[quote name='BitMaster' timestamp='1300281306' post='4786493']
The thing is that the human body deals much better with a short radiation spike (like from a CT scan or X-ray image) than prolonged exposure, even if both events average out to the same equivalent dose.

Add to that that the immediate radiation isn't even the worst thing once amounts of radioactive materials begin to accumulate in the food cycle. External alpha radiation is practically harmless but once anything with alpha decay enters your body (either by breathing in dust or eating contaminated food) you have a very, very big problem.

I am aware of that. Maybe my expectation that after such an issue they would not perform a very thorough cleanup including testing of foodstuffs is expecting too much though. I would certainly hope that would be the case. :-/
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And what about the drinking water? Sure, that and food is something you could handle with a bit of a logistical headache by importing food from further away. Of course if the local food is contaminated the whole local environment is as well. People living there had to be at least very careful, if they could live in the area at all for any longer time. Let's not forget the plant is aroundish 250km away from Tokyo. Depending on what will be happening at that plant in the near future and quite literally on how the wind blows a temporary or even permanent evacuation of the Tokyo metropolitan area is not complete fiction. And apart from the massive amount of people living there, that is also a major financial hub which is responsible for around one third of Japan's GDP.

Depending on what will be happening at that plant in the near future and quite literally on how the wind blows a temporary or even permanent evacuation of the Tokyo metropolitan area is not complete fiction.

Um... Hiroshima and Nagasaki are both inhabited, and that was worse than Chernobyl several times over at ground zero.

If you take the entire reactor and dump it in downtown Tokyo, it would take a few months to cleanup until everything but the hotspot is at allowable levels.


The effects of radiation are misunderstood. Most of it has no effects on human body. A simple proof of that is, unlike tongue, which can detect bitter taste (poison), human body has no radiation sensor, despite radiation being present in nature.

Acute exposure is extremely rare and that one is lethal in matter of days to weeks. The rest ends up as statistical risk. Think of it this way. Being obese does not kill you. But it increases the risk of heart failure. Obviously, the only solution is to try to keep obesity low. At the same time, heart disease can occur to anyone and not everyone that is obese will die of it.

Radiation released by man-made sources is something that wouldn't normally be there. So all regulations, procedures, laws and everything else aim at just that - minimize any kind of additional exposure beyond acceptable levels of background radiation.


Also, for comparison, Chhatrapur beach is known for naturally elevated background radiation. Similar places exist around the world. The dose rates reported there are up to 10 times higher than usual. The activity in itself nor the rates say much. In that particular case, Radon products would be the main cause of concern. But Radon being heavy gas isn't dangerous in the open, it is however a major contributor to exposure in buildings.

Also, it's funny how perception is everything: "particularly at Talesh-Mahalleh which is a very high background radiation area (VHBRA) having an effective dose equivalent several times in excess of ICRP-recommended radiation dose limits for radiation workers and up to 200 times greater than normal background levels" "There are more than nine hot springs in the area with different concentrations of radioisotopes, and these are used as spas by locals and tourists"

So if things go bad, Japan might just change Fukushima to a spa.

Here is a very good explanation of what a meltdown is: http://blogs.smithso...clear-meltdown/

On a side note... Here is the latest and it sounds like it's not going to end well: http://www.dailymail...ter-hidden.html

Here is a good link that I watch as it gives real-time updates, via tweets, so you don't have to go searching for the latest information: http://www.google.co...80b5d4c2f738288

Kudos to the 50 workers trying their hardest to resolve the situation. They knew it was a suicide mission and they still did it.

The problem isn't contained. The containment of at least one reactor is probably cracked and no one knows what is happening inside the reactors. More containment breaches, if they haven't already happened, are a distinct possibility. Let's not even talk about the situation of the spent fuel rods being stored on top of the reactors.

The whole situation at the plant is very far from controlled. This is a catastrophe in progress with desperate and highly unusual attempts to prevent an even bigger catastrophe and as it stands it is difficult to guess how it will end.

I hadn't finished reading all the stuff this morning. That is indeed troublesome. The spent fuel rods being stored over the reactor is really a non-issue (edit: a non-issue in that storing them above is the non-issue, the area catching fire is a definite issue). They have to be stored somewhere close to the reactor until they cool. Above it is as good a place as any.

Anyway, the whole plant is already lost. Even if it were technically feasible (if extremely expensive) to salvage anything here, who would want a reactor which has already proven to be of a problematic design?
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why is its design problematic? It survived an earthquake 7 times what it's supposed to survive and the failure of every fail safe. If anything the plant is of bad design, but again surviving a catastrophe 7 times worse than the planned worst case scenario isn't exactly bad design; bad planning maybe.

And it's not reusing the reactor that they should be worried about. It's just being able to reclaim anything from inside it.There's a big difference between not being able to restore something to functioning order and not being able to reuse any part of it.

The effects of radiation are misunderstood. Most of it has no effects on human body. A simple proof of that is, unlike tongue, which can detect bitter taste (poison), human body has no radiation sensor, despite radiation being present in nature.

Are you really making this argument? That humans have no radiation sensor because radiation isn't dangerous? Does this statement also implies that nuclear plants and industrial enriched uranium have been around for the last couple of million years and still nature refused to provide humans with a radiation sensor?

I'm gonna say this again. Nuclear power is handy. Ideally, it could be cleaner than fossil fuels. The only problem with it is that on a human mistake it can fuck the environment real bad, give cancer to/and fuck everyone's genome for generations.

That's not nice. Nuclear plants, as they exist today, should be the fuck away from populations and vital ecosystems.

The effects of radiation are misunderstood. Most of it has no effects on human body. A simple proof of that is, unlike tongue, which can detect bitter taste (poison), human body has no radiation sensor, despite radiation being present in nature.

That is no proof for anything besides the fact that we probably spend most of our evolution in an environment where common background radiation was never a problem. On a side note, it took me about 15 seconds to find an apparently tasteless, highly lethal poison (Botulin) which occurs naturally (and frequently if you screw up the food storage).

Acute exposure is extremely rare and that one is lethal in matter of days to weeks. The rest ends up as statistical risk. Think of it this way. Being obese does not kill you. But it increases the risk of heart failure. Obviously, the only solution is to try to keep obesity low. At the same time, heart disease can occur to anyone and not everyone that is obese will die of it.

Acute radiation poisoning is not exactly my chief worry. Anything that would statistically significant increase anyone's risk of getting a severe life-reducing disease by living somewhere is already a big worry in my book. Cleaning up a city might be possible, if a bit expensive and time-consuming, provided the contamination is largely limited to the outside of the buildings, which would of course require to seal the buildings as good as possible until clean-up is done and makes the place difficult to work in during that time.

Nagasaki and Hiroshima probably had the 'advantage' that there was nothing really left standing in the relevantly contaminated section of the cities making it easy cart all of the rubble away somewhere and bury it under a layer of earth, like what happened with a lot of the (non-radioactive) Cologne rubble. Being able to carry away a lot of contaminated material away and putting a fresh layer of concrete over the rest sounds like a reasonable option for a nearly completely destroyed city, but not for a still-standing city.

[quote name='BitMaster' timestamp='1300283141' post='4786504']
The problem isn't contained. The containment of at least one reactor is probably cracked and no one knows what is happening inside the reactors. More containment breaches, if they haven't already happened, are a distinct possibility. Let's not even talk about the situation of the spent fuel rods being stored on top of the reactors.

The whole situation at the plant is very far from controlled. This is a catastrophe in progress with desperate and highly unusual attempts to prevent an even bigger catastrophe and as it stands it is difficult to guess how it will end.

I hadn't finished reading all the stuff this morning. That is indeed troublesome. The spent fuel rods being stored over the reactor is really a non-issue (edit: a non-issue in that storing them above is the non-issue, the area catching fire is a definite issue). They have to be stored somewhere close to the reactor until they cool. Above it is as good a place as any.[/quote]

Even spent fuel rods have to be constantly cooled, usually using something that is essentially a big pool of water. Having a big pool of water on top of a building with by now rather questionable integrity does not strike me as one of the best ideas, with the habit of water running downhill even through small cracks and the location being rather difficult to reach if the underlying building kinda becomes a hot zone.

Anyway, the whole plant is already lost. Even if it were technically feasible (if extremely expensive) to salvage anything here, who would want a reactor which has already proven to be of a problematic design?

why is its design problematic? It survived an earthquake 7 times what it's supposed to survive and the failure of every fail safe. If anything the plant is of bad design, but again surviving a catastrophe 7 times worse than the planned worst case scenario isn't exactly bad design; bad planning maybe.
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I don't have any English links available on why the reactor design is dangerous by todays standard, but I'm sure there must be several English sources around in those parts of the web not directly sponsored by the atomic lobby. Nevertheless, a quake of that magnitude was not a complete surprise (it has not been measured by modern science but there is geological evidence of a quake of similar strength around a thousand years ago and possibly several comparable quakes within the last 3000 years). And building a reactor in a geologically highly active region which has a potential for earthquakes above what the reactor can handle might not be considered the wisest of ideas.

And it's not reusing the reactor that they should be worried about. It's just being able to reclaim anything from inside it.There's a big difference between not being able to restore something to functioning order and not being able to reuse any part of it.

What do you want to reclaim from the inside? For several of the reactors we know they have at least partially melted. When Three Mile Island had its accident in 1979 it took them until 1993 to clean up the reactor (where 'clean up' meant disposing of the fuel in the reactor as nuclear waste) and the actual reactor is still not safe to walk in. Of course that is still better than just building a Chernobyl-style sarcophagus on top of the reactors because there is no feasible way to get anything out of there.

I don't have any English links available on why the reactor design is dangerous by todays standard

Yes, it was built in 70s using proven technology from 50s and 60s. It's old, just like all, since during last 40 years any research or application was blocked by public opinion.

It's not a revelation, but a lot has been learned since the 80s, but any attempt to actually put it into practice has been halted since 86. It's a well known fact. It's like medicine would have halted before antibiotics were invented.


The biggest breakthrough during this time were micro reactors. Rather than having a huge honking industrial complex, having small, almost self-contained facilities with minimal external needs. This approach reduces risk by reducing scale. Unfortunately, due to runaway regulation, the overhead of individual facility would not make it profitable. So we are stuck with bigger and larger, increasing damage from worst-case failure.

It's the fuel station vs. refinery fire equivalent. It's better to have many smaller ones.

And building a reactor in a geologically highly active region which has a potential for earthquakes above what the reactor can handle might not be considered the wisest of ideas.[/quote]
Let's talk practical.

Japan is third largest economy in the world. What do you suggest they use to replace around 20GW of power with?

Serious question - what is the alternative. And nothing hypothetical/in theory/looks nice. The stuff that can be built today, by a company that has built stuff like this, that can supply 20GW of constant, industrial grade (not residential) power. That means individual megawatt consumers.

If I were Japan and I planned to have more nuclear plants after this I'd seriously consider having them 500 miles inside the sea. On some sort of platform or even a ship.

If I were Japan and I planned to have more nuclear plants after this I'd seriously consider having them 500 miles inside the sea. On some sort of platform or even a ship.

Definitely a great idea. Unfortunately, research into portable reactors has stopped in 86 due to public pressure. Prototypes of such reactors existed for decades, but they will (especially now) never see the light of day. Compact versions exist in carriers and submarines and they are built to be reliable, but are relatively weak. Same argument as above - putting self-contained carrier/submarine-grade reactor on land is best of both worlds. The downside is shorter life-span (10 years) and weaker output (10-100 MW), meaning many would need to be built and replaced regularly. The opposition to recycling and absurd nuclear waste regulation means this is not feasible politically, even though it's technically superior.

In addition, nuclear proliferation treaties prevent nuclear facilities in international waters. How would some country feel if they suddenly found 20 reactors parked outside of its borders, but still in international waters.

There is also the problem with storms. The facility here was hit by merely 10m wave. 30-50m occur regularly in open sea. In Pacific, 300m cargo ships were sunk in single hit.

Then there is the problem of recovery. Unlike on land, if such a platform sinks, it will remain completely uncontained, releasing everything into sea from sea floor (1-5km depth) for next 40 years. See recent oil spill. Also, Kursk, Exxon Valdez, Thresher. Potential consequences include contamination of large portion of Pacific.