if it was the Dai-ones or the Dai-twos or the Tokai ones.
A rather good updating storyline is actually to be found here. Surprisingly it is not hypercritical of nuclear power as an energy source.
Go figure.
You can’t fight in here! This is the War Room!
Fukushima Nuclear Accident – a simple and accurate explanation.
Thanks geoffb – Considering the age of these plants they will almost certainly be closed. I’d really like to see a nation go ahead with pebble bead reactors and some of the more modern safety precautions. I see no reason that it can’t work, other than the political opposition.
*LNG also would seem to provide a great future power alternative; however, I’m not even sure if they are allowed to dock in the U.S.
Thorium Reactors seem like a good viable alternative. Link.
It’s not like this stuff is rocket science. It’s just that one of the convenient by products of current day reactors was shit that could be used to build a nuke. Other forms of nuclear energy are actually cheaper than the ones currently in use and have a much smaller footprint.
your likability quotient has skyrocketed to Obama levels newrouter!
It only takes a minute particulate of airborne plutonium to start a lung cancer.
…from the Reuters live update thinger.
Why the pools are ‘on top’ of the buildings is curious. It’s best to cooperate with gravity, because gravity will never stop yanking at’cha. If these ‘pools’ were punctured, water drains out.
There’s much to learn from this disaster, to incorporate into future designs. If we are allowed to have a future, that is.
A few points of clarification (sorry to be so late to the party).
1) Fukushima Daiini is about 10 miles from Fukushima Daiichi. Daiini shut down as it should have, and nobody is talking about it. When Jeff posted the above, it was in regards to a different reactor complex than the one everyone has been following. This may have been apparent to the readers, but I didn’t see the distinction mentioned above, so I’m mentioning it now.
2) A suppression pool and a spent fuel storage pool are two very different things. The first is a big donut under the main pressure vessel that is used for bleeding off excess steam and pressure. The second is a big swimming pool located outside the reactor, but within the building. For reference, it is believed that the suppression pool (the donut) in #2 was damaged the other day, and there is great anxiety over the condition, temperature, and water levels in the swimming pool in #4.
3) To serr8d’s point: I’m not sure that an off-the-cuff comment from “OpinionatedArmchairExpert” is the sort of thing I’d pass along without getting some verification.
But… REUTERS~!!11!1!
Why the pools are ‘on top’ of the buildings is curious.
The storage pools are at the top of the reactor assembly because you need to get at them with cranes when you’re fueling/unfueling the reactor. Storing them too far away causes significant issues with transporting them to the reactor assembly at refueling time. You want to minimize the amount of time that the rods are exposed.
As a temporary spot, sure, store ’em on top of the reactors. But if they sit there 20-30 years, that’s problematic. Put ’em in a lead condom, eventually, and get ’em as low down as you can. I hear Nevada has a perfect spot…
Squid —
I called it one of two and noted Daiici is the other.
Once they’ve cooled enough to be stable, they’re usually encased and put into dry storage casks for long-term storage. The problem with the #4 pool is that the Daiichi plant had three reactors offline for maintenance, so you’ve got three reactors’ worth of fuel in the pool, plus whatever inventory was cooling down in there to begin with.
I’m a physics nerd and a nuke geek, so I’m not going to pretend to be objective here, but from my perspective, we’re seeing what happens when everything goes wrong. Earthquake, tidal wave, no electricity, contaminated water, pumps offline/damaged, storage tank unusually full, no transportation, emergency services otherwise occupied, workers distracted by family situations. We’ve got explosions, fires, radiation spikes, idiot newscasters helping anti-nuke “scientists” spread FUD like it’s going out of style, and what I could swear was a brief appearance by Cthulu himself. And yet overall, radiation exposure has been surprisingly modest. I wouldn’t be surprised if the technicians were breaking rules on exposure, and some of them may get sick as a result, but nobody’s glowing in the dark. And this really is the worst-case scenario.
If these guys pull this off, I hope they all wind up gaining Spider-Man powers. They’ve earned it. If they don’t pull it off, and everything goes pear-shaped, I look forward to many years of sitting in the dark, freezing my ass off while the Brazilians enjoy all their petroleum wealth.
I saw that you noted it, but I wasn’t sure that the audience was reading closely. At the office, I’ve had any number of cow-orkers see “Fukushima” and think it’s all one and the same.
Someone should contrast and compare, eloquently, that these 50 workers who are staying behind to work their asses off and trying not to think of what the future might hold for them personally are certainly not Fleebaggers. Nor are they as the little prezzident man and his staff, undecided and unsure, when confronted with 3:00 AM phone calls.
“DANGER – Zombie Ninjas
Keep Weapons Loaded”
So much for my “Safari Park” business plan…
Squid,
Since the #4, #5, and #6 units were all down for inspection, the ponds next to the main containment stored only the spent fuel rods that had been removed from each reactor. These had been removed over 100 days ago according to this here.
omeone should contrast and compare, eloquently, that these 50 workers who are staying behind to work their asses off and trying not to think of what the future might hold for them personally are certainly not Fleebaggers. Nor are they as the little prezzident man and his staff, undecided and unsure, when confronted with 3:00 AM phone calls.
That’s not really a fair comparison- those workers with Obama. I mean, for one, all the golf courses are prolly not in very good shape after the tsunami.
They simply don’t have the same temptations as the POTUS.
Last night I posted..
Now, I hate to be the one to link to the crazy bastards at Infowars, but they’ve come up with some good data…
Ignoring the typical Infowars-patented feverish finger-pulling, if one can believe their numbers, it’s staggering. Those spent fuel rods should’ve been sequestered somewhere else.
What were Japan’s plans for long-term storage? They’ve no Yucca Mountain repository, obviously. And waiting around until ‘this’ happened didn’t work out so well.
GE Fuel Rod
Fuel Pellet Diameter: 1.04 cm
Fuel Pellet Height: 1.04 cm
Fuel Material: UO2
Cladding Diameter (O.D.): 1.23 cm
Cladding Thickness: 0.81 mm
Cladding Material: Zircaloy
That’s one fuel rod. 63 in an assembly would be on the order of 2 feet long and slightly less than 1/2 inch in diameter.
“Fukushima redux – design basis Godzilla?
“ More info and a new update coming for March 17.
Here’s an exploration of the cultural changes Japan is facing.