This image accompanies Ashai Shinbum’s Fukushima coverage today, which reports that radioactive iodine in the discharge to the sea continues to grow. There have also been high levels of radiation discovered outside of the evacuation zone (up to 40 km north). The levels there are twice the level that triggered evacuations around Chernobyl, yet no evacuation has occurred.
Some good/bad news from WNN about radioactive water in trenches around the plants is that the bulk of the water in those open trenches probably came from the tsunami, not just from plant leakage.
If you want to know what the US can do now to avoid this kind of accident at its plants, Dave Lochbaum’s testimony to Congress [pdf] is a relatively short and very readable list of things that need to be done to deal with plant blackout and spent fuel.
Damned at Random
It seems wasteful to me that “spent” rods are still producing enough energy to burn without being submerged in circulating water. If we are going to use this dangerous power source, why are we not wringing every BTU possible from the “spent” fuel?
Tom Levenson
I am pro-nuclear, in the sense that a well run and very well regulated nuclear industry seems to me essential to bridge the gap between peak oil and a sustainable renewable-energy economy.
I’m anti nuclear in that there is no evidence that industry can run itself well, nor that regulators can avoid poorly-run industry capture.
Sincerely Yours, shivering in the dark.
Fuck U6: A More Accurate Measure of the Total Amount of Duck-Fuckery in the Economy
Damned at Random: Energy density.
mistermix
@Damned at Random: The amount of waste heat in a nuclear plant is astonishing – IIRC, only 1/3 of the energy emitted by the core is actually used.
Jude
@mistermix: There’s a lot of “waste heat” in every power source, not just nuclear.
[Insert long comment about Carnot efficiency and Rankine cycles here.]
cleek
@mistermix:
roughly the same thing is true with coal or oil plants: 33% thermal efficiency is average.
fasteddie9318
Has anybody been reading Brave New Climate? With my (seriously low) level of knowledge about nuclear power, I can’t figure out if it’s the lone outlet of reason amid a bunch of ignorance and fearmongering or if it’s putting a happy face in what’s going on because it has an agenda to push.
PeakVT
I wrote a letter to the Vermont Legislature (which I can’t print and send because my printer just broke) on Vermont Yankee and the Fukushima crisis.
mistermix
@Jude:
@cleek: Thanks for the info.
Cermet
@mistermix: True but that has to only do with the laws of thermodyamnics – not engineering. The waste heat on a huge reactor core is much less than most other power production devices – that is why they are built with such high density cores with enriched uranium – it is much more cost effective. Of course, that also means that there is a LOT of heat that must be removed even with the control rods in place. I guess there are big down sides, too. One reason the CANDU reactor is safer – far less latent heat (and less cost effective, however.) Still, looks like a power company could save many tens of billions by building CANDU’s rather than our sub based designs so when an acsident does happen, no core melt down with no coolant flow – also, fewer safety systems required.
Troll alert – yes, I know the enrichment value and that subs are PWR and plants are BWR and there is no f’ing real differnce so why bother with making noise just to try and post (unless you get paid to post, then please DO post – in this economy, its as good a job as one could hope for!)
Punchy
You and your fancy-pants “km” shit. Get your nancy yurrupean units outta here. I want it in fathoms or perches, bitches.
daveNYC
@Punchy: Quiet heathen! Everyone knows that the only true units of measurement are cubits and spans.
Roger Moore
@Cermet:
If you know that the Fukushima reactors aren’t actually based on sub designs, either historically or in important engineering details, why do you keep repeating it? It isn’t adding to your argument. It hurts your credibility with people who know something about reactors without being especially convincing to people who don’t. There are enough good, strong arguments about why our existing designs are unsafe that you don’t need to bolster them with stuff about sub reactors that gives nitpickers an excuse to argue with you about details.
Face
@Punchy: I expected all you nerds here to clamor for Parsecs.
Fuck U6: A More Accurate Measure of the Total Amount of Duck-Fuckery in the Economy
cermet: Did Just Some Fuckhead die and make you God of Balloon Juice?
TJ
@cleek:
Somewhat higher efficiencies for oil and coal steam plants, since they can get higher water temperatures than nuclear.
Insert [blah blah Carnot blah blah Rankine blah blah entropy]
TJ
@Cermet:
No, actually the waste heat is less on combined cycle plants.
Insert [blah blah Carnot blah blah Rankine blah blah blah blah Brayton blah blah entropy]
catclub
@Face: Also, barns.
becquerels are nice, and henry’s, and coulombs.
els and furlongs have their uses, too.
I cannot remember the unit used for measuring the Cambridge bridge, but know it ends in an ear.
Roger Moore
@catclub:
I think you’re thinking of Smoots. Personally, I’m a big fan of stadia and talents. And Thompsons are awesome, though I only think that for professional reasons. The best unit of all, though, is the part per million; everyone loves parts per million.
catclub
@Roger Moore: Yes, Smoots!
I forgot teslas and webers and farads.
Those E-M guys! Of course, there are also einsteins and fermis. Steradians are more of a dimensionless unit.
Robert Sneddon
@cleek: The UK has a small fleet of Advanced Gas-cooled Reactors (AGRs) that get about 40% thermal efficiency. Their design was based on the projected price of uranium going up during their operational period due to scarcity and many more reactors being built worldwide hence the drive for thermal efficiency. In the event uranium remained abundant and cheap and there wasn’t the expected upsurge in reactor building. The AGR design is noticeably more expensive to build than light-water reactors, using carbon dioxide as coolant.
A friend of mine got invited for a behind-the-scenes trip to the local AGR plant at Torness near Edinburgh and he wrote an article about it:
http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/rants/nothing-like-this-will-be-buil.html
Captain Goto
@Tom Levenson: as a former employee of a Navy nuke contractor, I will add “What you said.”
In that job, I saw people willing to make their underlings miserable NOT for an extra buck wrung out of the customers (because they didn’t have any), but to insure that things RAN SAFELY. Because Hyman Rickover didn’t want his reputation going down along with some sunken nuke sub.
After that experience I found it hard to believe that ANY commercial enterprise would EVER take safety that seriously, if their first priority was profits–which (by definition of “commercial”) it has to be.
MikeJ
@Captain Goto:
You should remember, the military is the only branch of government that doesn’t have to run efficiently. Every other part is subject to people poring over the budgets to wring every last nickel out of it so that they can give millionaires a tax break.
Independent oversight of government spending is obviously a good thing in most cases. I don’t believe it’s compatible with safety though, and in the end, when the argument comes down to money or safety, there will be less safety.
Robert Sneddon
@catclub: Barns are good, too, and on-topic as the barn is the unit of nuclear cross-sectional area, i.e. how easy or not it is to hit a given nucleus with a particle such as a neutron. It derives from the phrase “You couldn’t hit the side of a barn” rather than being named after some famous dead scientist.
Bill H.
Wait a minute. The “radioactive water in the trenches” came from the tsnuami? If it did not come from the reactor, how did it get radioactive?
Bill H.
@MikeJ:
Hahahahah. You should go on tour.
gex
Fucking thermodynamics and diminishing returns. How do they work?
gex
@Roger Moore: I’m a angstrom fan, myself.
WereBear
@Captain Goto: Mr WereBear, who worked a lot with the Navy, cites the excellent record of nuclear subs as a way of making sure it gets done, right.
Because we do need both; we must have nuclear, and we must have it safely.
Incoherent Dennis SGMM
Will no one stand up for coulombs or even regular ohms?
Roger Moore
@Incoherent Dennis SGMM:
No. I will stand up for the MΩcm, though; 18.2 MΩcm is a great resistivity, though anything over 10 is still useful.
catclub
@gex: Just don’t call it an angstrom unit. That is like a PIN number or an ATM machine.
Fuck U6: A More Accurate Measure of the Total Amount of Duck-Fuckery in the Economy
catclub: Insert CD or DVD disc into drive.
Gravenstone
@Cermet: You know, fucknuts, people might take you a bit more seriously if you stop accusing everyone who dares disagree with you of being a fucking troll!
Bob L
Can we get some love for the Hertz? Without those cycles none of this happens.
catclub
@Bob L: They rent motorcycles now? Who knew?
also, anyone else know what a sverdrup is?
Jude
All of these unit lovers, and no one mentions the mho.
Best. Unit. Ever.
/Other than the one in my pants.
//Shows self out
Fuck U6: A More Accurate Measure of the Total Amount of Duck-Fuckery in the Economy
Heh, go over to the Oil Drum and you might decide that this is the right week to start shooting Her0in into your pen1s.