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A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

George Washington's picture




 

You already know that Fukushima’s fuel pool number 4 may be the single greatest threat, but that pool number 3 is very dangerous as well.

You’ve heard that unit 3′s fuel pool contains less radioactive material than unit 4 … but still a tremendous amount of radiation. Scientific American reported last year:

The pools at each reactor are thought to have contained the following amounts of spent fuel, according to The Mainichi Daily News:

• Reactor No. 1: 50 tons of nuclear fuel
• Reactor No. 2: 81 tons
Reactor No. 3: 88 tons
Reactor No. 4: 135 tons
• Reactor No. 5: 142 tons
• Reactor No. 6: 151 tons
• Also, a separate ground-level fuel pool contains 1,097 tons of fuel; and some 70 tons of nuclear materials are kept on the grounds in dry storage.

You’ve learned that unit 3′s reactor was the only one at Fukushima which burned plutonium. As Japan Times notes:

Reactor 3 … uses highly dangerous mixed oxide fuel, Tokyo Electric has reported.

***

No. 3 reactor is the only one at the crippled power station that was powered by the plutonium-uranium MOX

You’ve gotten the fact that – if the water drains out for any reason – it will cause a fire in the fuel rods, as the zirconium metal jacket on the outside of the fuel rods could very well catch fire within hours or days after being exposed to air. See this, this, this and this. (And that even a large solar flare could knock out the water-circulation systemsfor the pools.)

You’ve listened to experts say that – unless the rods are removed from the fuel pools before a major earthquake strikes (using special equipment which keeps the rods submerged in water the whole time) – they will likely catch fire and release huge amounts of radioactivity. See this and this – starting at 4 minutes into the video.

You’ve read that – after reviewing photos from several different angles – the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s initial impressions were that spent fuel pool number 3 might not be there at all, and that nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen said a couple of days ago:

Unit 3 is worse [than No. 4]. It’s mechanically its rubble, the pool is rubble. It’s got less fuel in it. It faces the same problem. Structurally the pool has been dramatically weakened. And, god nobody has even gotten near it yet.

And you may caught the recent headline that a 35-ton machine fell into spent fuel pool 3. As Kyodo News reports:

The operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant on Friday found that a 35-ton machine had dropped inside the spent fuel pool of the No. 3 unit, possibly because of a hydrogen explosion that occurred in the early stage of plant’s nuclear accident last year.

Tokyo Electric Power Co., commonly known as TEPCO, reported the finding after placing a camera inside the water-filled pool the same day to prepare for removing, as part of the decommissioning process, the nuclear fuel stored there.

One photo showed part of the machine, originally located above the pool and used to insert and remove fuel, appeared to have dropped onto the nuclear fuel storage racks.

But – until you see pictures – it is hard to get a sense of what all this means.

Here’s a picture just released by Tepco of the giant machine in the fuel pool :

AJ201204140043M A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

And another new Tepco photo showing other tangled wreckage inside the pool:

AJ201204140044M A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

The following graphics from Ashai news show how the crane is normally used to move spent fuel rods in and out of the pool. Here’s the crane bringing in a special container to hold the rods:

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

Loading spent fuel rods into the container:

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

The crane then lifts the rod-carrying container up:

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

And then away from the pool:

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

Keep in mind that the machine which fell into pool number 3 was part of the crane “used to insert and remove fuel”, and so now there is no easy way to remove the fuel from the fuel pool. And the crane at unit 4 is also broken:

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

Still confused?

Let’s look at some more pictures …

Before the Quake

Here is where the fuel pools are located in the Fukushima reactors:

 Japan Fukushima Spent Fuel A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima
Here are pictures Unit 3′s fuel pool before the earthquake, and the fuel pool crane:

R3 crane A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

R3crane A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

crane2 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

R3 insidebefore A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

R3sfp A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

This shot is during repairs at reactor 4 before the earthquake – but gives a sense of scale:

article 1367524 0B3B48D800000578 106 472x754 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

After the Quake

Here is the green fuel pool crane at unit 4 after the earthquake:

pict7 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

pict32 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

pict21 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

pict32 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

The view from above the crane at fuel pool 4:

R4 sfp4 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

(“SFP” in these photos refers to the spent fuel pool.)

Former fuel pool nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen notes that – for at least some period after the earthquake – the fuel pool had insufficient water, and the nuclear rods were sticking out into the air:

 

Here is water later being poured into fuel pool 4:

9 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

Reactor 3 is a mess:

 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of FukushimaLARGE3 4 A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

HouseofOust notes of this picture:

Oval is the reactor well location. Lines on the left side of the image outline the crane that seems to have fallen over or been crushed. Spent fuel pool outlined in the foreground.

LARGE3 4b A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

And of this picture:

Perspective lines are drawn to show where the deck should be and how much is gone. A circle shows the beam apex to appoximate the reactor well. Spent fuel pool is again seen off to the right and outlined. Marked structure in the foreground is the end of the refueling crane.

LARGE3 5b A Visual Tour of the Fuel Pools of Fukushima

Now can you see what’s going on?

 

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Sun, 04/15/2012 - 13:33 | 2346770 Urban Roman
Urban Roman's picture

Several hours ago, when I first loaded this page, the pictures were all there.

At some point, the formatting got messed up and now I can only see a good layout on your personal blog page.

Thanks for putting together this information, GW. It's good to know this stuff, even as frustrating as it is to learn of the utter incompetence of the 'engineers' over there.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 13:07 | 2346738 RafterManFMJ
RafterManFMJ's picture

Excellent post!  Could you gin up a graph showing the fallout patterns for when pool 4 begins to burn? I'd like to move south, stay indoors, stop drinking milk, kiss my butt goodbye as the case may be. And will pool 4 burn? Let's look at it.

1. More earthquakes are a certainity. In fact, seismic activity seems to be increasing.

2. The 'leaders' in question are sociopathic incompetent liars.

3. Any serious attempt to secure these pools will reveal the true level of danger; easier to do nothing and hope they can squirrel away a few more billion yen, then flee.

4. Therefore, pool 4 will burn. Only a question of when.

PS Great Engineering, building an fin cooling pool 40 feet in the sky.  Why not build it on a 500 foot tower, and use the base as a combo nightclub/nitro storage facility?  I guess all the competent engineers were hired by Toyota; or was it a GE descision? "GE: We'll blow Obama and destroy the planet" Talk about a coporate motto.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 10:54 | 2346483 hardcleareye
hardcleareye's picture

GW, DATE THE PICTURES!!!!!!!!!!!  please..... it would add to the creditability of you article, which I appreciate.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 11:53 | 2346545 jekah
jekah's picture

The small crane underwater was apparently recorded 2 days ago.

http://www.google.com/imgres?start=86&hl=en&sa=X&biw=1647&bih=958&tbs=qd...

 

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 10:13 | 2346433 krispkritter
krispkritter's picture

GW...formatted perfectly in chrome. No issues on this page or your blog. Thanks for your efforts...

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 06:33 | 2346269 Wakanda
Wakanda's picture

I can see 1 through 7 here at ZH and all of them at your blog.

The after pics are the dark side of industrialism at  it's scary, insane, irradiated worst.

edit:  now they all load here upon refresh

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 08:06 | 2346315 nuscorb
nuscorb's picture

Not industrialism, statism. The nuclear industry would not exist without the state, insurance on these plants would be business suicide.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 13:10 | 2346741 Woodyg
Woodyg's picture

Frankenstein industrial production -

Financial bankster terrorists

And greedy corrupt fascist bastard politicians in charge of both parties (actually one party under 2 names - known throughout time as a Dictatorship)

All for an extra nickle......

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 09:58 | 2346418 LowProfile
LowProfile's picture

I suspect that without the interference of the state, thorium power would be quickly developed, as it is far safer and cleaner.

Right now you couldn't build a private thorium plant because of the stultifying bureaucracy.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 12:41 | 2346680 nuscorb
nuscorb's picture

 

So many things wrong with your comment. On a risk scale of 1 to 100 a thorium plant would be in the high 90s just like any nuke plant. Calling that safer is insane. The risk is still be far beyond anything that you can get insurance for. And mentioning bureaucracy as if inefficiency was the main problem with the state?

Anyway, why risk it with nuclear when this is actually safe (risk in the low digits) and plentiful and almost infinitely cheaper:

http://www.kitegen.com/en/technology/details/

 

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 11:36 | 2346456 steve from virginia
steve from virginia's picture

 

Before you get too excited and cum all over yourself look at the Thorium fuel cycle.

The hard radiation associated with the cycle (uranium and proactinium isotopes) are beyond what the nuclear industry is prepared to deal with right now (ever). Keep in mind, ALL nuclear technology is from the 1950s and 60s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium_fuel_cycle

BTW, all nuclear is supported by governments. Take away the governments everyone hates and there is no nuclear industry (no other industries, either).

Econ 101: any private surplus means a (larger) deficit elsewhere. A perpetual surplus in the private sector means perpetual deficits. These/both taking place within the private sector would not allow an increase in private sector surpluses. The private sector deficits cannot be perpetual: firms go out of business! Deficits would cancel out- overhelm the private sector surpluses.

Only agent able to carry perpetual deficits is governments: they don't have to make money or 'show a profit'.

Take away government deficits and you take away private surpluses.

Go ahead, make my day, get rid of the deficits and watch what happens next.

 

 

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 12:02 | 2346573 Diogenes
Diogenes's picture

Canada's CANDU reactor can burn Thorium right now, see this from Stanford.

http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2012/ph241/bordia2/

I have also seen on the net, a report by Canada's Atomic Energy Commission , dated 1984, recommending this idea be developed, that Canada's CANDU reactors be changed over to Thorium,  and that work be started on a new more efficient Thorium reactor.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 11:52 | 2346547 Diogenes
Diogenes's picture

How does the accumulation of surplus through productive work cause a deficit elsewhere? Only if you are talking about funny money, fiat currency games.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 13:07 | 2346736 steve from virginia
steve from virginia's picture

 

Give the man a cigar, he gets it!

There is no such thing as 'productive work' in an industrial economy, only 'funny money' (debt).

Economists cannot mention this b/c to do so would eliminate their reason to exist: they cannot justify themselves or the endearvor they support.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 13:06 | 2346735 Urban Roman
Urban Roman's picture

Define 'productive work'...

What is a 'good'?

...

But seriously, Diogenes, we have reached the end of the economics of endless expansion. No more can we 'grow our way out of it'. Therefore, a surplus in one place now amounts to a deficit somewhere else. Zero-sum. Soon to be widely recognized as negative-sum.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 15:10 | 2346934 Revert_Back_to_...
Revert_Back_to_1792_Act's picture

We haven't been expanding.  We have been debasing.

Let's say the government opens up Assay Offices and Public Mints.

Anyone who brings gold, silver, copper or nickel to the assay office may have it minted into coins (coin money)

They set values by law for the coins to be produced by the mints in line with the current market value of precious metals. (regulate the value thereof)

Wouldn't this draw the wealth (gold, silver, copper, nickel) out of the private vaults and sock drawers and into circulation where it could be used as a medium of exchange and create prosperity again?

This system works on voluntary action.  People want the gold and silver.  They are willing to trade their labour for it freely.  They are willing to take it to the mints freely and have it converted into coin so they can spend it.

The government is not working as an adversary to the people in this system.  It is protecting their rights by minting good true coins and making sure that what people receive for their labour is real.

You can understand the original Constitutional money system in the USA by inference from reading this old book.

http://archive.org/details/coinsfinancialsc00harvrich

We were on a Silver standard for 170+ years.  For all those years, you could exchange any paper dollar for silver coin at the bank.  The amount of silver you received never changed in all those years.  In 1964 I could buy a gallon of gas for about a quarter.  I can still take a 1964 Quarter and cash it in for silver and buy the same gallon of gas.  That was a good stable system.

The Dollar was defined in terms of silver.  The Eagle was the unit of measurement for gold.   Instead of Bretton Woods, they could have just re-minted smaller Eagle coins.  Changing the size of the eagle coin was the mechanism for regulating value that was provided by the founding fathers.   People would have voluntarily turned in their older bigger eagle coins at the assay offices to receive the newer smaller coins because they still would have received $10.00 in silver purchasing power for each one.  This would have stopped the outflow of gold from the United States.  This is what the government did via Bretton Woods treaty.  Revalue the dollar (silver) in terms of gold.

Read this statement about the 1965 coinage act.

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=27108#axzz1s8VEQHTG

then this happen in 1971.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRzr1QU6K1o

 

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 23:42 | 2347758 Reptil
Reptil's picture

Of course, but only after the banks and those behind it have plucked everyone else to the last feathery down.

 

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 04:37 | 2346218 merizobeach
merizobeach's picture

I still can't see photos 3 through 7, even after the jump; unfortunate, but thanks for what I could read and see.

As an aside, do the folks at ZH ever consider to hire a copy editor?  A few corrections per article would make for a much smoother reader experience (especially when the typos occur in the bold text), even if the corrections were made after the articles were originally posted.  Or shall I just submit an application?

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 10:47 | 2346464 LoneStarHog
LoneStarHog's picture

Do you know that the NORMAL functioning brain only interprets the first, middle, and last letters of longer words; first and last of shorter words?

Do you know that the NORMAL functioning brain generally does not notice a misspelling and/or punctuation error because of this phenomena?

I guess the operative word here is NORMAL.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 12:34 | 2346659 mkhs
mkhs's picture

Normal?  The normal worker ant does what it is told.  The normal worker bee just gathers pollen.  The normalJapanese don't complain or protest thier corrupt, inept, or stupid leaders.  The normal ..........

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 20:43 | 2347519 Doomer_Marx
Doomer_Marx's picture

Worker bees can leave.

Even drones can fly away.

The Queen is their slave.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 20:21 | 2347448 skank
skank's picture

./.. asks, when does the shoosting begin?

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 09:01 | 2346365 Stoploss
Stoploss's picture

Excellent news!! Your going to reactor 4!!!

General consensus believes typo's ( you left out the apostrophe ), require on the ground real time copy editing from the source.

Thank you for your commitment to copy editing.

You won't be missed.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 13:50 | 2346815 lasvegaspersona
lasvegaspersona's picture

stop loss

not certain if your misuse of 'your' was for humor or not

As one who reads these articles and comments all day I have to say that the usual 3rd grade mistakes are easy to read through but there are a few errors that make the meaning... well ...meaningless.

It also decreases the authors credibility when they mix up 'to' and 'too' or use there, their and they're incorrectly...how can you believe that someone is an expert with less than 5th grade spelling and word use?

even 'an' for 'and' can confuse to the point where the sentence has to be reread several times.

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 13:30 | 2346767 cbxer55
cbxer55's picture

Obviously the eight folks that junked you did not realize you were being sarcastic.

Mikey likes sarcasm.  ;-)

+1

Sun, 04/15/2012 - 10:43 | 2346459 engineertheeconomy
engineertheeconomy's picture

CLEARLY WE NEED TO BUILD HUNDREDS OF NEW POWER PLANTS IN JAPAN IMMEDIATELY

sarc

So, where is Japan's 1% military-banking complex leaders hiding out?

Why have the Japanese citizens not made 1% (banker asada) tacos out of them?

you all need to get more creative with your post's here on ZH, (is it the code, is it my operating system) you guys are fucking killing me

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