Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#11

Post by rosser » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 8:58 AM UTC

waterlesscloud wrote: post #4

I was a pretty solid supporter of nuclear power, but if Japan can't make it safe, I don't believe anyone can.

Fukushima Daiichi #1 is a couple weeks shy of 40 years old (from first criticality, 26 March 1971) at this point. There are a number of prototype, and production, reactor designs that are in principle "meltdown"-proof. That a reactor that old didn't survive one of the most massive earthquakes ever recorded is no basis for abandoning nuclear power.

Unfortunately, that's all we're going to hear from some corners of the nuclear debate, regardless of the facts.

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#12

Post by anigbrowl » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 8:59 AM UTC

mkramlich wrote: post #10

mkramlich wrote: post #7

There are actually whole websites and news channels dedicated to this sort of news. We don't need to turn HN into a sort of live streaming play-by-play about what's happening in Japan.

not cool to penalize my karma for a reasonable and honest comment trying to preserve site quality.

I can't downvote your comment, nor did I want to. I'm only posting this here because the English language media has been slow with their coverage and this is an exceptional situation.

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#13

Post by geuis » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 9:01 AM UTC

waterlesscloud wrote: post #4

I was a pretty solid supporter of nuclear power, but if Japan can't make it safe, I don't believe anyone can.

This is kind of like saying, "I really believe that commercial airlines are the safest way to travel, but if they can't keep them from crashing sometimes I won't ever fly again."

I know, its not an exact paraphrasing but the intent it still there. For one thing, the Japanese are not the super awesome technology supergiants that the common wisdom from the 1980's in the US makes them out to be. Europe, Japan, South Korea, and the U.S. are all technologically equivalent. Its more of a matter of how much certain tech is spread out. When it comes to stuff like nuclear plants, we're all basically the same.

Gotta give 'em a break. Japan, as far as I know, has not had many accidents. We've had a number of them including Three Mile. When something the size of a continental plate snaps with enough power to shift the speed of the planet and a country's position on the globe by over 10 feet, there's not a lot of blame that can be put if it happens near a nuclear reactor.

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#14

Post by maigret » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 9:02 AM UTC

waterlesscloud wrote: post #4

I was a pretty solid supporter of nuclear power, but if Japan can't make it safe, I don't believe anyone can.

This is actually a proof that nuclear energy is not green, not safe, and should not be used any more. Nuclear plants can't resist direct airliner impact or big earthquakes or anything that the engineer didn't think about.

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#15

Post by nathanhammond » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 9:04 AM UTC

The official line from the press conference being given by the Secretary General of Japan is "We don't know and we are investigating further, however radiation is still within acceptable levels." This means the only real update from this press conference is that the evacuation perimeter for Fukushima 2 (the second power plant) has been increased to 10km (from 3km).

To the contrary, however, somebody was quoted that the explosion was the containment building for reactor vessel 1. If that is the case it would pretty much be the worst case scenario for both Japan and the future of nuclear power.

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#16

Post by maigret » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 9:07 AM UTC

rosser wrote: post #11

waterlesscloud wrote: post #4

I was a pretty solid supporter of nuclear power, but if Japan can't make it safe, I don't believe anyone can.

Fukushima Daiichi #1 is a couple weeks shy of 40 years old (from first criticality, 26 March 1971) at this point. There are a number of prototype, and production, reactor designs that are in principle "meltdown"-proof. That a reactor that old didn't survive one of the most massive earthquakes ever recorded is no basis for abandoning nuclear power. Unfortunately, that's all we're going to hear from some corners of the…

German politicians voted runtime extensions for many nuclear plants. Many plants in the world are just old, because regularly rebuilding plants would make real green energies much more interesting. I think such a disaster on the environment justifies stopping using nuclear energy, even if it means more constraints on energy price and availability. If I look at the German nuclear energy discussion, there is a lot of greed involved. That is not something we can afford.

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#17

Post by waterlesscloud » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 9:07 AM UTC

geuis wrote: post #13

waterlesscloud wrote: post #4

I was a pretty solid supporter of nuclear power, but if Japan can't make it safe, I don't believe anyone can.

This is kind of like saying, "I really believe that commercial airlines are the safest way to travel, but if they can't keep them from crashing sometimes I won't ever fly again." I know, its not an exact paraphrasing but the intent it still there. For one thing, the Japanese are not the super awesome technology supergiants that the common wisdom from the 1980's in the US makes them out to be. Europe, Japan, South Kor…

I'm not criticizing Japan.

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#18

Post by anigbrowl » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 9:11 AM UTC

NISA press conference: 3:36 pm (2.5 hours ago) explosion was reported to them as containment breach, exact situation unknown at present. Further evacuations will be necessary, people should not travel alone. Official says radiation level data 'unavailable at present'. 'We are not sure if the station is devastated or not.'

Not a panic situation yet, according to NISA.

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#19

Post by panarky » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 9:17 AM UTC

nathanhammond wrote: post #15

The official line from the press conference being given by the Secretary General of Japan is "We don't know and we are investigating further, however radiation is still within acceptable levels." This means the only real update from this press conference is that the evacuation perimeter for Fukushima 2 (the second power plant) has been increased to 10km (from 3km). To the contrary, however, somebody was quoted that t…

This was a zero-information press conference.

Authorities still investigating, stay calm, 'it depends on the circumstances', etc.

Several reporters asked if a 10km evacuation radius was sufficient, and the reply was '10km is what we decided'.

This looks like an unmitigated disaster in the making.

Re: Explosion at Japanese nuclear plant, fuel may be melting - Officials

#20

Post by anigbrowl » Sat, Mar 12, 2011, 9:17 AM UTC

Apparently the reactor roof has collapsed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pg4uogOEUrU if you haven't seen it or can't get to a TV. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMEV-_X5b_8 is a better video.