Tepco Quietly Admits Reactor 3 Could Be Melting Down Now

jrod
reply to post by Alekto

 

Japan could have built hydroelectric plants in various places along the coast that are powered by tidal currents. Hydroelectric plants are about as clean as you can get.

It's not that simple as you know. We can't sit by and wait for these things to be built. Do you know how much they cost?
In the meantime, Japan is spewing tons of carbon monoxide. Still, it's better than nuclear energy. That stuff's really bad.

reply to post by Alekto

We have had the technology to make hydro-plants for a very long time. There probably would not be all that expensive, especially when you consider all the nuke plants on the coast have had to build jetty's and large seawalls. Needless to say, it was something that should have been done a long time ago.

I think with nuke power, and the push for it we need to look at who profits the most from it. Who makes the reactors, who makes the fuel, ect.. Nuclear power is not cheap and it is not safe!

jrod
reply to post by Alekto

 

Japan could have built hydroelectric plants in various places along the coast that are powered by tidal currents. Hydroelectric plants are about as clean as you can get. (though there is some negative environmental impact which compared to nuclear and fossil fuel options is acceptable imho).

Also Japan is a technologically advanced country, they could have been using that to make some innovative ocean wave power plants.

it's not about having the tech, it's about spending the money. wars create profits, better and more efficient power production does not. destroying people and things are much more profitable, mainly because bullets and bombs are one-use products, and need to be replaced with new ones, as does the infrastructure that is destroyed....priorities, my friend, priorities.

jimmyx


it's not about having the tech, it's about spending the money. wars create profits, better and more efficient power production does not. destroying people and things are much more profitable, mainly because bullets and bombs are one-use products, and need to be replaced with new ones, as does the infrastructure that is destroyed....priorities, my friend, priorities.

Hey Jimmy - I'll use you to break open this carriage - Unlock your Inner Rage by showing you this Wiki Page as I be some sorta Rhymin Sage.

It's all about the Marshall Plan
YO it's MARS plan walk down the HALL of WAR.
This be so Raw you know I talk to Ra about all this crap Yall.

The Marshall Plan (officially the European Recovery Program, ERP) was the American initiative to aid Europe, in which the United States gave economic support to help rebuild European economies after the end of World War II in order to prevent the spread of Soviet Communism.[1] The plan was in operation for four years beginning in April 1948.[2] The goals of the United States were to rebuild war-devastated regions, remove trade barriers, modernize industry, and make Europe prosperous again.[3] The phrase "equivalent of the Marshall Plan" is often used to describe a proposed large-scale rescue program.[4]

The initiative[5] was named after Secretary of State George Marshall. The plan had bipartisan support in Washington, where the Republicans controlled Congress and the Democrats controlled the White House. The Plan was largely the creation of State Department officials, especially William L. Clayton and George F. Kennan, with help from Brookings Institution, as requested by Senator Arthur H. Vandenberg, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.[6] Marshall spoke of an urgent need to help the European recovery in his address at Harvard University in June 1947.[3][7]

This is a SOS - I show the Secret of Ary-Ari-Arise-Mary the (Secretary)
Ares bombs leave Mares on Mars
Mary Jane = Janus-Jana aka Aries of the Air Strike
That's a ride on the Etym Mary - Go - Round so all of you could Hear the Wacky Sound and be Found !

Ah man I could just go on forever about that.
Just click my name and Raise the Djed by reading my Reed it's Rich (Fantastic).

reply to post by Alekto


It is funny how we throw price around around. We all do it. Me included. But when you get right down to it cost is an illusion. We can make anything cost effective if we really want to. Do we honestly think it has been cheaper to build nuclear power.

Hmm not after we built the first one and everyone after. Everything else is cheaper to build and operate. It has always been more about power and greed and corruption. We know how to burn coal cleanly, we set on natural gas for another hundred years. We have enough alternate forms we could provide energy for the whole country.

Think of it like the electric car mandate back early 90's and then reversal after immense pressure from car manufacturers. They took back the ev1, from customers who loved them and wanted to keep them, and destroyed them.

Blind greed, control, and power at it's finest. The oil industry and car industry had to squeeze the profits and keep new lower costing technology at bay.

When we say it is about money we should usually say it is about making money or greed. Nuclear power was about making money at everyone's expense. It did not matter how much the cost over runs are. They knew then it could kill us all. Well most of us anyway.

We could have free energy, tesla was poised to make happen 70 something years ago. After his death they stole his work and the government and industry has benefited ever since. To say the lack of energy alternatives is only due to expense is not true. It is only as expensive as they want it to be.

You can't put a price on your health or the welfare of the planet.

The Bot

dlbott
reply to post by Alekto

 

It is funny how we throw price around around. We all do it. Me included. But when you get right down to it cost is an illusion. We can make anything cost effective if we really want to. Do we honestly think it has been cheaper to build nuclear power.

Hmm not after we built the first one and everyone after. Everything else is cheaper to build and operate. It has always been more about power and greed and corruption. We know how to burn coal cleanly, we set on natural gas for another hundred years. We have enough alternate forms we could provide energy for the whole country.

You can't put a price on your health or the welfare of the planet.

We do not know how to burn coal cleanly, there is no such thing. Coal plants in the US where we have "clean coal" kill 15,000 people per TWH generated, worldwide it averages 150,000 per TWH, and in China it's as high as 240,000. Nuclear plants globally (including every nuclear plant disaster) kill 90 people per TWH. The numbers don't lie, nuclear is our safest option. Did you know that nuclear plants (including so called "clean coal") put out so much radioactive byproduct that there has been serious efforts made before to goto areas powered by coal and collect the material for use in nuclear plants?

As for the price, I think nuclear is more expensive per TWH which is why it's not more widely adopted but like you said, you can't put a price on your health. And it's a far more healthy choice.

Aazadan

dlbott
reply to post by Alekto

 

We do not know how to burn coal cleanly, there is no such thing. Coal plants in the US where we have "clean coal" kill 15,000 people per TWH generated, worldwide it averages 150,000 per TWH, and in China it's as high as 240,000. Nuclear plants globally (including every nuclear plant disaster) kill 90 people per TWH. The numbers don't lie, nuclear is our safest option. Did you know that nuclear plants (including so called "clean coal") put out so much radioactive byproduct that there has been serious efforts made before to goto areas powered by coal and collect the material for use in nuclear plants?

As for the price, I think nuclear is more expensive per TWH which is why it's not more widely adopted but like you said, you can't put a price on your health. And it's a far more healthy choice.

Talk about disinfo, I said we do know how to burn coal cleanly, I did not say it was implemented. Search proven cause of death, which we have for every death in the United States for coal and you won't find what you are quoting. Simply false. None of your numbers are actual. You will not get this kind of real data out of China ever. You can get wild estimated numbers from the likes of green peace and others but none based on actual facts backed up by autopsy data, not happening.

Don't get me wrong I do not like coal for the same reason most other sane honest people don't, global warming. Not because it kills people.

Nuclear power is the most dangerous things we have to all life on earth. The only thing possibly more dangerous is the collider project and dark matter. In 2015 or sooner they are gonna hit that baby to the point it could end us all. The last time all kinds of strange things happened that you will only read about on sites like this. Literally playing god and playing with the whole planet.

Nothing else threatens us more than nuclear power. Of course you have the missiles, but don't count them because they are not actively being used like power plants. All of which are in areas susceptible to natural disasters.

You won't be able to go back to large area of Ukraine for what, thirty thousand more years or what ever ridiculous number it is. You are seriously insane to still be defending nuclear power. It would be better to have wind turbines and solar plants and numerous other new tech everywhere that is safe. Are you kidding me.

Anything, even no power is better than killing the planet. Which is exactly what happens when nuclear power goes bad.

The Bot

poet1b
reply to post by Aazadan

 

tomsebourn.blogspot.com...

Most likely the person that sent that data just took the high reading from each day, infact, I say most likely but in reality that's exactly what he did. I can't post it though because it uses too much of the character limit. You're free to look it up for yourself. Here's the actual daily averages compiled by me in a spreadsheet of hourly readings, it's considerably lower than the claim:

12/31/14 136.4
01/02/14 63.5
01/03/14 130.4166666667
01/04/14 124.1666666667
01/05/14 75.0833333333
01/06/14 107.0416666667
01/07/14 122.4666666667

Then I went back and started looking for patterns. It's not just healthcare.gov that's slow so it took a bit. First I looked at a similar time frame and it was only 2013-1014 that spiked. So I tried a couple months throughout the year, and came across this in October:
10/10/14 49.4782608696
10/11/14 28.5833333333
10/12/14 39.625
10/13/14 56.0416666667
10/14/14 56.5833333333
10/15/14 59.875
10/16/14 59.3333333333
10/17/14 77.75
10/18/14 91.2173913043
10/19/14 109.4583333333
10/20/14 87.7083333333
10/21/14 96.9545454545
10/22/14 98.28
10/23/14 90.44
10/24/14 74.96
10/25/14 57.36
10/26/14 109.0666666667

A funny thing happens though when I go forward a little bit more. Here's the data November, unfortunately their website cuts off at 400 returns from a query so I only get complete information through the 17th.
11/01/14 43.0833333333
11/02/14 34.625
11/03/14 19.9565217391
11/04/14 25.4583333333
11/05/14 26.3333333333
11/06/14 30
11/07/14 23.2083333333
11/08/14 13.125
11/09/14 30.4583333333
11/10/14 40.25
11/11/14 38.5
11/12/14 24.0416666667
11/13/14 22.875
11/14/14 19.1666666667
11/15/14 21.2916666667
11/16/14 9.5217391304
11/17/14 13.6875

Look at those low readings. The point is, the data points that person is claiming aren't from a long duration and short spikes are nothing unusual. If it's longer lived you'll maybe have a point.

I see no reason to dismiss bloggers putting out this information as a bunch of fear mongers. In fact, I would say they are more likely to report accurate information, as they are very unlikely to have any ulterior motives, like mainstream news agencies, and most government and private institutional sources.

Bloggers are sometimes good, but at the same time many bloggers aren't journalists and are merely acting as concerned citizens. Then there's always the uninformed masses who don't actually understand something but jump on a cause because it sounds good to them, and they have a soapbox to speak from.

The "Sea Star" claim only stated that radiation could be contributing to the problem, did not see it as the cause. You are focusing on a non-point here.

Do you seriously not see how "radiation could be contributing to the problem" is a very weak claim in this case? Also, I'm not the one that put it forward as an example of radiation related problems.

I don't know where you have done your research, but when you put out stuff like this, it really blows your credibility.

furthermore most of them (though not all, like caesium) have a halflife such that they decay by the time they reach our shores and fishing areas. As things currently stand there's nothing to worry about.

There's 3 types of radioactive particles released
Iodine 131
Cesium 134
Cesium 137

Cesium 134 is a byproduct of fission, it doesn't naturally occur. Ever since the reactor melted down no more is being produced (though if fission starts back up more could be released). It has a half life of 2 years, as a result, more than half of the amount released has since decayed.

Iodine 131 has a halflife of about 8 days. The vast majority of it decays before it reaches our shores.

Cesium 137 is the big one because it has a halflife of 30 years and is a byproduct of the fuel rods, it's also the one they were trying to prevent being released from overheated fuel rods. For now that problem is under control. The interesting part of this however is that up until 1993 15 countries were simply dumping these fuel rods into the ocean, mostly off the coast of Somalia due to the state of their government. Those fuel rods contribute way more radiation to the oceans than Fukushima.

There's a couple more types of particles like strontium that have been found in the groundwater around Fukushima but they haven't entered the ocean in any significant amount.

So yes, 2 out of 3 is most.

It turned out that the water in that area contained Strontium-90, a radioactive isotope of strontium produced by nuclear fission with a half-life of 28.8 years, at a level as high as 440 becquerels per liter.

Oh, and looking at radiation data from the 1950ties, and comparing it to the present and seeing similarities, actually indicates that the problem in Fukushima is far worse than we are being told.

2,566,087PBq

That number is a measurement of the radiation released into the ocean by nuclear testing.

11,346PBq

That number is a measurement of the radiation released into the ocean by Fukushima.

It's not good but Fukushima is far from the levels that are going to cause you harm.

Oh, and to top it all off I suppose it's worth mentioning that the radioactive plume from Fukushima isn't actually going to reach the US until sometime in 2014 and it will peak in 2016.

Alekto

jhn7537


I wouldn't have them build it then

Quite honestly, I'm glad you're not making the decisions. Japan has precious little in the way of natural resources and is now importing coal and wood like crazy to make up for the reactors they closed down.

I know which one will cause more environmental damage in the long run. And it's not nuclear power.

How do you know this when we haven't even seen the real long-term effects from Fukushima yet? I feel like you're making bold claims that you honestly can't back up with data, but what we do know is that Japan has created a global disaster event, which the effects will be felt around the world not for year, decades, but likely centuries and longer...

Bakatono
The worry has always been that one of the cooling pools would melt down. If this has happened then we are truly effed.

It is also true that tepco is incompetent and has been covering this up as much as possible to save face. Along with the Japanese government.

Finally. The full lifespan of mox fuel is like 7 million years. If this thing is melting down no human will see its end.

It's an ongoing challenge that I don't really trust TEPCO to clean up but so far they've averted total disaster which I suppose is something. That said, as the situation currently stands it's not that dangerous outside of a localized area.

Nuclear power is far from "clean". It is in fact very dirty. I will take co2 and some mercury any day over thousands of tons of massively radioactive rods which we don't have any idea what to do with. There are reactors all over the world and they all store their fuel rods in these pools. No one knows what to do with the mess. If you were to expose one and walk within 10' of it you are dead in a minute. Now multiply that by thousands per site times hundred upon hundreds of sites.

You do realize radioactive particles are released by coal plants too right? It's not just CO2 and Mercury. My town happens to be the world leader in a certain type of cancer because of the combination of a couple of factories and a coal plant we're built down wind from. The very air is a carcinogen. I would love nuclear power here, rather than the approximately 15 years of life I've lost from the coal plant by living in this town for 10 years I would instead prefer a 1/400 chance of being near a meltdown in a decade. Especially when the largest side effect of a meltdown is developing a cancer later in life, just like a coal plant. Few people die right away in meltdowns.

On top of that these sites are prone to issues. Just look at wolf creek in Kansas. It is one of the worst in the US and routinely has problems. So many in fact it gets special monitoring. Oddly enough form a power plant it keeps losing power. No power means no pumping which means meltdown. Others have had all sorts of issues like a near meltdown because no one bothered to replace old valves or old monitoring equipment. They all suffer from a lack of training and when something does happen they routinely screw up.

Yep, our nuclear plants in the US suck and are way too dangerous. I don't disagree. They're using second generation nuclear technology (the first approved for commercial use) and were rated at 30-40 year lifespans. Because we can't do without the power and the energy companies don't want to invest in building new ones we've had no choice but to give our existing plants extended commissions and let them operate for 50-60 years instead. This is ridiculously dangerous but it's what the anti nuclear crowd has forced. In their attempt to get rid of all the bad nuclear plants they've made them more dangerous when our alternative would be building brand new plants that are 4th generation, have way more safety features, are 100x more efficient with the fuel (1% as much waste generated), and maybe a few that would even be thorium. The anti nuclear crowd is the biggest threat we have to nuclear safety.

Our short sighted ness is our undoing. Even if we shut down every reactor we are burdened with hundreds of thousands of tons of these fuel rods to deal with for hundreds of thousands of years.

Dumb.

My personal preference would be geothermal covering as much as possible (it's as safe as nuclear, and cheaper but restricted by location, we could provide for 1/3 of our energy needs with it), subsidies for people to build individual solar/wind generation on their property to get off the electric grid, and a combination of natural gas because we have a lot and it's cheap, with nuclear (preferably thorium, but any will do) because it's high output but expensive. All combined this would give us moderately costed electricity with a pretty low carbon footprint, and a low harm index.

dlbott
Talk about disinfo, I said we do know how to burn coal cleanly, I did not say it was implemented. Search proven cause of death, which we have for every death in the United States for coal and you won't find what you are quoting. Simply false. None of your numbers are actual. You will not get this kind of real data out of China ever. You can get wild estimated numbers from the likes of green peace and others but none based on actual facts backed up by autopsy data, not happening.

Since it's your claim I'll ask you to prove it. Show me actual clean coal. What we've implemented is no such thing (and most plants don't even adhere to the current regulations). Also, show me how it's an economical choice. Everything I've read has said making the emissions "clean" is cost prohibitive. Basically what it amounts to is capturing the coal ash before it enters the atmosphere, putting it into containers, and burying it. The waste is still there, and if past and present examples of burying waste are anything to go by, it's not a viable solution.

Deaths directly related to coal are just the coal miners, however there's a lot of deaths related to equipment for coal plants, and adverse health effects like increased rate of cancer to account for. Not every death is immediately lethal, some are in the form of giving more people cancer.

Nuclear power is the most dangerous things we have to all life on earth. The only thing possibly more dangerous is the collider project and dark matter. In 2015 or sooner they are gonna hit that baby to the point it could end us all. The last time all kinds of strange things happened that you will only read about on sites like this. Literally playing god and playing with the whole planet.

Nuclear power is very dangerous, you're right. That's why so many safeguards are put in place. That's also why it's absolute lunacy to ban building new nuclear plants that are safer by orders of magnitude while extending the life on our older plants that are literally falling apart. With the current nuclear technology we have, we're looking at a major nuclear accident every 13 years or so. If we actually used newer plant models we could push that to every 100 years while only creating 1% of the waste. Is that perfect? Nope. But it's the best we have right now.

You won't be able to go back to large area of Ukraine for what, thirty thousand more years or what ever ridiculous number it is. You are seriously insane to still be defending nuclear power. It would be better to have wind turbines and solar plants and numerous other new tech everywhere that is safe. Are you kidding me.

Until 2000 Chernobyl was still a functioning reactor. People can visit the site today as part of a tour (but it's otherwise restricted). Many areas in Europe that got hit by the radiation plume have in the past few years been able to start letting animals graze on the grass again.

BTW, more people die from wind and solar for the power generation than Nuclear, and it's by quite a few people. Those are still good technologies but they're not safe and they have serious power output issues.

Anything, even no power is better than killing the planet. Which is exactly what happens when nuclear power goes bad.

The Bot

If the planet dies we die, but nuclear has the same environmental impact for the power released as technologies like wind and solar. No power isn't a solution since electricity saves more lives than it costs, and it improves everyones quality of life at the same time.

reply to post by jaffo


they may as well set off all those reactors, humans are stupid creatures and going nowhere their existence in any galaxy is meaningless... and after all 8 billion of us are temps on this space ball no full timers, whats the fuss?? in earth's lifespan we are here only a few seconds...and zap, wer'e gone again......so if its not Japan it will be somewhere else, in the end it matters not..

Aazadan

If the planet dies we die, but nuclear has the same environmental impact for the power released as technologies like wind and solar. No power isn't a solution since electricity saves more lives than it costs, and it improves everyones quality of life at the same time.

When solar and wind go wrong (ie disaster to a plant like Fukushima) do they have the same environmental impact too? Is that what you're saying? Or are you just saying that when the energy is doing its job, the environmental impact is no different from solar to wind to nuclear? Because I've never heard of wind farm plant disasters that have global impacts, but I have heard of nuclear plant disasters having possible global impacts...

jhn7537

Aazadan

If the planet dies we die, but nuclear has the same environmental impact for the power released as technologies like wind and solar. No power isn't a solution since electricity saves more lives than it costs, and it improves everyones quality of life at the same time.

When solar and wind go wrong (ie disaster to a plant like Fukushima) do they have the same environmental impact too? Is that what you're saying? Or are you just saying that when the energy is doing its job, the environmental impact is no different from solar to wind to nuclear? Because I've never heard of wind farm plant disasters that have global impacts, but I have heard of nuclear plant disasters having possible global impacts...

It's not just when they go wrong that you have to take into account. You have to look at everything. When they work as designed, hazardous maintenance, amount of power generated per unit, and when of course when things go wrong. Most nuclear plants aren't going to turn into Fukushima, Chernobyl, or Three Mile Island and that's something you need to take into account when evaluating them.

here4awhile
i'm always confused when people say that we "don't know what to do with the fuel rods"...

with all the developments in robotics a human being wouldn't have to get remotely close to the rods and what exactly would be so wrong with launching this crap out into space?

just a thought as i don't know much about it...

I just can't believe that there is nothing that can be done about something like that...

The problem is that the radiation is so great it shuts down electronics.

The reason we can't launch it into space is because of a number of things:
1) there is so much of it that it would cost bagillions of dollars
2) if a launch failed then it would spread the radiation throughout the atmosphere; which would be bad
3) it would cost bagillions of dollars

vkey08
reply to post by Bakatono

 

If all the cooling pods melt down we are effed? You don't understand a little about Nuclear Power much less the aftereffects of a cooling pool meltdown (there's no such animal)

The cooling pool could catch on fire, yes. If the rods hit 700 degrees they will spontaneously combust this is true but it's not a meltdown mind you it's a fire.. a simple radioactive fire who's effects are not life threatening outside of a small exclusion zone. As long as the rods are kept below 700 degrees they are fine.

There's the issue, if the water from the cooling pool has evaporated or it is no longer at or below 120 degrees F, theres the chance that the rods will boil away the poolwater. but meltdown of the cooling pool is impossible. The only place you can have a meltdown is in the reactor Core itself which is why they call it CORIUM when the reactor melts down and produces a lavalike substance...

There's your nuke lesson for the day..

Thanks.

Thus I offer the following:

Which raises the questions: What exactly is a nuclear meltdown? And what is a partial meltdown?

"This term 'meltdown' is being bandied about, and I think people think that you get the fuel hot and things start melting and become liquid," said Charles Ferguson, physicist and president of the Federation of American Scientists. "But there are different steps along the way."

superheated core must be cooled with water to prevent overheating and an excessive buildup of steam, which can cause an explosion. In Japan, they've been relieving pressure by releasing steam through pressure valves. But it's a trade-off, as there's no way to do this without also releasing some radioactive material.

A nuclear meltdown is an accident resulting from severe heating and a lack of sufficient cooling at the reactor core, and it occurs in different stages.

As the core heats, the zirconium metal reacts with steam to become zirconium oxide. This oxidation process releases additional heat, further increasing the temperature inside the core. High temperatures cause the zirconium coating that covers the surface of the fuel rods to blister and balloon. In time, that ultra-hot zirconium metal starts to melt. Exposed parts of the fuel rods eventually become liquid, sink down into the coolant and solidify. And that's just the beginning of a potentially catastrophic event.

Meltdown can also occur in the pools containing spent fuel rods.

Overheating of the spent fuel pools could cause the water containing and cooling the rods to evaporate. Without coolant, the fuel rods become highly vulnerable to catching fire and spontaneously combusting, releasing dangerous levels of radiation into the atmosphere.

"If material [from the cooling pool] is released, it has a greater potential to spread because there's no primary containment,"

So, while you are correct(ish) that it isn't the same as a core meltdown, it is still a meltdown nonetheless and highly dangerous.

You say po-taa-to, I say po-tah-to.

Aazadan
We do not know how to burn coal cleanly, there is no such thing. Coal plants in the US where we have "clean coal" kill 15,000 people per TWH generated, worldwide it averages 150,000 per TWH, and in China it's as high as 240,000. Nuclear plants globally (including every nuclear plant disaster) kill 90 people per TWH. The numbers don't lie, nuclear is our safest option. Did you know that nuclear plants (including so called "clean coal") put out so much radioactive byproduct that there has been serious efforts made before to goto areas powered by coal and collect the material for use in nuclear plants?

As for the price, I think nuclear is more expensive per TWH which is why it's not more widely adopted but like you said, you can't put a price on your health. And it's a far more healthy choice.

Clean coal or otherwise, nukes aren't clean by any means. 1) they do generate "greenhouse gases" in the mining and production of the fuel and 2) they create a waste that cannot be mitigated for hundreds of thousands of years, if not millions

It is not "clean" by any means. It is merely a version of highly concentrated sequestration of a catastrophically dangerous by-product which is distributed throughout the globe in cooling ponds at every single plant world-wide. No one has any idea what to do with this stuff. The best we have come up with is to bury it as deep as we can, hope for the best, and make it a subsequent generation's problem.

So, while coal is by no means "clean"; nuclear power is a "clean" facade.

Aazadan

There's 3 types of radioactive particles released
Iodine 131
Cesium 134
Cesium 137

or:

Also, it is important to include not only iodine-131 and cesium-137 in atmospheric release assessments, such as JAEA, but also radioisotopes such as iodine-133, strontium-89/90 and plutonium-isotopes, as they were also detected in soil, groundwater and sediment samples in Fukushima Prefecture.

Linky

Cesium 134 is a byproduct of fission, it doesn't naturally occur. Ever since the reactor melted down no more is being produced (though if fission starts back up more could be released). It has a half life of 2 years, as a result, more than half of the amount released has since decayed.

Oh, well that is better then. There is only half as much harmful radiation as there was a few years ago.

Cesium 137 is the big one because it has a halflife of 30 years and is a byproduct of the fuel rods, it's also the one they were trying to prevent being released from overheated fuel rods. For now that problem is under control.

Except the OP is stating they are NOT under control

The interesting part of this however is that up until 1993 15 countries were simply dumping these fuel rods into the ocean, mostly off the coast of Somalia due to the state of their government. Those fuel rods contribute way more radiation to the oceans than Fukushima.

Oh, well it is OK then, because we were stupid before we can also be stupid now. Nothing to see here; move on.

There's a couple more types of particles like strontium that have been found in the groundwater around Fukushima but they haven't entered the ocean in any significant amount.

Ok, so there ARE more than the 3 mentioned above. Also, link or it didn't happen on the not significant amount quote.

Oh, btw:

In the past months, there has been between 90 and 900 Tbq (terabecquerels) of strontium-90 pouring into the Pacific, raising levels by up to two orders of magnitude. Since June 2011, there have been further large discharges of strontium-90 from Fukushima that have not been measured with precision. - See more at: www.intrepidreport.com...

This is from October 2013

Oh, and looking at radiation data from the 1950ties, and comparing it to the present and seeing similarities, actually indicates that the problem in Fukushima is far worse than we are being told.

2,566,087PBq

That number is a measurement of the radiation released into the ocean by nuclear testing.

11,346PBq


generalities; not specifics such as the types of radiation. Also see above comment about stupid before makes stupid after ok.

[quote
Oh, and to top it all off I suppose it's worth mentioning that the radioactive plume from Fukushima isn't actually going to reach the US until sometime in 2014 and it will peak in 2016

2014 is now btw. So, bad news I suppose.

reply to post by Aazadan


finally it would appear that we agree on a few things. Nuclear power is, in its current form, stupid. If we were not to have suppressed thorium reactor technology in favor of $ and bombs then we would be much better off. Additionally, the fact that alternative forms of power are disallowed (hell, even my HOA prohibits solar panels in the bylaws) we are contributing to our own demise. Short-sighted politicians, corruptocrats and profiteers have brought us to the brink. Unfortunately we now have thousands upon thousands of tons of highly radioactive "spent" fuel rods littering the planet all one disaster away from irradiating an entire population or, worst case, a majority of the planet.

I do; however, think it is disingenuous when you downplay the possible fallout from fukushima. You stated earlier you would rather die from cancer from a nuke plant later than from emissions from a coal plant later. That seems odd justification to me. dying painfully is dying; no matter the cause. Additionally, it is not for myself that I am worried; it is for my children. I have led a decent life thus far and if I were to die that would suck but at least I had time to live how I lived. Disasters such as this are preventing some children from ever having that chance. The number? Who knows. It takes so long for the effects to truly be known but I think the concensus is that the results will be bad.

There are dozens of alternatives from plain old solar, to wind power, gas, geothermal, space based solar power (which is amazing and proven on Discovery a few years back), thorium reactors which can't melt down, and so on and so forth. Yet our politicians, corruptocrats and profiteers prevent these things from happening at every turn.

congrats to Germany for banning nuke power btw. They seem to be doing fine.

Nuke power is, in its current form, very bad. The fact that we don't know what to do with decades of these massively radioactive "spent" fuel rods is bad. The fact that reactors all over the world, to include the US, have such problems on a routine basis is bad.

I find if funny, for example, when i watch "the walking dead" because the survivor fighting the zombies wouldn't actually be there in such an event. They would all be dead from radiation poisoning because all the reactors would have melted down and killed everything. We are a disaster away from being a note in the next sentient being's history on this planet; they will be digging up our fossils millions of years from now when life can grow again and wondering what happened to those funny looking monkey things that have radioactive bones.

Aazadan


Deaths directly related to coal are just the coal miners, however there's a lot of deaths related to equipment for coal plants, and adverse health effects like increased rate of cancer to account for. Not every death is immediately lethal, some are in the form of giving more people cancer.

people die in all jobs in the manufacture of equipment. Numbers talk; facetious posters walk. Coal isn't the answer but the above post is fallacious at best

Nuclear power is very dangerous, you're right. That's why so many safeguards are put in place. That's also why it's absolute lunacy to ban building new nuclear plants that are safer by orders of magnitude while extending the life on our older plants that are literally falling apart. With the current nuclear technology we have, we're looking at a major nuclear accident every 13 years or so. If we actually used newer plant models we could push that to every 100 years while only creating 1% of the waste. Is that perfect? Nope. But it's the best we have right now.

every 13 years is a pretty poor track record especially considering that a nuclear accident can kill untold numbers of people over decades or centuries

BTW, more people die from wind and solar for the power generation than Nuclear, and it's by quite a few people. Those are still good technologies but they're not safe and they have serious power output issues.

Link or it didn't happen. Additionally, let us say, for the sake of argument, that 1,000,000 people have died from solar and wind power generation via some sort of accident. Perhaps they fell off a wind turbine or stood in front of some enormous solar collector to get a tan. This pales in comparison to the deaths over time caused by a catastrophic event at a single nuclear plant which has the potential to kill tens or hundreds of millions. Now, multiply that times the number of plants in the world. It is a simple risk calculation.