TEPCO thinks graphite melts? It vaporizes. At what temperature? Over 7,0000F degrees. Unless they know something else was going on inside Unit 3's reactor vessel (higher pressures, etc) they are still guessing to what happened.
Mock setups for meltdowns show fuel melts and collects in a blob to heat up the bottom of the reactor vessel then blasts out the bottom all at once with the help of overpressure from off-gassing. The iron bottom of the reactor vessel is going to glow red and give way long before any graphite does.
Unit 2 shows a hole in the grating from a hot blob passing thru. I suppose outer fringes of the reactor bottom might survive with some control rods and drive equipment intact below.
Simplyinfo has a pic of Unit 5's pedestal area in pristine condition to compare against.
From what I read, after Unit 4 blew, then Unit 3 pressures dropped. Possibly showing they might have been linked via tunnels and piping.
Doubt Unit 4's pool was ever hot enough to meltdown so melted fuel fallout releases were less possible. Might have been a lot of off-gassing (rod tube pressure failure) and some zirconium reactions there but not a lot of irradiation like at Unit 3 (neutron bombardment).
Still would like to know where all the scattered fuel pellets came from.
Unit 3's spent fuel condition will be hidden with the new cover being put in place.
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razzz if you run past that info about U3 pressure reducing when U4 blew, make sure you post it. Ive never seen that, that I recall.
This is not to go against your info about vaporization of graphite but I have seen graphite melted somehow with my own eyes. It looked like a black moon surface. Related to a nuclear reaction…
How can we know what the conditions in U4 sfp were? If there was a freshly unloaded fuel load, then how different is it than fuel in a shutdown RPV? Except no RPV pressure. Recall that large releases have been reported in the literature from U4. Also high neutron flux was reported there also
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Methinks the scattered fuel pellets at R4 shown in the header of my website, were experimental MOX they were planning on tossing into R4, recently souped up with a new reactor shroud, sitting on top of the used fuel. Many looked barely damaged.
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razzz, I didnt verify for Fuku, but nuclear fuel is usually UO2, melts at 5189F. But in the presence of oxygen (air or water) it will turn back in U3O8 at around 1600F, which will then melt at 2100F,
which then boils to U02 (again) at 2370F.
With MOX they also have PuO2 which melts at 2744F, but just milliseconds later in a uncontrolled chain reaction, will turn to gas at 2800F
hmmmm, do ya thinks all that Pu may have been gifted to the atmosphere via stretched reactor bolts and the most of it that melted through the reactor vessel and then "flashed off" to a gas just 56F after turning to a melt?
Did that massive pressure increase when turning into a gas, compress all the water vapor, thus changing the "reactivity" and thus creating a Moderated Prompt Criticality.
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Also quite curious, in September of 2011, the Journal of Nuclear materials published a big change in the melting point of PuO2, from 2450F up to 2744F. They discovered that using lasers.
Hmmm….so they figured out there is just a razors edge between between solid to liquid to flashing to gas at 2800F.
What else happened in 2011? Methinks they were investigating something of great interest to me.
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Lol. I needed a good laugh from all this antinuclear Enenews claptrap. Fukushima has jumped the shark.
ReplyDeleteHey Locey, I was just thinking about you last week, and your lengthy absence.
DeleteYour grammatical usage of your "cool phrase" is wrong.
Had, has, doesnt matter. I've been busy with stuff. The world is becoming complicated. Still doing nuclear sci. for a living. Someone has to put actual nuclear degrees to good use. YouTube, ratfarm doesnt cut it.
DeleteHear about the reported criticality in Russia last year?
you should have said ENE jumped the Fukushima shark
DeleteExcept the effen shark already beached itself in protest.
https://www.facebook.com/halflifefilm/
ReplyDeleteNo, please provide details on Russia criticality (did that hack the election?) lol
ReplyDeleteIt's in some obscure Russian tabloids. Does that make it fact?
DeleteI wonder if Loose Pooper is James Conca?
ReplyDeleteI don't think so. Lucey is a jet setting gov type, and least so he says.
DeleteHaven't travelled in a while. Had surgery. I do have respect for Dr. Conca and his work.
DeleteAntinuclear people are driven by fears such as North Korea, taken to extremes by Hollywood celebrity types to typecast peaceful nuclear science and technology. Even 60 yrs after, the world population gas grown 10 fold. There is no evidence comercial nuclear increases humanity's overall cancer risk. It's all rhetoric on their side. No factual basis. Large acute doses are deadly. That is the truth. Nagasaki, Hiroshima survivors are still with us.
Lucey, there are tons of evidence, the best evidence, showing that nuclear power causes not just cancer, but even more importantly, morbidity and poor immune systems.
DeleteI did buy 2 gas masks though.....
No. There is really no definitive scientific evidence. Epidemiology isnt evidence. I'm a trained engineer, so are you. Yet my advanced background includes nuclear graduate degrees, stochastic methods and the like that you don't possess. Everything you say is from the popular antinuclear playbook. Coffee causes cancer. Drinking coffee prevents cancer. You can't claim either side. If there were "no safe dose" there would be no atom bomb survivors. I guess when the 100 year old survivors pass away youll find a way to blame nuclear. Do your due diligence. Consult real learned people as myself. Stop being enamored by those antinuclear dillitantes.
DeleteYou know a new nuclear facility is breaking ground in Wisconsin. I'm intimately familiar with their work as they are with mine. I won't move to the area. BTW it's not a reactor site. You need to understand all of the impact of nuclear science. Nuclear energy is only a small component. Too bad antinukes have co-opted the message. They'll be outed by history as faux.Peace.
'Mutant pig' with two bodies and EIGHT legs dies minutes after it is born on a Chinese farm
ReplyDeletehttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4789990/Mutant-pig-8-legs-dies-minutes-birth-China.html#ixzz4pmJhHwLy
And the cause Is? Let's use the scientific method here. 10,000 reasons. You haven't nailed the cause.
DeleteProbably only a few dozen possible causes, radiation being a strong contributor and likely factor.
Delete"Strong contributor and likely cause" is conjecture without proof. Show your work. You made the claim. Hint: use Bayesian methods. You'll find Im right.
DeleteDoubt that farm has any strong radiation exposure. Natural reasons for mutation. Consult Darwin.
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