Two Deep Nuclear Thoughts
I have a nuclear reactor in my back yard. If the Japanese can’t design a safe nuclear reactor, can anybody?
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I have a nuclear reactor in my back yard. If the Japanese can’t design a safe nuclear reactor, can anybody?
Connect with us on the following social media platforms.
And the PR value of their names is priceless!
They make folks feel all warm and fuzzy and get them to forget about three-eyed fish, year round tans and fleeing for their lives on the occasion of an “event”.
They didn’t design it did they. It was GE. The two biggest stupids here are putting any nuke plant on a fault line (Delaware River has a fault line) and not putting the water pumps up above the sea water-rise levels.
“PLANNING” OR “LACK OF PLANNING”
Most likely a safe nuclear unit facility can be built, but it may be that nuclear engineers, scientists, politicians, work for the economy and benefit of the industry, rather than at the creation of a ‘safe’ facility. Failure to build a safe unit, is a failure of desire, not ability.
Part of “Planning” should be – to avoid at all cost, incorporating the worse case scenario as part of the Plan.
The world is seeing what nuclear power can do when science and engineering are ignored to engage in “faulty planning,” due to economy of location outranking the concern over nuclear’s dirty power and it’s consequences.
At Salem/Hope Creek, “Planning” should avoid mixing faulty, old reactors with newer (especially when “planners” are promoting four or five reactors at the same location.) Also, older units should meet the newest safety standards.
Because of the meltdown of one or more units, emergency personnel are evacuated. Even planes can’t be flown by to dump water, war ships back off at Fukushima Dai-Ichi atomic facility. All six on site reactors/plus the spent fuel at Fukushima can’t be observed, regulated, controlled, because of nearby worse case scenarios taking place and the lack of adequate personnel to control six units plus spent fuel, in extreme trouble. The world will soon see what happens when six reactors are at one location, obviously built for the economy of location rather than safety planning.
Has the same “lack of planning” been built into the existing units across the Delaware River? If one unit goes into meltdown, what about the other units, the fallout radii?
Another ‘lack of planning’ {called the “planning area,”} involves the ignored (predictable) results for the highly populated Delaware area and people near Salem/Hope Creek otherwise known as the “nuclear fallout radii” involving millions of people, hundreds of billions of land use dollars, production, farming, water resources, transportation, etc.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hope_Creek-Salem_Nuclear-2.jpg
“No region in America has as many people living within the overlapping 50-mile planning areas of so many nuclear power reactors.” Quote from News Journal.
Scroll down to 2nd map showing ten mile radius ‘planning area’ including mid Delaware
http://www.preparede.org/home/nuclear-accident
Under “Protect Yourself” wait for map of nuclear radii, showing more U.S. nuclear “Planning.”
http://www.nukepills.com/nuclear-reactor-maps.htm
problem posting
“The plant operator described No. 3 — the only reactor that uses plutonium in its fuel mix — as the “priority.” Experts described plutonium as a very nasty isotope that could cause cancer if very small quantities were ingested.” “The situation at No. 4 reactor, where the fire broke out, was “not so good,” TEPCO added, while water was being poured into reactors No.5 and 6, indicating the entire six-reactor facility was now at risk of overheating.” The Vancouver Sun,March 17, 2011 12:24 AM
Gregory Jaczko, Chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission told Congress that he believed all the water in the spent fuel pool at the No. 4 reactor at the plant had boiled dry, leaving the fuel rods exposed and bleeding radiation, reports The New York Times. (3/17/11 5:31 a.m.)
“We believe that radiation levels are extremely high, which could possibly impact the ability to take corrective measures,” he said. “My understanding is there is no water in the spent fuel pool. I hope my information is wrong. It’s a terrible tragedy for Japan.” The New York Times states, “If the assessment of the situation is accurate, radiation levels would make it difficult to fix the No. 4 reactor as well as service the other reactors at the plant. Workers could then be forced to completely vacate the plant, and the fuel rods and spent fuel pools would be left to meltdown.”
“The units housing the Nos. 1, 2 and 3 reactors have all been hit by explosions, and their radioactive cores have begun to at least partially melt down, authorities have acknowledged. Fires broke out for two days running in the building housing the No. 4 reactor, and temperatures have been rising in Nos. 5 and 6.”
“The White House recommended Wednesday that U.S. citizens stay about 50 miles away from the plant,” the Los Angeles Times reports. (3/17/11)
“Jaczko told lawmakers that the 50-mile evacuation radius was based largely on concerns about the spent-fuel pool, which is believed to be seriously damaged and responsible for “very significant radiation levels likely around the site.” The pool, which contains an estimated 125 tons of uranium fuel pellets, is not enclosed in a containment vessel, and if the pellets start burning, radiation will escape directly into the environment.” If the backup efforts to cool the reactors were to fail, “it would be very difficult for the emergency workers to get near the reactors. The doses they could experience would potentially be lethal doses in a very short period of time,” Jaczko said. (L.A. Times 3/17/11)
BUILDING NUCLEAR UNITS WITH “PLANNING AREAS,” – TOO BIG TO FAIL
What energy production comes with a hundred mile diameter “planning area,” otherwise known as a nuclear fallout radius? Think about it. A hundred miles across is the approximate length of Delaware. What’s the acreage, the total population that are the “planned areas” of Salem/Hope Creek? What are the health, business, agricultural, infrastructural, governmental, financial losses that would be contained within the 10, 20, 50 mile fallout radii? Are the nuclear engineers, telling the industry, we can provide large volumes of cheap energy, in exchange for this large “planning area?”
Have nuclear engineers ‘overlooked’ the inherent problems of multi unit facilities and ‘on site storage’ of spent fuel, earthquake fault lines, flooding, the consequences of the breakdown of vital technology/equipment/machinery, or the intrinsic inability of emergency personnel to adequately approach (or live) after inspecting conditions/or working on damaged reactors/exposed spent fuel storage relating to the spread of nuclear fallout, thereby substituting “planning areas” (nuclear meltdown zones) instead of requiring foolproof safety measures be built into their systems?
Is planning/operating nuclear reactors, with it’s present lack of safety assurances, (thereby the need for ‘planning areas) considered more valuable then the health/lives of human populations, the natural environment, the massive destruction of land, waters, transportation systems, industrial and food productions, the U.S. economy contained within those massive zones; or is it less costly to require safe size/design/operation/location of all nuclear units.
‘Actual’ clean energy cost less. Why is it the energy industry prefers nuclear facilities over clean energy facilities?
Could it be because the fuel product, wind and sun, are free? Never mind that they have zero emissions and require no “planning areas”
Jason asks, “If the Japanese can’t design a safe nuclear reactor, can anybody?
Yes, you can.
Sell you house to a nuclear advocate (most likely republican.) Move to where the nuclear radius isn’t.
There is no ‘design’ excuse for the nuclear industry piling spent fuel in “your back yard.”
They do it, because they can.
http://www.delawareonline.com/article/20110318/NEWS02/103180368/Spent-fuel-rods-piling-up-nearby-nuclear-plants?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|Home