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TEPCO Stock Implodes As Radioactive Iodine In Fukushima Seawater Now 3,355 Above Limit
Following the full day trading halt yesterday, a soon to be nationalized TEPCO decided to reopen. Instead it should not have passed go and gone straight to prison. The stock crashed 21% from yesterday's closing tick immediately at the open, 35% from Monday's close, and 79% in under three weeks. To all the major holders (which just happen to be Japan's largest insurance companies as disclosed previously) our condolences.
And while TEPCO continues to be the only shining beacon of the complete uncontrolled collapse of the rescue efforts in Fukushima, with global markets now having moved on, here are the latest and greatest headlines out of the worst radioactive disaster since Chernobyl:
- IODINE IN SEAWATER SOUTH OF PLANT 3355 TIMES LIMIT (highest reading ever announced)
- SEAWATER SAMPLE TAKEN YESTERDAY AFTERNOON (so by now it is all good)
- LOW PRESSURE IN REACTOR 2, 3 PRESSURE VESSELS COULD BE SIGN OF LEAKAGE (or it could be a sign that futures are about to surge: nobody knows for sure).
And the latest news from Asahi, which is precisely as we predicted from the very beginning: "giant shrould mulled over Fukushima 1 to cut radiation leak." Now if only here was a shroud for all the radioactive lava and seeping subsoil water radiation...
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From Zappa to Tull, it's all good:
Happy and I'm smiling, walk a mile to drink your water.
You know I'd love to love you, and above you there's no other.
We'll go walking out while others shout of war's disaster.
Oh, we won't give in, let's go living in the past.
Once I used to join in every boy and girl was my friend.
Now there's revolution, but they don't know what they're fighting.
Let us close out eyes; outside their lives go on much faster.
Oh, we won't give in, we'll keep living in the past.
Yes, Jim, I also would like to add my thanks as well. You've done a great job, as have your professional peers, of helping us understand what we're seeing.
So, thanks for that.
I agree Ms. Creant.
He has non-biased information that he posts with religious fervor.
I appreciate the information aforementioned and the info posted by Jim is credible consistently.
Thanks again Jim.
Peace Bob.
A hat? Three weeks in to nuclear meltdown...and the Japanese people decide they want to put a hat on the exploded reactors? Ummm...hello....is this thing on?
OK...so is there a maker of exploded nuclear reactor hats? Would the giant reactor hat be made of wool or cotton?
Does anyone think that maybe it is time to rotate the current crew out of the radiation zone? You know, the crew that came up with the reactor hat idea?
+1
Yes.
Well, the French have landed you see, and... I dunno. The idea seems connected somehow.
Whatever the case, I share your horror.
How can you short Japanese seafood??
go bald (Pu)
or
go home
r2k 36,000 bitchez
you can stick 50 plutonium rods up my ass but im still gona' make a grip of dough.
#winning
Last time today, I promise - "Just pull it. Just pull it."
www.buildingwhat.org
Don't worry....be happy.
...this is bullish for US stocks, right?
Any of you guys trade the ES or S&P 500???
The guy from http://www.forecastfortomorrow.com just did a free video analysis of the market and where it could be heading in the next few days. he is very spot on and has had some great calls in the past. This is he latest free video. Love the accent too!!! :)
Here is Live video of S&P for 30th March 2011 ==> http://bit.ly/eB2HwD
Type "shroud" into google images and you'll understand very quickly why this is the latest and greatest idea to get things under control:
http://bit.ly/foIpDH
Hey my mark to market (and less margin) trading account balance is right now at $66,666.62....that is 2 666s...weird and very portentous. I am going to short the Nikkei and US stocks...mostly jappo though
duplicate
4" steel and concrete domes, waste water pools, and massive subsurface horizontal concrete pumping to stabilize things while cooling operations continue and waste disposal options finalized.
Built how, and how long? What happens in the meantime to the rods, etc.?
Ive stopped fightig the massive fed liquidity spigot and I feel better. My kids are fucked but I feel better. No more being bearish for me instead ive decided to see the market as glass half full silver and xle at new highs, markets forever going up, cash is trash etc. Give it a try it feels like you are taking a load off. Just make sure to stockpile the necessaries while you can afford them if you can still afford them.
I bet the bernank would smile if he saw my last post
Shareholders taking a haircut....or did the hair just fall out?
Turns out this isn't such uncharted territory after all: (FCI=Fuel Collant Interactions, Corium=melted fuel elements) Whatsamatter? No internet service at Fuk-u-shima?
Results of Phase-1 of OECD Programme SERENA on Fuel-Coolant Interaction
http://www.sar-net.org/upload/s3-presentationinvitedpaper1magalon.pdf
From Slide 21:
Despite the differences in modelling and approaches, and the large scatter of hypothesis and results for both pre-mixing and explosion, the reactor calculations indicate clear tendencies
–For the in-vessel case, the calculated loads are far below the capacity of the defined-model intact vessel
–For the ex-vessel case, the calculated loads, even low, are above the capacity of the defined-model cavity walls
The scatter of the results raises the question of the containment safety margin for ex-vessel steam explosion
STATUS AND PROSPECTS OF RESOLUTION OF THE VAPOUR EXPLOSION ISSUE IN LIGHT WATER REACTORS
http://article.nuclear.or.kr/jknsfile/v41/JK0410603.pdf
FROM THE ABOVE PAPER
"5. CONCLUDING REMARKS
Steam explosion research has been successful in producing FCI codes able to calculate all the phases of a steam explosion in an LWR, both in- and ex-vessel. These codes differ in physical and numerical modelling, andhave been validated against experimental data to various degrees. Present knowledge does not allow a conclusion on the validity of a specific model against others, and in light of the historical development of FCI research it is not expected that this situation will change in a reasonable time frame. The codes are used for safety assessment by different organisations, but suffer from a lack of strong predictive power. A comparative assessment was made in the frame of the international OECD/SERENA programme on the basis of two reference scenarios, one in-vessel and one ex-vessel. Significant discrepancies have been found in the predictions indeed, but it has been established that they could be significantly reduced if uncertainties concerning void fraction prediction in pre-mixing and steam explosion behaviour of corium melts could be resolved. These issues are addressed in the on-going phase 2 of the SERENA programme.
The exercise also brought about the important conclusion that confirming that melt-rich void-poor mixtures cannotbe obtained for in-vessel FCI scenarios would definitively eliminate the risk of lower head failure by in-vessel steam explosion, no matter whether the uncertainties of the
explosion phase are resolved or not. Thus, as alpha-mode failure has been eliminated from the risk perspective years ago, the in-vessel steam explosion issue as a whole could be considered as resolved. This is not the case for ex-vessel steam explosion, in which damage to the cavity is expected. Predictions differ by one order of magnitude, which means that it is not possible to specify the level of loads on the cavity walls and thus establish safety margins for the containment.
With the scope of increasing the safety margin as far as physically reasonable, great importance is attached to experiments performed in the last two decades that have shown that UO2-based corium melts produced relatively mild explosions compared to alumina-based melts. A number of reasons have been invoked to explain the low energetics, such as formation of crusts, presence of mushy zones, and role of chemical properties, but no definite conclusions have been drawn so far. Detailed modelling of these effects is not expected in the short term. Such modelling might not be necessary in a reactor-oriented approach if the use of reduced fragmentation and heat
transfer parameters in the existing explosion models could be legitimated by confirmatory testing and analysis. Confirmation of the reduced energetics is expected for oxidic corium compositions having UO2 as the dominant species, but might be more difficult for oxide-metal mixtures, especially in the case of phase separation. Experimental and analytical efforts undertaken in SERENA-2 on these issues should bring answers to these questions and allow a sufficient reduction of the scatter of the predictions to achieve predictability of the loads for exvessel
situations.
As the response of the structure while an explosion is developing may have a mitigating effect on the loads, fully coupling FCI and structure analysis codes is also desirable if further increase of safety margins is required. It is a little frustrating for people who have been involved in steam explosion research for many years that no solution can be proposed to prevent steam explosions from occurring. Adding substances to the water to change its properties (e.g., increase surface tension and/or viscosity) has been studied in the past but did not provide reliable results. Expecting that damage to the cavity may affect containment integrity, a solution to mitigate the
consequences of an ex-vessel steam explosion would be, for future reactors, to design cavities as much as possible mechanically independent of the containment walls and as large as possible to allow sufficient venting of the explosion and prevent any uplift of the pressure vessel. Lastly, beyond the issue of dynamic loading, an explosion produces very fine debris that will form a layer above non-exploded debris in the lower head or cavity floor. This may challenge the coolability of the particulate debris bed. On the other hand, an explosion may disperse
both exploded and non-exploded debris in various parts of the primary circuit or containment, which may challenge debris retention strategies as well. This issue has not received a great attention so far."
"CORIUM COOLABILITY UNDER EX-VESSEL ACCIDENT CONDITIONS FOR LWRs" (2009)
http://article.nuclear.or.kr/jknsfile/v41/JK0410575.pdf
"Steam Explosion Experiments in the "Test for Real cOrium Interaction with water (TROI)" Program (2001)
http://www.iasmirt.org/SMiRT16/P1925.PDF
Session 3: Containment issues, Paper N° 5: "Material Influence on Steam Explosion Efficiency: State of Understanding and Modelling Capabilities"
http://www.sar-net.eu/upload/ERMSAR-07_Papers/S3-5.pdf
"Analysis of TROI-13 Steam Explosion Experiment"
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=24&ved=0CCsQFjADOBQ&url=htt...
OECD/NEA Steam Explosion Resolution for Nuclear Applications (SERENA) Projecthttp://www.oecd-nea.org/jointproj/serena.html
"About modeling of the corium jet penetrating the pool of volatile coolant under reactor vessel"
http://www.wseas.us/e-library/conferences/2010/Malta/ACS/ACS-10.pdf
Reactor Pressure Vessel Head Loaded by a Corium Slug Impact- Confirmation of the Results
http://www.iasmirt.org/SMiRT16/J1029.PDF
So Japan is fucked, right? My head hurts....
From above.....
"It is a little frustrating for people who have been involved in steam explosion research for many years that no solution can be proposed to prevent steam explosions from occurring."
Whoop there it is......
I guess we'll have all the real world data we can handle to check-fit to these predictive models, if they ever get close enough to these piles of radioactive slag to measure anything. Or if they ever tell anyone the truth...
And another thing... In the land of Nikon, Canon, Olympus, Sony et al, the pix of this catastrophy, except those from DigitalGlobe, are so very shitty. Can't anybody hold a video camera steady? I'm sure every imaging spacecraft in orbit has been pointed at this smoking wreck. Show us those pix. Where is the IR imagery? How about a night image showing that nice blue Cherenkov glow?
That big hole in the turbine hall roof was probably the concrete containment cap landing.
Thanks for your last 2 comments, so far I have only had time to read the first doc that you linked (OECD on SERENA re FCI)
You certainly have provided plenty of material which I for one will be reading later today. So will plenty of others I'm sure.
As you note; 'they' are sitting on the truth - motive: erratic -- success rate: about as consistent as some of the SERENA modelling.
But those that are interested, like ZH, have quite a bit of data to go on now.
The 131I is a giveaway, the Pu 'data' - a red herring (eyecount uncertain), DG photos released to public domain stopped nearly 2 weeks ago, but we have video of 2 explosions which differed mightily.
The 'upstairs door' for #2 SFP was open before #1 danced the fandango..
I agree with you regarding turbine hall 3's new skylight, but had thought it was a chunk of steel that caused it.
I suggest that it might be prudent for them to relocate the contents of the communal SFP to another location at another facility while they have that option. Ditto 5 & 6 if possible. Before the site becomes potentially unapproachable.
Truth for dinner? Can we kindly suggest you our fresh propaganda plate?
Wanna earn $4855 per day? Apply at Fukushima I Nuke Plant!
http://ex-skf.blogspot.com/2011/03/fukushima-i-nuke-plant-4855-per-day-2...
$4885 bonus for lasting the whole day without your fuckin eyes melting....
Not to mention the godamn Neutron Beams!
Physical MOX as inflation/dollar hedge. Store it in b__ d_______'s ass.
Do not worry comrades!
This is extremely bullish news, there is a simple and well tried solution to these problems, let me explain...
They will simply make a bad company and a good company. All of the radionuclides will simply be assigned as liabilities to the bad company and we will be left with nothing but good company. Easy!
Disclaimer: long positions in neutron beams and 10 from 6, bitchez!
Day 19 status overview. I'll do this in three comment parts for each of the three most affected reactors, and welcome any other info or links you can add, to make more sense of this situation. I've been busy reviewing stuff for the last few days and thinking about it, so have probably missed key points or info others can add - please do. Ultimately this is about economics, finance and decisions, not just some doom and gloom parade. People need to understand the underlying picture because the Govt and TEPCO are not being forthcoming.
--
Thoughts on No.2
Regardless, later in the day nuclear industry expert pundits were saying that during the past week radiation levels have been "steadily falling", but with others pointing out that the wind is now blowing off-shore again, but that will not continue. Other 'expert' morons (on PBS Newshour ... the willful propaganda plaything of America Inc.) were saying that the heavily radioactive water found in service trenches running off the reactors could be pumped into some magik infinite-capacity onsite storage tanks ... that of course, don't exist.
The Govt itself admitted that a meltdown clearly has occurred and said they have no choice but to keep pumping and spraying seawater on and into these reactors as stopping it would cause a much worse situation. So the amount of radioactive water to come is potentially uncapped. They have no plans for how to end the water flooding because this is now the defacto emergency back-up cooling system.
Get used to it Japan, it's not going away and nor is the intensifying local soil contamination, or mobile sea contamination.
The secondary feature (not a bug) of this new ad-hoc emergency cooling system, if we can call it that, is that it also pumps an endless stream of plutonium, cesium, strontium and iodine and many other radioactive nastiness directly into the ocean water in fine suspension.
At best the service trenches will allow the heaviest contaminated particle sediment components to settle on the floor, rather than flow out over-topping trench walls and basement areas. Isotopes that remain suspended in this overtopping water will be very fine grained silts, or else molecular.
So a lot of it will still get out into the ocean and clearly a lot of it already has.
Studies have shown that a SCRAM-ed BWR reactor will begin to rapidly heat up and melt within ~1 hour of fuel rods becoming uncovered.
It's been almost 19 days since these cores became at least partly or fully uncovered. We know for sure that the core of No.2 was completely uncovered before dawn on March 15 2011. See notes below
--
START OF MY NOTES FROM THE 15TH MARCH 2011:
At 11PM last night [Mar 14 2011] it emerged that the No.2 reactor also suddenly developed a serious plumbing leak, and the reactor drained COMPLETELY, and so far, can not be refilled. Whatever occurred also caused the pump that was pumping sea water into the reactor to fail [looks like they were using the re-circulation pumps but the lower pipe from the reactor has failed from a pressure spike and emptied the reactor, and permanently uncovered its core 100%]. My GUESS is that a spike of pressure burst a pipe and backed water toward the pump, again, causing it to fail. No.2's core is melting down and radiation in the steam reached >3,000 mSv per hour.
The No.1 Reactor's plumbing still appears to be intact and has possibly stabilized its temp, but we know from the cesium and iodine in the first explosion that No.1's core has indeed melted, to some degree.
This morning it emerged that THREE MORE REACTORS, at Fukushima-2 (10km south), are also having serious emergency-cooling issues.
[Mar 15 2011]
9:05AM - ABC repeated an AAP report of 'damage' to one of the reactor containment vessels [No.2].
9:21AM - NHK TV says another explosion was heard at Fukushima-1's No.2 reactor!
10:00AM - At 6:14AM "heard a strange sound then an explosion", at the base of the inner containment vessel of the No.2 reactor at Fukushima-1 reactor plant complex.
The primary containment of the No.2 reactor is apparently leaking into the "suppression chamber", the lower area where melted fuel can pool in the event of a full core meltdown and primary containment breach. It appears this fuel will now begin to ablate through the thick concrete dry-well foundation directly under the reactor vessel. The surrounding water in the suppression chamber torus at this point, can only act as a heat-sink, to help make steam to moderate the heat buildup in the melted fuel of the dry-well. There is a good chance that the explosion heard from the suppression chamber destroyed the cylindrical concrete wall rising above the dry-well.
END OF MY NOTES FROM THE 15TH MARCH 2011
--
What is not clear is if this March 15 2011 explosion also damaged the secondary containment flange at the top of the reactor vessel, or destroyed the automatic decompression system valves and plumbing. Either of those would explain the hole on the eastern side of No.2's roof, and the steam coming out of that hole. A jet of high pressure steam released from a secondary containment failure could have blown out that panel.
Also, because of the roof on No.2 and the radioactive steam/vapor, this prevents water being added to No.2's depleting water levels in its stored fuel pool. No one knows its water level or temperature.
This is something no one is mentioning, a time bomb, with no way I can see to stop it going up in smoke, at some point.
What we do know about Fukushima Daiichi's spent fuel pools, is that they have all completed a re-packing of them to a higher density fuel placement configuration, to get even more fuel in there that will make it much easier for a fire to start and propagate if they boil dry.
We also know that there over 1,760,000kg of stored spent fuel from the 6 reactors stored there and that these pools were at ~84% of total storage capacity (total of 21,000,000kg), as of March 2010.
For those who don't know, a kilogram is about 2.2 pounds. There should be about 30 million pounds of spent fuel-rods shared between reactors 1, 2 ,3 and 4. We know all these reactor pools have staggering quantities of spent fuel stored within them. In fact, the oldest reactors (1, 2, 3 and 4) are probably closer to ~100% storage capacity than to the published average of 84% for the whole complex.
No.2's spent-fuel pond (SFP) currently can not be accessed to top it up, and is for sure getting lower, every day, and closer to a fire.
A fire in any one of these pools has the potential to make Chernobyl look like a non-event.
Don't forget that.
The issue of radioactive plutonium in extremely contaminated seawater, or local soil, is horrendous, but a very minor and insignificant sideshow, when compared to the pending spent fuel pond fire from under an inaccessible roof, of reactor No.2.
That will make central Japan uninhabitable for decades, and savagely dislocate and smash the global ekonomy, marketz, financez and bailoutz, within a few weeks to months of it occurring.
+
Thoughts on No.3
Studies have shown that a SCRAM-ed BWR reactor will begin to rapidly heat up and melt within ~1 hour of fuel rods becoming uncovered.
For a MOX-fuelled reactor as in No.3 this will happen in as little as 30 minutes.
It's been almost 19 days since these cores became at least partly or fully uncovered.
--
START OF MY NOTES FROM THE 15TH MARCH 2011:
The Govt says Fukushima's No.3 reactor has a serious water 'leak'!
There's apparently a plumbing leak in the No.3, near to the bottom of the inner containment vessel, and the water is draining out some other pipe [we now know it was draining plutonium contaminated water directly into the turbine hall] as fast as it can be pumped in to the reactor. This is why the level is not rising. Thus the reactor was getting hotter, melting, creating hydrogen, and pressure is rising, anyway.
The No.3 MOX core is still at least partly exposed and melted. This morning it is emerging that 11 people were injured in yesterday's reactor explosion at No.3.
END OF MY NOTES FROM THE 15TH MARCH 2011:
--
There is a serious problem with using MOX in a BWR Mk1 design;
From: Reactor Concepts Manual Boiling Water Reactor Systems, USNRC Technical Training Center, section 3-8
"Reactor Core Isolation Cooling
The reactor core isolation cooling (RCIC) system provides makeup water to the reactor vessel for core cooling when the main steam lines are isolated and the normal supply of water to the reactor vessel is lost. The RCIC system consists of a turbine-driven pump, piping, and valves necessary to deliver water to the reactor vessel at operating conditions.
The turbine is driven by steam supplied by the main steam lines. The turbine exhaust is routed to the suppression pool. The turbine-driven pump supplies makeup water from the condensate storage tank, with an alternate supply from the suppression pool, to the reactor vessel via the feedwater piping. The system flow rate is approximately equal to the steaming rate 15 minutes after shutdown with design maximum decay heat. Initiation of the system is accomplished automatically on low water level in the reactor vessel or manually by the operator."
The key line in that quote is: "The system flow rate is approximately equal to the steaming rate 15 minutes after shutdown with design maximum decay heat."
i.e. the system is designed to be able to add water at the same rate that steam is driven off, so that the core is not exposed.
It does this via a high pressure system, driven by a steam driven secondary turbine and its generator, fed from steam from the reactors main reactor steam line, when the reactor is hot, and thus still at high pressure.
But that system, which logically should not have failed, did fail! My GUESS is the generator and/or its electrics, that drive the pumps for this high pressure cooling system, were inundated with seawater from the tsunami, and thus completely and permanently FUCKED UP.
Which left the low pressure system. The problem is the low pressure system can not be powered by a reactor at low pressure, so it requires off-site AC main power or an onsite diesel generator. All fucked up by the Tsunami.
So all the king's horses and all the king's men, could not put Fukushima Daiichi back together again.
Ok, so it's all fucked up, but this reactor had MOX fuel in it, and MOX has much more decay heat in it, than low-enriched uranium oxide fuel, and it heats up twice as fast as the other fuel rods at Fukushima, so needs more than TWICE the cooling flow and it needs emergency cooling systems that react much faster to prevent the core being exposed by steam being driven off by the Automatic decompression system, faster than the high an low pressure cooling systems can replace it.
i.e. "The system flow rate is approximately equal to the steaming rate 15 minutes after shutdown with design maximum decay heat."
The "design maximum decay heat" was NOT for a MOX fuel mix! The maximum decay heat flux of the MOX is over DOUBLE the standard design criteria for No.3, and if that reactor's emergency cooling system was not up-graded to provide more than double the standard design emergency cooling water input flow for cooling the MOX sufficiently, then No.3 was a meltdown waiting to happen ... tsunami, or no tsunami.
My question is; did TEPCO suitably upgrade the emergency cooling system capacity in No.3 BEFORE they placed MOX in it?
If they didn't, several senior people need to go to prison - for life.
--
Finally, this clusterfuck left the Automatic Decompression System (it does not require an operator, and it was not a controlled radioactive steam release, it's automatic, and the control rooms were actually empty and dark with zero power) to vent off the remaining water that was evaporating off the base of the melting core of No.3.
And that's where most of the initial vapor, smoke, hydrogen, iodine cesium and plutonium has come from, that produced the spectacular mushroom cloud above No.3, on the 14th of March.
Then it likewise melted through into the suppression chamber of No.3, probably on the same day the No.2 fuel did so, March the 15th 2011. They have been pumping seawater through both ever since.
And they dare not stop the flow, no matter how contaminating it is, because if that water stops the situation gets much worse - fast.
However, at least with No.3 there's a chance they can refill the spent fuel pool as needed - manually. Well, ... until No.2 catches on fire ... then manual water injection (ad-hoc emergency cooling system) will also fail.
The best thing the Japanese can do is focus on devising an ad-hoc way of getting as much fuel out of No.5 and No.6 as they can, and out of any shared spent fuel pools, before these also become completely lethally inaccessible, once No.2 pool catches fire.
No.4 reactor bothers me the most (in terms of what happened);
There is something very wrong with the story we have be told (or rather not told) about No.4.
A few salient points:
1) No.4 is clearly the most damaged reactor building of all of them.
2) No.4 was not operating at the time of the Tsunami
3) At the 11AM press conference on NHK on Tuesday March 15th 2011, Naoto Kan said the fuel was STILL SITTING INSIDE THE NO.4 REACTOR, and so No.4 reactor was ALSO OVERHEATING.
He said that, don't take my word for it, check it out yourself.
That was the official statement about No.4 from the Japanese PM himself. If it was a factual error, he did not recant. And the physical evidence since confirms he was right about the fuel still being in No.4.
4) Several days later it became clear that No.4 had violently exploded, but no video of this explosion was ever released, plus it was almost not talked about, officially, at all. Fucking incredible!
Think about that; an 'empty' reactor explodes, the SFP pond remain intact with water in it, a whole reactor building is destroyed ... and no one says a fucking word about it???~!+!!!&*&#*%$*%*!!!
WTF!!!??? Seriously ... W. T. F. ?
How can this be? A reactor EXPLODED! No video of the site for a few days, just a few stills, then we get private sat images of a shattered No.4 ... and still no one official says anything about what happened at No.4.
If this was not cause by fuel in the SFP pond ... then what fucking caused it then? huh? No fuel in it my arse!
... weectors don just splode uno!
5) a couple of days after this TEPCO claimed that the fuel had been taken OUT of No.4, prior to the Tsunami, and placed temporarily into the SFP pool, for temporary storage, while maintenance was done on No.4.
From the statement of Naoto Kan on the 15th March, and the completely shattered condition of No.4, and the fact that the ROOF structure of No.4 was NOT blown off (which really should be a clue), that therefore the hydrogen or steam explosion of No.4 has originated INSIDE the reactor building itself, not from the roof area. The damage to the eastern side of No.4 makes this clear. It's obvious the explosion at No.4 was the most energetic of all so far, and it was lateral, not vertical, it left the roof structures still sitting on top ... and yet we're expected to believe it ignited from hydrogen exsolved from fuel cladding in the SFP pool ... on the roof?
Yet the roof is still there?
Just piss-off TEPCO, that's complete crap and lies.
Explain why the lower concrete walls are destroyed? What blew them out laterally from within?
Why is there zero video of this event released? Even if it was at night it would have been one hell of a fireworks show. You know and I know that video exists, and probably from several angles. Why are we not being allowed to see it? Would it raise too many questions about how and empty No.4 could explode like that?
Why is there almost zero media discussion or official explanation of what caused the massive damage to No.4 reactor?
--
The simplest and most consistent explanation of the evidence is that the fuel was still sitting INSIDE reactor No.4 (as Naoto Kan said) and that it melted-down like 1, 2 and 3, and it exploded internally, probably also within the suppression chamber.
This then cracked the secondary containment vessel and allowed steam, and or hydrogen to enter the reactor building's upper floors and blow the walls off laterally, but to leave the roof largely intact on No.4. The roof of No.4 was damaged because some of the upper floor slabs also blew out (they are no thicker than the walls in schematics), allowing the explosion to propagate upwards as well, and throw off the roof cladding, but leave its structures basically intact.
This explains the resulting condition of No.4 today.
Some direct questions need to be asked of TEPCO, about No.4, and where its fuel really was stored before the quake occurred, because they are not telling the truth.
I suspect TEPCO was not following accepted procedure and got caught red-handed by the tsunami.
So, were they intending to perform maintenance on the reactor with the fuel still in it? We don't know, but they are definitely trying to cover this up, and hoping such questions don't get asked. But of course they will be asked, there is no chance they can just brush this aside.
I'm 99.9% satisfied the fuel was still sitting in the core of No.4, and is currently residing in the suppression chamber of No.4, and is leaking out in seawater, just like at #1, #2 and #3.
Lastly ... what is going on at No.1?
I can't tell because the Maxwell Smart dome-of-silence (TM) has descended on that reactor.
All I know is that a few days ago it started steaming for the first time since it blew up, probably from the SFP pool (on a very cold morning).
So logically the hydrogen that blew off the roof panels at No.1 almost certainly came from the core's Automatic Decompression System, venting off reactor core steam, directly into the roof cavity because the venting system was down, because the AC-mains were down, and the diesel generators flooded and kaput, or else their electrical systems (remember those service trenches where the power lines go) were all flooded by the tsunami's sea water. So it all now permanently porked.
My GUESS is the core of No.1 has ablated through to the suppression chamber, as well, on or about the 14th of March.
In short, after 19 days it's a fairly safe bet that all 4 reactor cores have melted, in asymmetric ways, and ended up splattering into the suppression chamber's concrete dry-well, and this remains extremely hot and self-reacting and will stay that way until structural damage results to the foundations.
The thing that is preventing damage to foundations, so far, is that sea water is still falling into the dry-well as well. If that water stopped, a melt through of the foundation may occur, and containment will completely cease to exist at that point.
In other words, at some point, that will be the outcome.
My GUESS is a pending fire involving ~3000 tons of fuel rods at No.2 SFP will cause 100% of water injection to fail.
But even that outcome will be moot, because any fire at No.2 SFP pool will make all radioactive releases so far pale to insignificance.
So, I would take DRASTIC STEPS to achieve mechanical access to the spent fuel pool, on top of No.2 so that it can be topped up - ASAP.
My GUESS is the mechanical assess needed will require some form of shaped chemical explosives to demolish part of the roof panels at No.2 so the SFP pool can be accessed and flooded.
If this is not done soon all seawater injection at all the reactors will fail, as radiation levels greatly exceed current.
At the very least, the Govt (NOT TEPCO!) needs to supply a very detailed briefing to the media on exactly the situation at each reactor.
The denial of information and of video needs to stop, and TEPCO needs to stop lying and pretending that its reactors only produce a special TEPCO plutonium (TM) that is 100% safe for human consumption.
The people who are saying effectively that need to be told by the MEDIA to shut the fuck up. It is the MEDIA who's place it is to rip these TEPCO guys to pieces, every time they assert that the plutonium is not at levels that will harm humans.
+1
+1
...and living proof of the veracity in the following statement:
"ZeroHedge: Come for the articles, stay for the comments."
Thanks Element.
I suggest that everyone who is following this rather than the Libyan distraction (all 82 of us), save these posts.
I need to look at reactor 4 a bit closer...
Hope this helps people focus a bit, this situation is headed in all the wrong directions.
I'm a bit amazed at the lack of direct media questioning and meaningful coverage of what's occurring at Fukushima, given it's clearly going to be a monumental event for the economics and energy solutions for our medium term. As usual the media is rather cock-eyed or blind on the important stuff, and serving up the fluff.
The media? The media? The mainstream media?
Oh, you mean those parrots who call themselves journalists?
Happy cashing their paychecks doing as little as possible just like everyone else (re-reading the press releases in their cases). Why should they be held to a different standard?
Frontal lobotomies are not reversible.
Done.
Thanks Element, this is why I come to ZH, the articles are great and the commentaries bring new ideas and an expansion of understanding that can't be found anywhere else. We are fucked, aren't we? Sad, we live in Hawaii and I'm becoming afraid to take our granddaughter to the beach, imagine the terror of living in Japan.
A most excellent analysis. Stunning, when the discrete events are assembled together that way.
So they're going to put a shroud over the place? A FUCKING SHROUD????
oh. my. fucking. god.
A shroud?
Has anyone contemplated the engineering aspects of such a proposal?
As John Mauldin might say ... "there are no good solutions", this is going to be the ugliest nastiest version of "muddle-through" recovery we have ever seen.
Good God...now I REALLY can't sleep. If TEPCO continues to bumble along, how long until we see more extreme reaction? If I read it, I can't remember.
Just a guess, but I think it all depends on the success or failure of the 'ad hoc' cooling system they've thrown together.
It also occurs to me that it probably depends, as well, on how soon they begin to expend human lives on a wholesale basis. Flesh and blood will have to get up close to this thing, imo.
In a more general sense, there may be one hell of an extreme reaction going already, and how would we know the way they've repressed every impulse to disclose what is actually going on?
I'd already priced in radiation levels 4000 times the limit. As far as I'm concerned this nuclear meltdown is better than expected.
I'm not waiting for Trav. Without further ado, a point by point rebuttal:
Why do I put up with you retards?
Very funny.
I would like to think your being /sarc here, but I'm not sure you are, so;
1) Radioactive iodine is not what is in table salt:
http://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CB0QFjAA&url=http...
2) Iodine would be decreasing if it were not being constantly replaced by water flushed through 4 melted radioactive cores into the sea. Despite the decay rate, each day the level is rising - do the math and plot that with time.
Iodine is a bit of a sideshow; it’s only a problem BECAUSE it decays so fast (and is so bio-active) and thus makes up a huge proportion of the initial radiation flux.
The real danger is cesium-137, Strantium-90 and plutonium-239 and its heavier daughter products. These are the components I want to know about, because if these are released in large amounts, proportional to the present iodine release, then it will be game over for a big chunk of central Japan and its fishery, for several decades - minimum.
3) As for lower pressures, you need to read up on the Automatic Decompression System in the Boiling Water Reactor. This system tries to keep the pressure within limits that allow the high pressure cooling system to work, and if that fails to kick in and the water drops by about 2 meters, then this decompression system immediately vents pressure so the low pressure system will work, but it needs AC mains, then there was none. So it failed too. So the Automatic decompression valves just continued to try and keep the pressure low by venting radioactive steam from an uncovered melting core.
FYI, low pressure in reactors No.2 and No.3 was first reported on MARCH 15th (i.e. the same day I suspect these cores burned through their primary containments). But either way, we have learned since that reactor core water got out of the melting cores into the turbine rooms. The turbines are driven by stream directly from the reactor core water, so it is a pretty safe bet that the primary steam pipe from the reactor broke due to an internal over-pressure, when the fuel melted and pooled, the last remaining water flashed to steam and was driven off out that broken pipe.
Which means the pressure will immediately fall to low levels.
Does this mean normal and safe conditions have returned then?
We know for sure that No.2's core became 100% exposed sometime just after 11PM on Mar 14th, and an explosion occurred in the secondary containment vessel of No.2 at 6:14AM on March the 15th.
That is pretty compelling evidence that No.2 is going to make 'lava' in there (if it has not already) ... if the seawater injection is disrupted.
A final point from geology, igneous magma + brine water in a magmatic melt makes the magma much lower in viscosity (flows and mixes faster and moves further), it also dramatically reduces the melting temperature of the magma.
So if 'lava' forms in the floor of the secondary containment foundations, adding seawater will make it melt faster at a lower temperature, and make it flow and mix more readily.
--
See: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/282318/igneous-rock/80234/Vola...
Igneous rock Volatile constituents and late magmatic processes Effects of water and other volatilesWater and most other volatile substances profoundly influence the properties and behaviour of magmas in which they are dissolved. They reduce viscosity, lower temperatures of crystallization by tens to hundreds of degrees, and participate directly in the formation of minerals that contain essential hydroxyl (OH) or elements such as the halogens. They also increase rates of crystallization and reaction, especially when they are present as a fluid phase distinct from the magma. In general, however, they have only a limited influence on the sequence of magmatic crystallization, except ... (100 of 14567 words)
--
As you can see, seawater brine cooling is far from ideal here, especially if there is not enough of it to ensure a metallic and silicate ‘lava’ can not form in the first place. Having an inadequate amount of sea water to prevent lava is possibly worse than having none injected at all. The more salt you get from evaporation the more the solutes in the remaining exhaust water is able to dissolve and transport the radioactivity ...
We shall see the results, if a robot ever gets to look at the mess in there, because humans never will.
If you image this is all just going to quiet-down to almost a non-event, I’m sorry, but you are mistaken. When the Japanese PM says there is no cause for optimism, he’s not kidding you.
According to latest releases from NISA and IAEA Reactor 2 core operates at almost atmospheric pressure, despite water being pumped into it.
That means its is in FACT open to atmosphere, via leaks or other damages. So anything inside it is getting out either with water, or with steam , gases, or all of the above. Its breached.
http://www.saposjoint.net/Forum/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=2657&start=220#p31462
As I said above, this information for No.3 and No.2 was available on March the 15th, when NHK stated that both reactors had fallen to low pressure. I knew then that the containment had failed.
That was 16 days ago.
So they are just reiterating this info to explain the spiking radiation release as all the water pits and service tunnels and basements fill up and overtop back into the ocean.
Keep in mind that it has now been 19 days since shutdown. Which means if there was no later criticality accident ( http://powerandcontrol.blogspot.com/2011/03/recriticality.html ) I131 levels should be down by about a factor of 5 since 11 March. The fact that the levels in the ocean are rising is a very bad sign.
OTOH by only reporting Iodine they will ultimately be able to show a gradual decline in radiation. More honest would be showing Iodine and Cesium levels.
Exactly. The bulk of the initial radiation flux comes from the fast-decayers with very short half lives.
If that flux is falling, that does NOT mean things are getting better. It was predictable they would fall, fast, if not constantly recharged by the wind.
A wind change can recharge them just as fast, and of course, will.
And news to make sure that on this *.day US futures soar once again
Resin up the bow...
beginning experiment to spray resin on the mess presumably to limit radiation from becoming airborne
http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/2011/03/82074.html
I would like to apologize to everyone for having described this event and its aftermath with the words 'surreal' and 'horror' back on 3/12.
In my defense, though, I had no way of knowing that Tepco was only beginning to demonstrate the true and accurate magnitude of their meaning.
Clearly I need a dictionary.
We're gonna need a bigger shroud.