The crippled Fukushima plant now rates six on a seven-point international scale of gravity for nucle

[grahamhgreen]

Source: Herald Sun

""The incident has taken on a completely different dimension compared to Monday. It is clear that we are at level six," Andre-Claude Lacoste, head of France's Nuclear Safety Authority, said last night.

"The order of gravity has changed."

The 1986 Chernobyl disaster in the Ukraine registered as a maximum seven on the international scale.

The 1979 Three Mile Island disaster in Pennsylvania, US, registered as five.

Japan's nuclear watchdog previously rated the situation at Fukushima as four."

Read more: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/special-reports/japan-earthquake-new-explosion-rocks-fukushima-nuclear-power-plant/story-fn7zkbgs-1226021415043

---

These are not my comments, but one from the Aussi newspaper that printed the story:

" as someone who has lived in Japan for 2 years and paid for nuclear generated power, my Japanese power bill was 8 times that of my current Melbourne bill. My Australian power bill is supplemented by excess Solar power "bought" back by the company and reduced from my bill. My current electricity bill was $61.45 (quarter). Friends of ours live in Nevada and their Nuclear generated electricity bill is high and they use very little power. I guess when a Nuclear Plant cost $3 BILLION+ to make they have t charge a lot to recoup. My time in Japan was wonderful, my thoughts go out to them in these terrible times.". - Patricia of Prahran

[thereismore]

1. Details needed, why 6 all of a sudden. nt

[grahamhgreen]

2. I believe because

the fuel is now exposed to the air...

[thereismore]

3. Got it. Thanks. nt

[Lastactiongyro]

5. As of 9:29am central half the pile is now submerged. But last night

the entire pile was exposed to air for 6 t0 8 hours and there are holes in the containment structure (unverified)

[caseymoz]

13. Not simple exposure to the air.

You have heavy, fissile isotopes like iodine, cesium, strontium, uranium and a half dozen other things being dispersed into the air due to fire and explosions. They can spread for miles, even hundreds of miles, and of course, they can be inhaled or ingested as dust. Internal exposure to radiation is far worse than external exposure. You don't want a highly radioactive isotope in your body.

It's the difference between having poison in a container and having it in a cloud.

[Hannah Bell]

44. it has not been rated 6. lacoste expressed his opinion and possibly the opinion of his agency.

but the french nuclear agency is not in charge of rating international nuclear incidents.

each country does that in conjunction with iaea.

[DRoseDARs]

4. Not sure what Patricia is talking about, there are no and have never been nuke pw plants here in NV.

Coal, natural gas, solar, wind and geothermal is what we have here. I guess it's possible some of the electricity that's imported from other states is nuclear-generated, but I don't believe NV Energy charges Nevadans more than their regular electricity fees for that given the plants (nuclear or otherwise) that we import from are in other states.

Edit: Derp, and hydro power from Hoover Dam (though California and Arizona get the lion's share) and a teeny tiny amount from along the Truckee River up in the north. Thanks for reminding me itsrobert. :hi:

[CRH]

6. Yep OP is incorrect, no nukes in Nevada, ...

Don't forget hydro electric power in Nevada, from Bolder dam. I'd be surprised if it wasn't the largest source.

[itsrobert]

7. Doesn't the dam provide most of Las Vegas' power

?

[DRoseDARs]

8. No, most of Hoover's power goes to California and Arizona.

LV only gets about 355MW from Hoover Dam.

[slackmaster]

9. Maybe she's referring to the town of Nevada, Iowa

Which does get some of its power from the nuclear facility at Duane Arnold, IA.

[DRoseDARs]

35. (Since the edit period has long-passed): Double derp, I meant to thank CRH for reminding me of Hoovr

I was in a rush to get to work this morning. :P

[Ferret Annica]

40. Navada is where Yucca Mt. is, where much nuclear waste has been buried

“Let’s just bury the shit in Yucca Mountain!”

This has become the rallying cry of nuke proponents. It’s true: Yucca mountain leads to a massively deep and solid ignimbrite base that can keep nuclear waste far from the water table and our kid’s sippy cups. We could put shit down there, slap on a few warning signs and just monitor the place for about 50,000 years and we’ll be fine. Sort of.

Trouble is, Yucca Mountain is the leftover remnant of an ancient caldera and an active tectonic zone. Fault lines extend throughout the area. One good earthquake, and we’ll be one nervous country. Who’s going to go down and see how things held up after the big quake? Not me.

OK, so maybe disposal is a problem we haven’t solved. But maybe we could solve it. Maybe we could find the perfect spot to bury the waste or maybe we could encase the shit in thick nano-carbon sarcophagi, then just rocket them into the Sun. Poof! Problem solved.

http://citizented.com/?m=201001

[caseymoz]

10. For those who thought they were covering up the severity before

My point of view that they weren't covering it up is vindicated, it seems.

Now we have just a momentous crisis. Unlike Chernobyl, you have multiple reactors involved and spent fuel rods. Now this is going to get worse, not better, because efforts to contain it have already failed and its now the radiation is no getting too high to work at the reactor grounds. It isn't going to explode like a hydrogen bomb, but it will make a large area of Japan uninhabitable, and it's not like they have any space to spare to begin with.

It will shorten a lot of peoples' lives, too, and not only in Japan. Its heartbreaking to see all their efforts failing.

[vicarofrevelwood]

11. NV has to be a misprint. but that aside...

NOW CAN WE HAVE A SERIOUS DISCUSSION ABOUT GREEN ENERGY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Bluenorthwest]

12. No nuke plants in Nevada....

so that puts a crimp in an otherwise interesting point. Facts are very important.

[caseymoz]

14. It looks like the left was right about nuclear plants, too-- right again.

So far, simple leftist common sense has beat the right on almost every issue that's been tested.

I don't know, it just didn't seem like common sense to build an extreme heat source full of toxic materials, one that actually couldn't turn off and had to douse with water constantly to keep from exploding. Those who questioned the wisdom of this were told it would be easy to always douse it with water, even though a glance at the design and hearing what it took to properly do it told you there was nothing easy about it.

And people did point out that building this on a highly unstable earthquake fault was not a good idea. Yes, I'll admit that we didn't understand plate tectonics and didn't have a term like "ring of fire" when we did, but people had noticed that plot of land shook a lot.

And I say "we" because the US sold this idea on the Japanese, and the design is based on our military reactor design.

I'm not saying, BTW, that there shouldn't be nuclear energy, only that we can't this basic design of a water-cooled reactor.

[suffragette]

15. LaCoste has been saying this should be rated higher from the start

Before the most recent developments, he had noted the rating should be level 5 or 6 rather than level 4.

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/asiapacific/news/article_1626012.php/French-nuclear-body-Japan-explosion-in-upper-ranks-of-accident-scale
Paris - France's nuclear safety authority ASN said Monday that it believes an explosion last week at Japan's Fukushima 1 power plant was a category 5 or 6 on the scale of nuclear accidents, with 7 being a Chernobyl-style disaster.
'We feel that we're at least at a level 5 and probably at level 6,' ASN president Andre-Claude Lacoste said at a press conference.
'We are beyond Three Mile Island without reaching a Chernobyl,' he added.
When the blast occurred on Saturday in reactor number 1, Japanese authorities had said it was a level 4 incident on the INES scale, with 7 being the worst.


Seems to make sense to me.

[caseymoz]

16. Those scales are rules of thumb with mathematical accuracy.

They just give people some idea, and for specialists, dictate procedures. I noticed that authorities in Japan immediately issued iodine tablets, so they were immediately taking precautions higher than the scale would dictate.

[suffragette]

18. Thanks for that clarification

Still seems to indicate they need to acknowledge that by increasing the level.

Watching the press conference on NHK yesterday, you could hear the increasing frustration of the Japanese reporters as they pressed for more specific information. They basically said stop apologizing to us and start telling us more about what's occurring.

[caseymoz]

19. CORRECTION: I meant 'without mathematical accuracy'

:o

I shouldn't post in the morning.:o

[suffragette]

21. Actually, I think I read it that way instead of the way you wrote it

I need more coffee, too
:)

[caseymoz]

20. It's quite possible they don't really know.

The instrumentation is probably melted. Getting close enough to see what's happening would be suicidal, even if you knew what you were seeing before you went blind.

Moreover, the people actually on site who actually have some idea sound like they really have their hands full. When they do have a moment to communicate what they know, it probably comes out in technical jargon the flacks don't understand.

In other words, I could understand why they'd have communication problems with this disaster, unlike say, the BP disaster.

[suffragette]

30. Good point about the instrumentation

Exhaustion and supplies are also elements. Yesterday, the source of the issue was apparently a pump that had run out of diesel.

And jargon would play a role.

But yesterday on NHK, the bigger communication issue was that they kept repeating apologies rather than explaining. And the reporters clearly expressed their frustration with that and disbelief that enough information was being provided rather than issues with jargon. I think they hit a major trust turning point yesterday.

[caseymoz]

32. Definitely this is going to change Japan, politically and culturally.

Economically as well. I'm hoping it doesn't slip to being a third-rate power.

[suffragette]

33. Agree with that

Significant political, cultural and economic change. Hopefully, events stop going in this direction and they recover, but with a different emphasis.

And hopefully the world shifts away from this "nuclear renaissance" I've seen referenced in articles.

On that note, just posted something you may find interesting:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x653404

[christx30]

42. I wonder

if they have thought about sending robots in? Radio controlled beastie with a camera and a geiger counter on it. Would the radiation prevent communication with the bot? It's safe the life of a human and prolly get a good look at what's going on in the depths of the place. Prolly can't get close due to space issues.

[caseymoz]

43. I'm certain that's exactly what they're doing, I mean it's Japan.

I'm certain they actually had bots set up there to do just this, and that's probably where they're getting the majority of their information now. But it doesn't substitute for those instruments, and robots can be vulnerable to heat too. I mean if it's hot enough to melt lead, it's hot enough to melt any bot they send in there.

[Hannah Bell]

45. lacoste can say anything he likes. but he's not in charge of rating incidents.

but it seems it's no use fighting against the misinformation being peddled in some threads (not talking about you).

lacoste expressed his opinion, as he did in the earlier article you linked. it carries no official weight.

each country rates their own incidents & iaea makes final determination.

japan has called for iaea determination on severity.

[Uncle Joe]

17. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, grahamhgreen.

[brooklynite]

22. Japan crisis worse than Three Mile Island, experts say

Source: MSNBC

SOMA, Japan — The catastrophe at Japan's stricken nuclear complex is now worse than Three Mile Island, experts said Tuesday, after the two most recent blasts exposed a spent fuel pool to outside air and might have compromised a reactor shield.

...snip...

Japanese officials told the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that the spent fuel storage area had caught fire and that radioactivity was "being released directly into the atmosphere."

...snip...

Moreover, the IAEA said Tuesday that an explosion Monday at the plant, this one within Unit 2, "may have affected the integrity of its primary containment vessel." That means radioactivity could be leaking from the containment vessel.

...snip...

The radiation releases prompted Japan on Tuesday to order 140,000 people to seal themselves indoors and a 30-kilometer (19-mile) no-fly zone was imposed around the site for commercial traffic.

Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42084187/ns/world_news-asiapacific/

---

My impression is that this is not going to get better, and that the degradation of conditions is going to drag out very slowly.

[nadinbrzezinski]

23. Yay, we are now number three!!!!

And Russian TV is actually giddy at the prospect of being number two

Gallows humor I know

[PoliticAverse]

24. Is there anyone who doesn't think this is worse than Three Mile Island? n/t

[nadinbrzezinski]

26. Yes, just hold on for the tappy feet brigade

they have been telling us just how much this was NOT possible

[snappyturtle]

25. I think you're right about the dragging out part. If I understood

what Rachel Maddow explained last night that salt water as a coolant rapidly oxidizes (degrades) the rods protecting the fuel and creates hydrogen which can and has caused the explosions. If the fuel rods completely decompose there's no protection for the radioactive fuel. So, this process would take time but hopefully the workers can get the heat under control.

[nadinbrzezinski]

27. Salt water is an oxidizer

and you only use it if you are going to sacrifice the reactor. The rods are exposed since they cannot keep water in the tank somewhere. Could be a valve... could be the vessel itself. But using salt water will oxidize them, while getting exposed on it's own will slag them.

Was I clear as mud?

[snappyturtle]

28. Yes...no, I understand....I was correcting my reply as you wrote

yours!! The more I think of it, I believe this process will prove to be about as beneficial as pouring water into a sieve....might work but the rods may decompose before they can control the heat.

[elias49]

47. Fuck the reactor! Use sea water!

If your house is engulfed in flames and all you have to throw on it is wine, I say fuck the stain! Put the fire out!

[Travelman]

31. Well, that's not really saying much

When all was said and done, pretty much nothing happened with Three Mile Island. Lots of scared people, and for damn good reason, but no one was actually hurt by the incident itself. That was one reactor in one building. In Japan, it's multiple reactors in multiple buildings all over the country.

So, yeah, I think it's safe to say that it's pretty much astoundingly obvious that what's happening in Japan is worse than TMI.

[StarsInHerHair]

36. why aren't they spraying frozen helium on it? simple water is beyond stupid,

to me, I'd be looking at gelled heat resistant material, the ceramic they used on space shuttles, & robots to carry the "spent" fuel away. The Japanese are well-known for their robotics, I'm beyond stunned they didn't already have some protocols in case of this very scenario. & why didn't they use the 'dynamite' rule, never store duds/spent fuel anywhere near 'live' fuel? Am I totally stupid on this? Science has all sorts of fire retardants, they should be cycling thru those looking at what might work.

[boppers]

38. Helium would expand too quickly, so you have another explosion problem.

(Assuming you were talking about inside the reactors).

Plus, it's hard getting that much frozen Helium moved.

[StarsInHerHair]

46. helium is not explosive, whatabout frozen nitrogen? hell, what about

throwing ice at it instead of sea water?

[boppers]

48. I like the ice idea.

How do we get it there, and deliver it safely?

Constraints:
No electricity
Blocked roads
Fuel shortages
Delivering ice at a distance without damage

[boppers]

49. Oh, and then there's this problem:

Ice absorbs heat more slowly than water+ice, or water.

Kind of not related, but amusing: Take an ice-cube. Put it in a glass. Microwave it.

What do you think happens?

[Baclava]

29. It's not getting much better...

Update 2:35: The IAEA is out with a new statement, which includes this line:

As of 00:16 UTC on 15 March, plant operators were considering the removal of panels from units 5 and 6 reactor buildings to prevent a possible build-up of hydrogen in the future. It was a build-up of hydrogen at units 1, 2, and 3 that led to explosions at the Daiichi facilities in recent days.

Update 12:09: IAEA's director general Yukiya Amano: New information about reactor core is "worrying."

Some other details from a press conference:

The suppression chamber at unit #2 appears to be damaged.
The cause of the fire at unit #4 is unknown.
The Japanese government has been asked to improve its information sharing with the IAEA

Update 10:45: According to Reuters, TEPCO's new plan is to dump water by helicopter, which sounds incredibly desperate.

[CJvR]

34. Basicly a good idea...

...blow a small hole in the roof so the hydrogen can escape gradually rather than blowing the roof off!

Now why does this speculation of the 5 & 6 reactor crew send an icy shiver down my spine? Just what is going on in the other three reactors if they start plotting thing like this?

[DeadEyeDyck]

37. $61.45 (quarter)???

my trash pick up is more than that?

[daleo]

39. I think it's an 8 on the 7 point scale

It looks to be off the scale, just like the earthquake and tsunami that started it.

[Overseas]

41. Things are indeed a lot worse than had been revealed so far.

The only bright aspect of this crisis is that it may push more countries to get real and abandon the pretense that nukes can be cheaper and handled safely and give them enough courage to resist the tremendous pressure of big oil and big monopoly energy sources.