21–30 of 97 posts
I guess the obvious question is whether 80% of electricity supply meets demand, probably not, how can Japan generate the additional 20% in a hurry?
I trust Japanese engineering more than Cringley predictions. Let's wait and see what the engineers do. BREAKING NEWS: Pressure successfully released from Fukushima No. 1 reactor: agency - Kyodo http://twitter.com/martyn_williams/statuses/4645894316531712... ----- Govt says radioactive measurements near plant roughly doubled, confirming release of gas. http://twitter.com/martyn_williams/statuses/4645969566958387...
Like they wouldn't have boron near a nuclear reactor. I'm a PWR man myself, but I am 99% sure that GE BWR designs have a couple of big tanks of borated water specifically for a LOCA. I highly doubt they're having reactivity problems, it's probably just managing the decay heat, and now the radiation leaks, that's the problem. "Just" is a relative word, here, of course. Boiling water reactors are simpler, cheaper, but…
He's also lied about having a PhD. I wouldn't consider him a very trustworthy source. If he's saying something reasonable, someone else more credible has probably already said it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
(insert bad joke about non-user-replacable iNuke battery here) I rather suspect the batteries are not easily replaced - they're a tertiary system, designed to be a short-term stopgap to get your primary and secondary systems back online. I'm sure that if just cycling batteries was an option, and the battery systems are operational, they'd do that - it's a heck of a lot cheaper than pulling the killswitch on the whole…
The batteries may also be someplace a workman really doesn't want to go.
Cringley's prediction will be wrong. There are a lot of units at that station, two of which are ABWR cores. I would speculate that the majority of these units will return to service.
Can they not simply ship in extra batteries, or are they batteries too large to be moved?
They could probably fly or ship or truck in some smallish diesel generators to accomplish the same thing -- they're just pumps, so I find it hard to believe any individual load is bigger than your average transportable diesel genset. It shouldn't be too difficult to divide a load connected hydraulically vs. electrically across a bunch of generators quickly (switchgear is otherwise fairly custom).
The people on the ground do not have an easy task in front of them.
Like they wouldn't have boron near a nuclear reactor. I'm a PWR man myself, but I am 99% sure that GE BWR designs have a couple of big tanks of borated water specifically for a LOCA. I highly doubt they're having reactivity problems, it's probably just managing the decay heat, and now the radiation leaks, that's the problem. "Just" is a relative word, here, of course. Boiling water reactors are simpler, cheaper, but…
Is one of the advantages of the BWR that you don't need a large pressure vessel? I remember news articles about JSW in Osaka being the only source for the huge forgings required for PWR pressure vessels, and only having the capacity for ~4 reactors per year.
I believe that JSW is the only place (also I think there's one in Germany, too) where you can forge a reactor pressure vessel in one piece, but that if you're willing to bolt two pieces together there are a few more options. It may be that this is more feasible for a BWR than a PWR, but I actually think that BWR pressure vessels are usually more expensive.
Where BWRs really save all the money is that you don't need to buy, maintain and replace pressurizers, steam generators, and a ton of piping and pumps that need to be rated for 2500 PSI, as well as a whole bunch of instrumentation for measuring and controlling boron dilution levels. You'll be paying more for engineering services, since all the calculations will take longer, but I can only imagine it's worth it, since, high-margin as engineering services are, they're chump change compared to how much the reactor costs.
Uhm... the other units at Chernobyl re-entered service for a solid decade after that incident. (Only one of them lasted a decade. Unit 2 caught on fire in '91. Unit 1 was shut down in '96 and Unit 3 lasted until Dec '99.) Cringley's prediction will be wrong. There are a lot of units at that station, two of which are ABWR cores. I would speculate that the majority of these units will return to service.
Even if they return to service eventually there's going to be downtime. That's going to force Japan to use more fossil fuels which will drive up the price (even more). Add a spike in oil costs to the loss of japanese economic output and I think our modest economic recovery just hit a big snag.