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Inspired By Game Of Thrones, TEPCO Resumes Building "Ice Wall" Around Fukushima

Tyler Durden's picture




 

14 Months after abandoning the "Game of Thrones"-esque frozen-water-wall containment plan for Fukushima, Bloomberg reports that TEPCO expects to begin freezing a soil barrier by the end of the year to stop a torrent of water entering the wrecked Fukushima nuclear facility, moving a step closer to fulfilling a promise the Japanese government made to the international community more than two years ago. Officials noted, rather uninspiringly, the frozen wall, along with other measures, "should be able to resolve the contaminated water issues before the Olympic games."

 

When they unveiled this "Pacific-Rim-like' 1.4km long ice-wall a year ago, we snarkily wished them luck, questioning their sanity. Of course, we got a hint when TEPCO admitted that "we have yet to form an ice plug because we can’t get the temperature low enough to freeze the water."

 

At the time, there was no Plan B - though we noted that 'wasting' JPY 32 billion on the project so far was likely helping GDP.

But now Plan B appears to be the same as failed Plan A... (as Bloomberg reports)

“In the last half-year we have made significant progress in water treatment,” Akira Ono, chief of the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant, said Friday during a tour of the facility north of Tokyo. The frozen wall, along with other measures, “should be able to resolve the contaminated water issues before the Olympic games.”

 

Solving the water management problems would be a major milestone, but Tokyo Electric is still faced with a number of challenges at the site. The company must still remove highly radioactive debris from inside three wrecked reactors, a task for which no applicable technology exists. The entire facility must eventually be dismantled.

 

Currently, about 300 metric tons of water flow into the reactor building daily from the nearby hills. Tepco, as the nation’s biggest utility is called, has struggled to decommission the reactors while also grappling with the buildup of contaminated water.

 

Even four years after the meltdown and despite promises from policymakers, water management remains one of Tepco’s biggest challenges in coping with the fallout of Japan’s worst nuclear disaster.

 

The purpose of the ice wall -- a barrier of soil 30 meters (98 feet) deep and 1,500 meters long which is frozen to -30 Celsius (-22 Fahrenheit) -- is to prevent groundwater from flooding reactor basements and becoming contaminated.

 

...

 

It is a very important issue for the public, and good water management is needed for Tepco to restore the public’s trust.”

 

The proposed ice wall has never been done on such a scale, and there could be operational issues due to the complicated nature of the project, according to Lake Barrett, former head of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Civilian Nuclear Waste Management.

*  *  *

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe promised in 2013 that the government would take the lead in resolving the water management issues at the Fukushima site ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Two years later, hundreds of tons of water continue to pour into the reactor building, while tainted water at other parts of the site overflows into the ocean.

 

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Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:21 | 6661234 CunnyFunt
CunnyFunt's picture

So does Tepco need to build a new plant to act as a power source for their chiller?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:26 | 6661253 countryboy42
countryboy42's picture

My first thought as well. Irony?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:34 | 6661274 Buster Cherry
Buster Cherry's picture

Mine too.

This is a stupid idea that will never work. Japan needs to just give up and abandon the area and evacuate people from the area for the next 200 centuries. A backhoe operator will be able to work 15 minutes before he recieves a lifetime worth of radiation exposure. 

Bye bye Pacific Ocean....

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:47 | 6661305 Gaius Frakkin' ...
Gaius Frakkin' Baltar's picture

Wouldn't it be more feasible to build a “geothermal” plant near the complex? At least then they might have a chance of cooling the material down some... Bring in some of those horizontal drillers from the bankrupt fracking companies.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:53 | 6661688 Fish Gone Bad
Fish Gone Bad's picture

Horizontal drill into where it is extremely hot and keep drilling until it is hot and radioactive.  Then insert as much lead metal as possible to slow down the core so it can finally cool down.  Simple enough plan even a Japanese prime minister could do it.

I guess all those really smart people never figured out how to shut down the cores. If any of them are reading this look ^^^^ up ^^^^.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 01:23 | 6661753 Macchendra
Macchendra's picture

OMG, they are SOOOO dumb!!!!  The answer is obviously to surround the contaminated area with sharks that have radiation detecting lasers that will blast any stray contamination out of existence, duh!

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:30 | 6662182 BorisTheBlade
BorisTheBlade's picture

Genius. The new idea for Sharknado, this time sharks are radioactive!!!

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:19 | 6661611 yogibear
yogibear's picture

New images show all melted fuel is “gone” from Fukushima reactor — Experts: Molten core may have reached outer environment, can’t tell if fuel is still contained .

Experts say the finding that most of the fuel had leaked out of the reactor core underlines the difficulties faced in scrapping the reactor.

http://enenews.com/images-show-fuel-gone-fukushima-reactor-presume-fuel-...
Sounds like they were screwed months ago.

This is another Japanese save-face move. All for PR.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 01:02 | 6661719 daveO
daveO's picture

Truth is stranger than fiction. I thought the Japs loved robots? Why don't they use remote controlled/robotic backhoes to trench around and fill in the whole thing w/ concrete, like the Soviets did using live soldiers? Too simple? 

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 02:47 | 6661834 Lore
Lore's picture

Good question. The thing that I find most unnerving about this is the apparent lack of problem-solving. Why NOT simply build a levee in front of the thing to create a zone where concrete can be poured over the entire site and surrounding area?  Or is it too hot for that?  Or is the spent fuel already off-site?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 03:19 | 6661859 StychoKiller
StychoKiller's picture

They shoulda sent in the Gundams by now...

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 05:27 | 6661950 PT
PT's picture

Err, just a little clarification for the mathematically / physics challenged out there.  Regarding comments by CunnyFunt, countryboy42 and Buster Cherry:

Hmmm, how can I describe this to the mathematically / physics challenged?  Here goes:

A nuclear thing is sitting at the bottom of the ocean pumping out a jillion Watts of heat.
Jillion = whatever the real number is.  I don't know.
Watts = Energy per second = Joules per second.
So an ice wall needs to extract that jillion Watts of heat energy just to get the temperature back to normal.  But ice doesn't freeze at "normal" temperatures (unless you have a normal cold winter where everything else is normally cold).  So now you have to extract even more Joules of energy from the environment every second so that you can get your ice wall down to freezing temperature.  Plus you need even more Joules of energy to run all your refrigeration gear.  Oh yeah, and water tends to need LOTS of Joules of heat energy extracted from it in order to bring its temperature down.

Bottom line:  You need to build, say, two nuclear power plants to power a cooling machine to extract the heat energy from one nuclear power plant.  Can you see the problem here?

Of course, there is a clever-er way, where you build a heat pump instead.  Sort of like your split system air-conditioning.  You use a small amount of energy to pump the heat energy from one place to another.  Now you just have to extract the radiation.

I like the geo-thermal idea that someone else mentioned.  The heat's there, why not just use it?  Not sure of the practicalities of the task - it all comes down to keeping the radiation away from harm.  Perhaps that radiation is better off just boring a hole to the centre of the earth.  Surely it would be safe there???

But the whole "build an ice wall" thing seems a bit silly.  You need a (jillion plus even more watts) Watt power plant to keep the water frozen.  Where do you get that power from?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 07:42 | 6662072 Diplodicus Rex
Diplodicus Rex's picture

"Err, just a little clarification for the mathematically / physics challenged out there."

That's a fair size pair of boots you are weraing there. I hope you can fill them.

"Jillion = whatever the real number is.  I don't know."

Its all very well talking about a big number, the size of which is unknown to you but if you're going to start drawing conclusions from this number for the "mathematically challenged" you're going to need to make some ballpark estimates.

"A nuclear thing is sitting at the bottom of the ocean pumping out a jillion Watts of heat."

As above, to make any sense you're going to need to put some context on that number otherwise its meaningless. You are assuming because the catastrophe is emitting radiation then it must also be an efficient producer of heat. Where is your evidence to support that? Where are the geysers spouting all of the heat that you propose?

"So an ice wall needs to extract that jillion Watts of heat energy just to get the temperature back to normal. "

No it doesn't. It only has to extract the heat which reaches the boundary where the ice wall is located. Any other heat leaving from the surface of the earth (upwards or downwards) within the boundary does not need to be extracted by the plant.

"But ice doesn't freeze at "normal" temperatures"

This part must be for the physics challenged. The last time I looked at a physical properties book water freezes at the same temperature subject only to the level of contamination (i.e. salt). If they are trying to freeze flowing groundwater then it is likely to be fresh water with only a limited mineral content.

"You need to build, say, two nuclear power plants to power a cooling machine to extract the heat energy from one nuclear power plant.  Can you see the problem here?"

Until you put a figure on your "jillions" how can you then propose that two power plants (of unstated capacity) will be required? I don't see you mentioning the ballpark capacity of the refrigeration plant required as a starting point.

"...to run all your refrigeration gear."

"Of course, there is a clever-er way, where you build a heat pump instead."

Again this must be for the Physics challenged. The last time I studied refrigeration any refrigeration plant is also simultaneously a heat pump. It is called a heat pump when the heating side is of use to you. If the cooling side of the device is of use to you (in this case) then it is called a refrigeration unit.

"You use a small amount of energy to pump the heat energy from one place to another."

This is true of a refrigeration unit or a heat pump. Typical refrigeration unit COPs are approx 3 (this varies depending on both evaporating and condensing temperature). However, at an evaporating temperature of -30DegC then a COP of 3 would be about the best you can achieve.

"Now you just have to extract the radiation."

What radiation? From the refrigerant circuit? What exactly are you talking about?

"I like the geo-thermal idea that someone else mentioned.  The heat's there, why not just use it?"

I think you missed the bit about the radiation flowing into the ocean and the purpose of the ice wall was to stop it flowing into the site and out the other side into the ocean.

"But the whole "build an ice wall" thing seems a bit silly.  You need a (jillion plus even more watts) Watt power plant to keep the water frozen.  Where do you get that power from?"

Unless you put some kind of definition on your "jillion" then it is not a question which can be answered. See Roddy's post below for an example of where this has been done before.

"mathematically / physics challenged"

Indeed.

 

 

 

 

 

Wed, 10/14/2015 - 06:29 | 6666124 PT
PT's picture

Who cares what a "jillion" is?  You can say "exactly 4.96 GigaWatts" or whatever the true figure is but that won't make the problem any clearer to the average yob.  2.067 million electric kettles?  Now the problem is just getting convoluted.  We have a vague understanding that nuclear power plants produce much more energy than, say, coal or gas powered plants.  "A jillion or two jillion" works fine, and is a lot simpler than saying "one or two times the power produced by the Fukushima cores (or whatever more correct terminology you choose to use).   Very easy to understand that the order of magnitude of the solution is approaching the order of magnitude of the problem, or even greater.

Man, one or two good points there coupled with a bucket-load of pedantic to the nth degree!  When you're trying to figure the circumference of a wheel, do you use 3.14 or 3.14159265358979323846?  (Personally, I use 4*atn(1) but that just proves how pedantic you are, even compared with a pedantic person like me.  I guess I've spent enough time in the real world to learn to be a little practical here and there.)  The point remains:  How much power do you need to keep that ice wall icy?  I'm just breaking it down for the "maths and physics" challenged so they can understand where and why the ball-park figure may lie.  Otherwise I didn't need to say anything.  The first three commenters already said it.

But feel free to give your simplified explanation to the masses.  It can't do any harm and people may thank you for it.

Or if you want to get technical, feel free to give us any amount of detail into how the ice wall solution would work, how much power is needed to keep the wall icy, how much power is needed to extract radiation, a comparison of the power used vs the power the Fuku generators used to make vs the power the radioactive mess is putting out right now vs diesel / coal / gas / solar alternatives.  We're here.  We'd be interested to know.

Re "Ice doesn't freeze at 'normal' temperatures":
UNLESS YOU LIVE IN ANTARCTICA or some other cold part of the world or ... depending on whether it is summer or winter ... Bloody hell!  I thought the meaning in that passage was obvious enough.  Yes, if you live in a part of the world where the temperature is less than 0 degrees Centigrade then ice DOES freeze at "normal" temperatures.  In fact, if you want to get even more pedantic, only water freezes becoz THE ICE IS ALREADY FROZEN!!!!  Do I really have to spell shit out to you at that level?  If so, then I think you need to leave the books and step outside for a few years.  You've forgotten how to be a human.  Point being, the Fuku core is heating everything above AMBIENT temperature, but the ice wall has to be cooled to WAY BELOW AMBIENT TEMPERATURE WHICH MEANS EXTRACTING HEAPS MORE ENERGY THAN FUKUSHIMA IS PRODUCING.  OTHERWISE THE OCEAN WOULD ALREADY BE FROZEN AND WE WOULDN'T NEED TO BUILD AN ICE WALL, THERE WOULD ALREADY BE ONE AT SOME POINT AWAY FROM THE CORES.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 05:52 | 6661967 roddy6667
roddy6667's picture

The ice wall is an established construction technique. It was used extensively in the "Big Dig" in Boston. TEPCO even hired the same company that did the Boston job. However, there seems to be a lot of underground water movement that is complicating the situation.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:24 | 6662176 Fukushima Fricassee
Fukushima Fricassee's picture

It will taste like chicken.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:36 | 6661284 Gaius Frakkin' ...
Gaius Frakkin' Baltar's picture

But only a nuclear one of course...

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:42 | 6661303 Son of Loki
Son of Loki's picture

I think thier Olympics will be sold out mostly to Chinese who are so used to pollution and radiation, they won't mind Japan. In fact, they are already flooding Japan due to the exchange rate despite the radiation risks. And Hong Kongers are tripping over each other to buy condo rental in Tokyo because they are cheaper then HK!

 

I have no doubt they will not be able to control that leaking unseen death. Why doesn't Barry offer to take 100,000 Japanese instead of his 100,000 angry Muslim men? I'd be ok with that.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 23:13 | 6661386 Billy the Poet
Billy the Poet's picture

Why doesn't Barry offer to take 100,000 Japanese instead of his 100,000 angry Muslim men? I'd be ok with that.

 

In the forties folks saw the Japs as being every bit as evil as some people find the Muslims to be today.

 

U.S. anti-Japanese propaganda film

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7DsFEwh2k4

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:14 | 6661596 Ace006
Ace006's picture

The Japs weren't; the Muslims are.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:29 | 6661635 Billy the Poet
Billy the Poet's picture

The Americans who survived the Bataan Death March would disagree with you. There were numerous other atrocities committed by the Japanese aggressors as well. Perhaps at some future date the Muslims will no longer recall the crimes committed against them by American aggressors like you just as Americans have largely forgotten about the crimes of the Japanese.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 01:30 | 6661762 Macchendra
Macchendra's picture

These war crimes were so small, so insignificant!!!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731

 

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 07:11 | 6662029 Motasaurus
Motasaurus's picture

The Nazis experimented on Jews, Poles and Gypsies. The Japanese experimented on the Chinese. The British experimented on the Africans. They did this because they viewed these other ethnic groups as sub human, at least in comparison to themselves.

It speaks volumes that the U.S. experimented on their own citizens. 

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:48 | 6662241 TxExPat
TxExPat's picture

I'll second that.  I had a couple of Great Uncles who spent the better part of a year as Marines on an enchanted garden spot called Guadalcanal.  One of the reasons so few Japanese were taken prisoner was that they had gone to terror tactics first,  It backfired.  You torture a captive past the point where he can survive, then leave him where his buddies can find him and leave them with the choice of taking him back to a hospital (where he will surely die slowly and painfully), or put him out of his misery right then and there.  After seeing this a few times, the guys on the receiving end stop surrendering and simply fight to the death, they also become disinclined to take prisoners...  (Even when Japanese did surrender, they were often shot on the spot, payback, but still better than what they had done as a matter of policy...).  Uncles had no use for the Japanese, and generally never forgave them upto and including the day they died... 

Think of it as Karma, you do terrible things in what you think is a good cause, and it has a habit of coming back to haunt you...

(History has whitewashed Japanese activity in the west as Japan became a good puppet state after the war, Individual Japanese troops were mostly following orders, terror tactics were ordered on high, under the belief that it would demoralize their enemies, instead it had more of an effect of filling them with resolve...).

Least that's the gist of the store told me by a couple of ex-marines who were there...

 

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 05:55 | 6661968 roddy6667
roddy6667's picture

Until the late Sixties, Japan was contaminated as bad or worse than China is today.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:10 | 6661557 Paveway IV
Paveway IV's picture

"...Currently, about 300 metric tons of water flow into the reactor building daily from the nearby hills..." 

WTF? Bloombergized facts? They even have to lie about that now? Does anyone else but me remember that it is actually 400 tonnes a day?

See, that's important because when you build your nuclear plant on the mouth of an ancient river that still flows 20m or so below the surface, well... you're bound to get some fraction of that river in your basement - especially after it cracks apart during an earthquake. 400 tonnes of water a day is just the part that's leaking into the reactor and turbine buildings, not the total flow of that underground river around the plant. 

Which brings to mind one other little problem with their ingenious underground Hoover Dam scheme: those smoking, red-hot corium blobs that they've never found are probably underneath - not inside - the reactor buildings. An additional several hundred tonnes of water from the underground river are flowing past them into the sea, but it's effectively cooling the coriums at the same time. When the ice wall of death goes up, you shut the flow of the underground river down, but now you have a red-hot radioactive blob surrounded by several tonnes of now-stagnant ground water.

OK, kids... can anyone guess what happens when you put a blob of red-hot molten metal at the bottom of a pail of water? Anyone? ...anyone? How about the special ed. kids in the back... anyone?

Nobody? Tyler, how about you? ...Correct. You have a kind of a gigantic lobster boil, except the lobster are the Fukushima Yakuza contractors cleaning up the site. What? ...no, Tyler. I don't think any of them are going to survive. It's not just the superheated steam flash burns, but the entrained cesium-137 that will interfere with the electrical function of their hearts.

What, Tyler? No, there's no peer-reviewed, scientific proof of that. They threw the evil Belarusian pathologist that discovered that into prison. The Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic didn't have 'radiocesium-induced heart attacks' as a cause-of-death code, so he must have just made it up or read it on one of those conspiracy sites like ZeroHedge.

You want to what, Tyler? No, you can't go to the ZeroHedge site. We block that for your own protection - it has 'dangerous' ideas that shouldn't be though about. You'll understand that once you've accumulated enough debt. The government will tell you anything you really need to know... for the rest of your life.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:39 | 6661658 Muppet
Muppet's picture

Funny and intelligent.  Bravo.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 01:02 | 6661718 Fish Gone Bad
Fish Gone Bad's picture

As bad as cesium-137 is, don't forget all the tritium.  Tritium is not anyone's friend, ever.  As it is chemically hydrogen until it decays into helium, and re-arranging any important chemical bond that was associated with it.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 01:13 | 6661732 RaceToTheBottom
RaceToTheBottom's picture

We need to use the same technology around Wash DC and Wall Street

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:23 | 6661247 A Lunatic
A Lunatic's picture

Where are the fucking cores......?! Yeah, dig the whole area up and put more water on it. They do know that ice is made of water right...?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 23:35 | 6661498 old naughty
old naughty's picture

Games of Throne"...still think it only happens in the movies ?

"you build it, they will come".

Athlets come, along come ad dollars, bondoogle!

all for the G A M E S. (Who cares the rest).

Bread and circus, nothing more. Ice will melt...

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:29 | 6661267 Thorny Xi
Thorny Xi's picture

Like Japan can afford an Olympics. Who finances these boondoggles?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:36 | 6661279 CunnyFunt
CunnyFunt's picture

Somehow a circle is closing here. From the chopper crews who first flew over Chernobyl to gather data (all of whom died shortly thereafter), to the forthcoming helicopter fiat drops in Nippon, and elsewhere for that matter.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:32 | 6661269 countryboy42
countryboy42's picture

If there is a God, then ZH should get the concession to sell the ice to TBTF parties. Glow in the dark ice sculpters, Martini, shaken, but not imploded, the list is endless.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:33 | 6661271 Ms No
Ms No's picture

Do they have enough diesel on site and the diesel generators up high enough now that they can withstand another wave in an area that has always been known to be at extremely high risk of tsunami, in this, the 21st century where computer modeling of potential wave destruction is readily available?

On the bright side, that Game of Thrones series is brilliant and the white walkers are a much preferred nemesis to what we are dealing with.  A friend dropped a series called "Di Vinci's Demons" off to me when I was sick, that one is absolutely brilliant too.  Apparently, there are a few good things on TV. 

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:40 | 6661292 Billy the Poet
Billy the Poet's picture

The final season of Fringe was pretty good. Here's the opening sequence:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMuuUvzYsIg

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:48 | 6661317 ZerOhead
ZerOhead's picture

The TV viewing will be getting better as the economic collapse accelerates.

What Japan really needs to do is rent HAARP out for a couple of weeks and create a 100 meter high tsunami that will wash all of Fukushima prefect away...

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:27 | 6661634 dark pools of soros
dark pools of soros's picture

there are some great stuff on TV over the years but you do have to keep your internal PC/brainwashing filtering on to push out all the forced gay characters, forced interacial, etc that they throw into even the good tv and completely flood into the bad tv

 

to be honest.. the commercials are usually the really terrible 'programming'

 

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 06:00 | 6661969 roddy6667
roddy6667's picture

In coastal Japan there stone monuments, some over 400 years old, with tsunami warnings. They warn against living any closer to the sea because tsunamis had come that far inland. They are ALL ignored.

If yo listen very carefully, you can hear the ancestors saying 'Told you so".

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:26 | 6662180 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

 

Those who fail to hear the voices of their ancestors are doomed.  It works in your scenario.   And I think it's working in the good ole USA now too.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:37 | 6661288 Mini-Me
Mini-Me's picture

They should embed Hillary in the ice wall.  I hear she's frigid.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:50 | 6661324 ZerOhead
ZerOhead's picture

Running a 12" cooling pipe up her ass and out her mouth may be a little unorthodox but heck... it's worth a try.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 06:06 | 6661972 macholatte
macholatte's picture

 

ROTFLMAO   *

 

 

 

 

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:15 | 6661603 BustainMovealota
BustainMovealota's picture

She eats more pussy than Bill

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:42 | 6661301 Omega_Man
Omega_Man's picture

retards

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:51 | 6661328 ZerOhead
ZerOhead's picture

leetards

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:44 | 6661307 bid the soldier...
bid the soldiers shoot's picture

This is a good way to develop the technology of the subterrarean frozen walls which must be put in place around the abundant, undrillible lose shale rock which must be heated to 500 - 600 degrees F. to extract its oil. 

The loose surface shale can only be exploited in situ by raising the ground temperature with electric heaters and putting an subterranean ice wall around the area of the superheated shale deposit.

The cost is excessive. 

 

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:44 | 6661309 Omega_Man
Omega_Man's picture

who needs nukes when regular old missiles can cause this much damage?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:57 | 6661345 Zero-Hegemon
Zero-Hegemon's picture

 

 

With a purposeful grimace and a terrible sound
He pulls the spitting high tension wires down

Helpless people on a subway train
Scream bug-eyed as he looks in on them

He picks up a bus and he throws it back down
As he wades through the buildings toward the center of town

Oh no, they say he's got to go go go Godzilla
Oh no, there goes Tokyo go go Godzilla

History shows again and again
How nature points up the folly of men

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 22:59 | 6661354 Neochrome
Neochrome's picture

Because first thing you think of in relation to building "walls" is "ice"...

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:29 | 6661637 dark pools of soros
dark pools of soros's picture

well if that relation is a marriage the wall of ice will grow pretty thick

 

 

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 23:46 | 6661536 scatha
scatha's picture

It’s been over six months since I posted the below comment on ZH and nothing really changed since then except another failure of some robotic toy : 

http://phys.org/news/2015-06-small-robot-interior-fukushima-daiichi.html#jCp

and turning back to the old tired ideas of ice wall proven wrong long time ago.

Also we had a lesson of justice Japanese style, when legal peoples’ court indicted the TEPCO for crimes of deliberate murder and physical, psychological and economical injury based on TEPCO previous knowledge of unmitigated seismic dangers that invalidated Fukushima  NPP operational license and required by law immediate shutting down of Fukushima NPP, was rejected by Sendai prefecture prosecutor due to “lack of evidence” unveiling true face of Japanese totalitarian regime disguised as “democracy”.

More on true Japan can be found at:

https://contrarianopinion.wordpress.com/2015/02/20/japan-miracle-that-wa...

So here I go for those who missed it.

Over 4 years passed since Fukushima disaster so it’s time for quick recapitulation of the situation:

Two of four reactors suffered complete melt down, one partial meltdown and fourth which was not operational at that time still has big spent fuel problem which cannot be removed, posing threat of explosion if another disaster hits.

In four years what they accomplished was merely pouring water on cores of melted reactors and pumping it into hundreds of storage tanks build in the vicinity of NPP while having no clue what to do with it. Attempts to effectively decontaminate it failed.

The vessel containments of melted down reactors have failed. They developed concrete cracks as well damage of pressure piping during disaster and in aftermath. Through those fissures some of nuclear fuel and highly contaminated water’s pouring into ground water system.

 The fact of bridging containment vessel (prelude to China syndrome) alone leads to horrifying conclusions that the problem is unfixable at all, short of currently impossible task of removing all melted nuclear fuel from vessel and/or wherever it went. The truth that anyone involved in mitigation of this disaster wouldn’t even utter.

On the top of it after four years TEPCO does not have good account of state of melted down reactors or complete list of damages, since supposedly world leading powerhouse robotics nation cannot produce one dammed good robot that would work in such extreme conditions. Several attempts to deploy robots have been proven complete failure.

It is shocking but they simply do not know what to do. They are in loss, confusion and panic, tons of nuclear fuel are missing, unaccounted for.  There is neither plan, nor technology invented yet to tackle the problem. In desperation thousand retired workers indebted to Japanese mafia were being sent there into these reactors, for two minutes each, to senselessly die on orders of Japanese Oligarchs. It is that bad.

Since rate of process of removing radiation from highly contaminated water is many times lower that rate of pumping newly contaminated water into new, freshly built storage tanks, the whole effort is hopeless from engineering point of view. All this is just Sisyphus work, which lead to nowhere since they have to keep pumping water to cool and moderate fission material inside leaky damaged reactors so they will not blow up again. Now many those tanks are also leaking profusely back to ground water adding to chaos. All the contaminated water leaked from reactor vessels and storage tanks ends up in the ocean continually bleeding radiation and all frantic attempts of preventive measures such as “ice wall” utterly failed.

Japanese MSM media, in 1984 style propaganda of changing past to control present, covers up gruesome reality of the Fukushima situation with its human implications, not to mention ignores severe problems with remaining 100 aging Japanese nuclear reactors put offline after 03/11/2011.

The official talk about Fukushima NPP decommission process planned for about four decades supposedly already started is a cruel fairy tale in context of utterly hopeless situation on the ground. The apparent inertia and indifference of the government, busy destroying Japanese economy with QE, cannot be explained in any other way than deliberated criminal, genocidal act against Japanese nation and world community unless you believe in fairy tales.

Situation at some US nuclear power plants and decommission efforts:

https://sostratusworks.wordpress.com/2015/01/01/devils-good-intentions/

and propaganda lies about renewable and nuclear energy, an excerpt from https://sostratusworks.wordpress.com/2015/02/11/engineering-renewable-delusions/ about fallacy of the concept of peaceful application of nuclear power.

The Nuclear power however, is neither clean nor sustainable and is simply a cruel hoax, masquerading as power generating technology. There is no such a thing as peaceful or civilian nuclear power. Little history. When in early fifties nuclear weapons race between US and Soviets and later China was in its apex a problem aroused of running huge operation of producing nuclear weapons in total secrecy. The issue was necessity of running secretly many nuclear reactors fueled with over 99% of U238 and less than 1% of isotope U235 which after controlled fission burning produced 3-4% of isotope U235 ready for subsequent enrichment in order to produce nuclear weapon grade fuel. Another problem was that further enrichment of uranium U235 and Plutonium Pu239 isotopes required enormous amounts of electricity, for running of hundreds of thousands mechanical centrifuges 24/7 affecting whole national power system with variety effects that were not easy to conceal.

To the rescue came bunch propagandists from Pentagon or W.H. and devised peaceful use of nuclear energy mantra, brilliantly conceived method of hiding massive nuclear war preparation effort as a benign service to humanity as proclaimed by president Eisenhower as early as  in 1953. As a result first so-called US Civilian Nuclear Power Plant was born in Shippingport, Pennsylvania in 1957, with moderate redesign of original military nuclear reactor and adding steam turbine and electric power generators. Even deadly adversaries of US in Soviet Union did not openly attack Eisenhower, by calling him liar and hypocrite in editorial of “PRAVDA” newspaper as they usually did but instead they were uncannily receptive to supposed “peace” overtures. They must have understood the point and figured out that they can also use this propaganda ploy to keep readying to nuclear confrontation while utilizing previously useless steam to light up half of Siberia, all in the name of world peace. No need to go on.

Ignoring inherited environmental dangers and flaws in basic concepts of design, nuclear power plants were never meant for civilian use for one reason alone. Namely complete lack of any technology enabling utilization of deadly, lasting up to billion years, nuclear waste for any further civilian use and fairy tales about new breeder reactor technologies do not change anything in that matter. The Fukushima NPP disaster is prime example of deadly results of reckless design based more on war contingencies than consideration for civilian lives, combined with complete criminal incompetence of private operator focused solely on profit. The medium term effects are starting to show up in form of 6000% increase in cancer cases in Fukushima prefecture while authorities call area safe.

 

UPDATE: [The old prisoners and those old guys indebted to Japanese mafia which were exposed to dangerous levels of radiation within first days and weeks all of them are dying many already died but you want hear it from NHK. They increase acceptable level of radiation 30 times in comparison to what it was before disaster and on the top of that their measurements of radiation were base of beta decay (Geiger) and not on alpha decay which as more deadly to human organism. Also 6000% increase in cancer cases in Fukushima NPP area have been already reported.90% of population in Fukushima area did not return even to so called safe areas. They know better.

Japanese MSM media, in 1984 style propaganda of changing past to control present, covers up gruesome reality of the Fukushima situation with its human implications, not to mention ignores severe problems with remaining 100 aging Japanese nuclear reactors put offline after 03/11/2011. So far in 2015 allowing only single one to be restarted spurring massive protests in Japan.]

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 07:14 | 6662032 My Days Are Get...
My Days Are Getting Fewer's picture

Thank you.  This is why I read ZH - to find well-written and thought-out comments like yours.

 

Good job.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:53 | 6662265 redd_green
redd_green's picture

Re   "Namely complete lack of any technology enabling utilization of deadly, lasting up to billion years,"   Not so!    Read up on spent nuclear weaponry, like they used in Iraq a few years back.   

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 23:55 | 6661550 Dre4dwolf
Dre4dwolf's picture

That radiation is really getting into the Japanese peoples heads.... a fucking ICE WALL? WHY? lol the cooling costs alone... i mean... why not CONCRETE??? you know, something that STAYS THERE?

 

There is no way the subteranian ice is going to do anything the substrate material is not consistant enough to have seamless freezing.

And im sure they have some nerd in an office someplace telling them the numbers add up, but in the real world.... numbers dont behave exactly like they do in computer models lol

Dig a trench build a concrete bathtub.

Design good equipment to shield workers from radiation.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 01:13 | 6661738 daveO
daveO's picture

It's not gonna work, of course. Graphite and concrete could have already been inserted by specially built remote controlled equipment. The oil industry probably has some. I remember, just after it happened, there was a US company that was going to send concrete cranes over there. The only question is, who's in charge and why haven't they been fired?

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 23:58 | 6661559 Northern Lights
Northern Lights's picture

Well, if they can freeze Han Solo, I guess anythings possible.

Mon, 10/12/2015 - 23:59 | 6661560 Duc888
Duc888's picture

 

 

Seems like a wonderful opportunity for Geo thermal mass heat / electric plant.  For fucks sake all the hard work is already taken care of.  You've got a marvelous source of multi generational heat there, don't fucking cool it.  Use it.

 

Paging Iceland....Iceland, pick up on line two.....

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 04:03 | 6661882 chopd livr
chopd livr's picture

awesome. 

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 06:49 | 6662008 GreatUncle
GreatUncle's picture

Yep, don't use water lead lined metal as a conductor then let loads of water wash over it.

It will be geothermally active for centuries ...

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:12 | 6661594 yogibear
yogibear's picture

All Japan needs is a few more level 9 earthquakes to finish it off.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:14 | 6661598 theliberalliberal
theliberalliberal's picture

They need to build a sheet piled wall around it.  whilst this wont be frogs-bum water tight, it will still stop the majority of the flow.  Then they can freeze the ground,  they will never do it whilst there if new warmer water constantly flowing past.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:22 | 6661619 yogibear
yogibear's picture

This is all for show. Seems like the stuff leaked out months ago. Of course what's there is highly radioactive.

How about som Japanese radioactive sushi?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 00:22 | 6661621 JailBanksters
JailBanksters's picture

Gee, who would of thought freezing water would not stop a meltdown of a Nuclear reactor ?

They should have gone with the Wall of dirty socks Idea, the soft fluffy socks would have slowed the particles down. It might produce a large smell but it's gotta be better than the leaking radiation, right.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 01:21 | 6661749 inosent
inosent's picture

omg. is there any good news?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 01:35 | 6661773 wisebastard
wisebastard's picture

why not just legalize toxic water

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 02:08 | 6661802 peterk
peterk's picture

amazing to see how nuclear technology is allowed to  operate while they have no clue on how to deal with these consequences of a melt down.

If japan does anything with  ABE's QE money printing kamakazi mission, it may as well have been to pour all that money into solving   the fukishima situation instead of creating  somethin useless like   inflation and  market bubbles.

QE with an actual beneficial outcome to society would have been interesting.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:31 | 6662190 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

Agree. And, do not ever mention the aging nuclear power plants stateside that all have spent fuel pools, and who are all one extended blackout away from Fuku-shima events.

The nearest one to me is downwind and about 100 miles away.

Where is your Fuku-shima?

http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/operating/power-reactors-map-sm.jpg

 

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 03:22 | 6661860 Watson
Watson's picture

Surely _however deep_ you make any wall (of ice, concrete, whatever), eventually the water will go _under_ the base of that wall?

Don't you really need to construct (no idea how) an underground _floor_ (as well as walls) to the reactor site?

Watson

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 15:31 | 6661884 Sid James
Sid James's picture

Fukushima sits on an old riverbed, the base of the site is constantly flooded. You would need miners in scuba gear for that job.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 04:04 | 6661861 Sid James
Sid James's picture

“In the last half-year we have made significant progress in water treatment”... largely by letting the contaminated water leak into the sea at every possible opportunity.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 03:29 | 6661865 VWAndy
VWAndy's picture

Stupid has no limits. Every time Ya say thats got to be the stupidest thing. Some,, just wow.

Who thinks this shit up? Mel Blanc?

 

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 05:03 | 6661928 hibou-Owl
hibou-Owl's picture

The best refrigeration plant gets a COP of 3, assuming heat going to be dumped into the pacific.

So they going to need three times the energy to  effectively cool the core over how many years????? 

Plus the heat of the groundwater, it will need massive amounts of energy to run.

 

Media Red Herring

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 05:12 | 6661937 Aussiekiwi
Aussiekiwi's picture

Perhaps they could build a nuclear reactor to supply the energy?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 05:10 | 6661933 Aussiekiwi
Aussiekiwi's picture

Common sense tells me this will not work, the ice wall if it works at all won't end up being contiguous resulting in water escaping either through or under the ice wall. Just how many hundreds of years does Japan expect their Ice wall to keep functioning flawlessly for, have they thought about that?

Concrete with steel mesh and lots of it.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 05:37 | 6661956 samjam7
samjam7's picture

Aren't there many suicidal Japanese? I hear that country has a high rate of suicides well if they want to leave they might as well do a last favour and help clean up the mess and then they're free to go...

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 07:59 | 6662097 Monetas
Monetas's picture

Muslims only suicide for Allah .... they aren't civic minded that way ?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 06:46 | 6662005 GreatUncle
GreatUncle's picture

Wow good luck on that one.

To maintain ice at 4200 J/Kg/Deg C going to take alot of energy ... glad I am poor, no way I would want to go to the Olympics in Japan, mind you the way Brazil is shaping up economically next year not going to be any better in Rio.

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 07:16 | 6662035 Gold Dog
Gold Dog's picture

This has got to be bad for the whales right?

Get those Sea Shepard stoners to do the work.......most of those meatballs say, "I would give my own life to save one whales life".

Outside the box folks.

Dog

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 07:51 | 6662085 Monetas
Monetas's picture

Turd Dog ?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 07:59 | 6662098 Gold Dog
Gold Dog's picture

Monetas,

One and the same!

Your friend,

Dog

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:01 | 6662109 Monetas
Monetas's picture

Do you still live under the Monex vault ?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:09 | 6662129 Gold Dog
Gold Dog's picture

Ha! I am currently a legal resident of America's Pecker. FL has a tax plan that fits my mood.

Getting out of The Workers Paridise of Illinois was a bit of a hassle but worth it. I am keeping my Summer Cottage on the North Shore however.

My current "loose tooth" is trying to unify the five predominant theories of string physics and get laid more.

YF,

D

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 07:56 | 6662078 Monetas
Monetas's picture

Can't import 100K Japanese to the US .... Negroes and Muslims are very uncomfortable around competent, self sufficient people .... like Jews, Koreans and Japanese .... Obama knows this .... they tend to vote Republican .... better to let them make things off shore !

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:00 | 6662107 Monetas
Monetas's picture

Russia is very quiet .... on melt downs and civilian airliner shoot downs ?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 08:48 | 6662243 redd_green
redd_green's picture

OOoOoooooOOOO!! An ice wall!  Now that's gonna fix everything!   Can all the children with thyroid cancer go down there and play in the ice caves?

Tue, 10/13/2015 - 09:21 | 6662372 NoWayJose
NoWayJose's picture

"Nuclear Winter" is coming...

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