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FBaggins

(26,697 posts)
Wed Mar 7, 2012, 04:35 PM Mar 2012

One year on: Steady progress at Fukushima

With essential nuclear safety secured, the focus for this phase of the restoration is to prepare for major projects such as the removal of used fuel from the ponds and the ultimate removal of the melted remains of the reactor cores. The most damaged buildings are units 3 and 4, and Tepco has worked to remove large pieces of rubble as well as sections of concrete and steel from the building tops - above the used fuel ponds on the service floor level.



...snip...

Accumulated water

As fast as Tepco is injecting water to cool the reactors, it is emerging from the damaged reactor pressure vessels and accumulating in a body stretching through each unit's reactor building and turbine building basement. Although this water is highly radioactive, it is being purified at the same rate and then stored on-site in ever-increasing volumes.

Despite being more than clean enough for discharge, Tepco has never been given permission to release the water into the sea. Currently some 160,000 cubic metres is in storage, tanks, with a further 40,000 cubic metres of capacity planned for installation. The Japan Atomic Energy Agency is currently analysing samples of water both from the basements and after purification, but Tepco is nevertheless considering an Advanced Liquid Processing System that could remove radioactivity in the water still further - even beyond the limit of detectability, it said.

http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/RS_One_year_on_Steady_progress_at_Fukushima_Daiichi_0703121.html


Hmmm... that's unit 4? I could have sworn I was told it was collapsing. I know we were shown fuzzy before/after photos.
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One year on: Steady progress at Fukushima (Original Post) FBaggins Mar 2012 OP
Interesting source intaglio Mar 2012 #1
You obviously missed some of the news. FBaggins Mar 2012 #2

intaglio

(8,170 posts)
1. Interesting source
Wed Mar 7, 2012, 07:49 PM
Mar 2012

Completely unbiased, of course. Oh and 4 was not "collapsing" it was in danger of collapse due to the grossly impaired structure and that's why they have had to remove the remains of the fuel handling crane.

Now the contaminated coolant, is that "safe" for discharge under the original Japanese standards or "safe" for discharge under the modified standard Japan has been forced to adopt?

By the way do you still insist (as you originally did) that no meltdown has taken place in any of the Fukushima reactors?

Or do you believe (as part of your later stance) that containment was not breached?

Enquiring minds need to know ...

/spelling

FBaggins

(26,697 posts)
2. You obviously missed some of the news.
Wed Mar 7, 2012, 08:25 PM
Mar 2012

It has been variously "reported" as in imminent danger of collapse all the way through actually collapsed and the pool spilled onto the ground... for many months now.
(On edit - here's one http://www.democraticunderground.com/10028042)

it was in danger of collapse due to the grossly impaired structure

Not really. A structural analysis was done and it was clear that there wasn't a danger of collapse. You may elect to question the source of this report, but the source for "in danger of collapse" is "an active imagination".

It chose to install the support even though the structural analysis determined that the spent fuel pool could withstand a large seismic force such as the Great East Japan earthquake without the additional supporting structure.
http://www.neimagazine.com/story.asp?storyCode=2060289


that's why they have had to remove the remains of the fuel handling crane

Hardly. They've been steadily removing everything above the pool for months now so that they can get into the pool to remove the spent fuel.

Now the contaminated coolant, is that "safe" for discharge under the original Japanese standards or "safe" for discharge under the modified standard Japan has been forced to adopt?

The original ones. It's the new standard that's keeping them from releasing it.

By the way do you still insist (as you originally did) that no meltdown has taken place in any of the Fukushima reactors?

Are you still insisting that Fukushima released more radioactivity than Chernobyl? Or that the "they're in air" that Gundersen mistakenly claimed was the result of the fuel pool collapsing and the fuel had spilled out?

You know what the difference is between those two questions? I never actually said the one you accuse me of (in fact said just the opposite from VERY early on in the events).

Or do you believe (as part of your later stance) that containment was not breached?

I'd have to see that post as well. By the most important standard, the containment did its job (when many at the time said that it couldn't). By a tighter standard saying that any release was necessarily a failure of containment, I didn't challenge that it had happened (from the time there was evidence that it had).
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