How Nuclear Reactors Work; And How They Can Fail. (electric, electricity, cables)
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Thanks for the info...tried giving you a rep point, but was told to 'spread rep around'...oh well...
Thanks for the info...
You're welcome.....And thanx for the "reputation attempt"
I hope the information and links were helpful........as you can see understanding this concept makes it possible to grasp many other scientific principles and various technical scenarios.
I'm surprised a 180 mSv dose was enough to penetrate normal clothing and blister skin (or did it soak through and dose them because the sources actually touched their skin?), but I suppose they must have walked into a pretty high flux. If it was all beta they'll only need to worry about melanomas as it won't have penetrated very far.
However, as I read it, there's no discernible effect below 250 mSv.
I'm surprised a 180 mSv dose was enough to penetrate normal clothing and blister skin (or did it soak through and dose them because the sources actually touched their skin?), but I suppose they must have walked into a pretty high flux. If it was all beta they'll only need to worry about melanomas as it won't have penetrated very far.
However, as I read it, there's no discernible effect below 250 mSv.
My understanding was the water went thru their shoes and soaked their socks........so the contact was of a fairly long duration....
I think the "burning" was not bad and I should mention it was implied that the radiation blistered the worker's skin......I never actually saw any pictures and you know how the media is hyping this way out of proportion.
I do believe is was "only" beta radiation........and they have only a marginal chance of an increased cancer risk.
Here's a thought; with the rest of the world freaking out over nuclear power, do you think there is the potential for the US to regain ground we've lost since the 1970's TMI incident?
The nuclear leaders today are France and Japan. Japan especially with it's impressive manufacturing capabilities and lack of legislative impediments to nuclear power plants. Both countries, and a host of those who are not so advanced, seem ready to pass legislation limiting the use of nuclear power, and thus hobbling their industries.
Asia, and especially China, was a great mover in the field of nuclear power. However, fear of radiation is probably strongest in Asian cultures, due to a belief system that emphasizes "unseen energies" and promotes fear/respect for them. Now that the Chinese have been reminded that nuclear power can result in releases of invisible radiation, they seem to have put the brakes on their nuclear program.
Response by Greens in the US has been muted by comparison. Do you think this might be a chance for the US to advance or at least hold ground while all other countries regress back into coal/gas/oil for their baseload requirements?
I hope you are correct........I'm a staunch advocate for Nuclear Power.......and we both know the Japanese Reactors are of an OLD design and it really withstood the earthquake, but the salt water from the tsunami crippled them.
I just don't understand why they built them so close to the shoreline, in a country famous for earthquakes and subsequent tsunamis. This incident, Chernobyl and Three Mile Island were ALL caused by human error and poor planning......IMHO.......Nucler Fission Power is the way to go until we have Commercial Fusion Reactors.
I hope you are correct........I'm a staunch advocate for Nuclear Power.......and we both know the Japanese Reactors are of an OLD design and it really withstood the earthquake, but the salt water from the tsunami crippled them.
I just don't understand why they built them so close to the shoreline, in a country famous for earthquakes and subsequent tsunamis. This incident, Chernobyl and Three Mile Island were ALL caused by human error and poor planning......IMHO.......Nucler Fission Power is the way to go until we have Commercial Fusion Reactors.
The real problem is the money and politics getting in the way of sound engineering judgement. I'm an advocate of fission power as well, but it must be implemented smartly.
Therefore, I'm strongly against re-certifying older plants. Most NE's I speak to are. For instance, despite Fukishima, the US is moving forward with re-certifying reactors which have been leaking radioactive water for years. (And ones which don't leak, but require constant active cooling, whose cores have undergone years of embrittlement by high neutron fluxes, etc) These 1st-generation power stations are at the end of their design life. Yes, the engineers 50 years ago built margin into their operations, but that doesn't mean we can eat into that margin just because it's profitable for the power companies.
You might say that if we don't re-certify these old plants that the power companies won't build any new ones, but if we re-certify the old plants can you say for sure that they will? We need to shut down gen-1 and gen-2 reactors when they reach their design life and build gen 3-5 plants. How do we go about doing this? Certainly not be re-certifying old plants. It's apples to oranges; like trying to solve high gas prices by drilling our small reserves. Sure, we can put a little more oil on the market, but it's just going to get sold overseas at market price, depleting our resources and fouling our land for no reason. Sure, we can make the old nuke plants more profitable, but power companies are just going to plow that money into lobbying Washington or building gas topping stations, or what have you.
The problem doesn't lie with shutting down old plants--that's the smart thing to do even if the know-nothing business wonks don't like it because those old plants are pure profit at this point--but rather with our inability to think long-term and build the new plants which will make the power industry a crap-ton of money in 20 years. Unfortunately a lot of the MBA morons aren't able to think past their next golf outing.
If we keep running these gen-1 plants beyond their design life, we're going to have another accident, and that's going to kill any chances of building new plants. It's a vicious cycle, and we need to break it. The best way to do that is for engineers to stand their ground and tell management "no you can't" when they're making short-term-profit-based decisions.
The real problem is the money and politics getting in the way of sound engineering judgement. I'm an advocate of fission power as well, but it must be implemented smartly.
Therefore, I'm strongly against re-certifying older plants. Most NE's I speak to are. For instance, despite Fukishima, the US is moving forward with re-certifying reactors which have been leaking radioactive water for years. (And ones which don't leak, but require constant active cooling, whose cores have undergone years of embrittlement by high neutron fluxes, etc) These 1st-generation power stations are at the end of their design life. Yes, the engineers 50 years ago built margin into their operations, but that doesn't mean we can eat into that margin just because it's profitable for the power companies.
You might say that if we don't re-certify these old plants that the power companies won't build any new ones, but if we re-certify the old plants can you say for sure that they will? We need to shut down gen-1 and gen-2 reactors when they reach their design life and build gen 3-5 plants. How do we go about doing this? Certainly not be re-certifying old plants. It's apples to oranges; like trying to solve high gas prices by drilling our small reserves. Sure, we can put a little more oil on the market, but it's just going to get sold overseas at market price, depleting our resources and fouling our land for no reason. Sure, we can make the old nuke plants more profitable, but power companies are just going to plow that money into lobbying Washington or building gas topping stations, or what have you.
The problem doesn't lie with shutting down old plants--that's the smart thing to do even if the know-nothing business wonks don't like it because those old plants are pure profit at this point--but rather with our inability to think long-term and build the new plants which will make the power industry a crap-ton of money in 20 years. Unfortunately a lot of the MBA morons aren't able to think past their next golf outing.
If we keep running these gen-1 plants beyond their design life, we're going to have another accident, and that's going to kill any chances of building new plants. It's a vicious cycle, and we need to break it. The best way to do that is for engineers to stand their ground and tell management "no you can't" when they're making short-term-profit-based decisions.
I agree the older generation plants should be decommissioned and new plant designs built in their place. Like you say it's all politics and public misconceptions. Look what happened after Three Mile Island....not one new reactor.
It is as you say......our country only looks at the short term.......and for fast solutions and profits. By now we could have had a robust Nuclear Power industry and an upgraded smart power grid but the infrastructure in the United States is beginning to collapse because we are too busy waging war and reaping quick profits at the expense of the environment and our long term economic prospects.
Pittston2Sarasota, I wonder if you know about this blog: Georneys. It occurs to me you may like it and if you go there, you'll see that Evelyn has posted 20 interviews about Japan's crisis with her dad who is a nuclear engineer. The Dad Interviews are listed in the right side bar.
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