> On 4/15/2011 5:26 AM, Bill Pragnell wrote:
>> Invisible<voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
>>> Nuclear power works in theory. In practise, if you make even the tiniest
>>> mistake, just once, everything is ruined forever. (Or at least, for
>>> several centuries.) And there's nothing you can do to fix it.
>>
>> That's not really true. Chernobyl was caused by a very long chain of
>> mistakes,
>> all committed with a reactor design which was already itself a long
>> chain of
>> mistakes. It should be noted that most other countries have never built a
>> reactor that could fail as catastrophically as this, even through wilful
>> sabotage.
>>
>> TMI was also long chain of mistakes, which resulted in only the
>> reactor being
>> ruined, and they did fix it.
>>
>> I suppose you could say that Fukushima was really only one very big
>> mistake,
>> i.e. how big a tsunami was ever likely to be. However, they show every
>> sign of
>> being able to fix it eventually.
>>
> No, the "big" mistakes where:
>
> 1. Having no way to cool it, or certainty that the power systems would
> still work, to do so, if enough failures happened. And, no, battery
> backup doesn't work, if it lasts less than 24 hours.
>
> 2. Placing the old, spent, fuel in something that was ever *less*
> effectively cooled.
>
> And, I would add 3. Presuming that a *big* reactor, which produces
> massive amounts of power, but where it would be nearly impossible to
> either make it less hazardous, or run battery backup long enough, or
> otherwise create a system that *could* compensate for major problems,
> remains bloody stupid.
>

Some more gross mistakes at Fukushima:

a. Need *EXTERIOR* power source to run the cooling system when you 
produce that power localy.
The pumps failed when the power lines TO the reactor got damaged by the 
tsunami. That's a humongously huge mistake!

b. NO passive shutdown mechanism. Sanity *demands* that there are 
several controll rods suspended by electro magnets powered by the 
reactor itself over the core. If the cooling system fails, the turbines 
stop, they no longer produce current, shutting down the magnets whitch 
let the controll rods fall into the core, stoping the nuclear reaction 
and thus the heat generation. Those rods are usualy made of cadmium 
because that metal can absorbs huge amounts of neutrons.
Those rods must be set and designed so that gravity alone will make them 
fall completely into position.
There where obviously none! Totaly insane!

c. NO passive cooling mesures. A passive cooling mesure should be enough 
to evecuate the residual heat from the shut down reactor.

d. Severly skipping on maintenance for over 10 years.
The director of the station said so himself...



Alain

Post a reply to this message