Fukushima: May 16, 2011
An adviser to Prime Minister Naoto Kan said Monday that the operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant had failed to inject water into the Nos. 2 and 3 reactors for more than six hours after the March 11 massive earthquake and ensuing tsunami.
Goshi Hosono, tasked with handling the nuclear crisis, said at a press conference that Tokyo Electric Power Co. had not been able to cool down the reactors' cores due to loss of external power for a long time after the quake, acknowledging that fuel in the vessels might have largely melted ''in the worst-case scenario.''
http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/2011/05/91395.html
“The findings at the No. 1 reactor indicate the likelihood that the water level readings in the other reactors aren’t accurate,” Junichi Matsumoto, a general manager at the utility known as Tepco, said today. “It could be that a meltdown similar to that in the No. 1 reactor has occurred.”
"The company expects to meet its timetable, President Masataka Shimizu said in parliament today. He said the risks of more hydrogen explosions and leaks of contaminated water remain at the plant. Shimizu was responding to a question on what risks are incorporated in the road map."
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-16/tepco-says-fuel-in-2-reactors-may-have-melted.html
"The China Syndrome refers to a scenario in which a molten nuclear reactor core could fission its way through its containment vessel, melt through the basement of the power plant and down into the earth. While a molten reactor core wouldn't burn "all the way through to China" it could enter the soil and water table and cause huge contamination in the crops and drinking water around the power plant. It's a nightmare scenario,the stuff of movies. And it might just have happened at Fukushima.
Last week, plant operator Tepco sent engineers in to recalibrate water level gauges in reactor number 1. They made an alarming discovery: virtually all the fuel in the core had melted down. That means that the zirconium alloy tubes that hold the uranium fuel and the fuel itself lies in a clump---either at the bottom of the pressure vessel, or in the basement below or possibly even outside the containment building. Engineers don't know for sure, though current temperature readings suggest that fission inside the reactor core has definitely ceased for good (i.e. there will be no further melting).
Anecdotal evidence doesn't bode well for how far the fuel melted: Tepco has been pumping thousands of tons of water onto reactor 1 to try to cool it-yet the water level in the containment vessel is too low to run an emergency cooling system. That means the water is escaping somewhere on a course cut by molten fuel--probably into the basement of the reactor building, though it's also possible it melted through everything into the earth."
http://ecocentric.blogs.time.com/2011/05/16/was-fukushima-a-china-syndrome/
Goshi Hosono, tasked with handling the nuclear crisis, said at a press conference that Tokyo Electric Power Co. had not been able to cool down the reactors' cores due to loss of external power for a long time after the quake, acknowledging that fuel in the vessels might have largely melted ''in the worst-case scenario.''
http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/2011/05/91395.html
“The findings at the No. 1 reactor indicate the likelihood that the water level readings in the other reactors aren’t accurate,” Junichi Matsumoto, a general manager at the utility known as Tepco, said today. “It could be that a meltdown similar to that in the No. 1 reactor has occurred.”
"The company expects to meet its timetable, President Masataka Shimizu said in parliament today. He said the risks of more hydrogen explosions and leaks of contaminated water remain at the plant. Shimizu was responding to a question on what risks are incorporated in the road map."
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-16/tepco-says-fuel-in-2-reactors-may-have-melted.html
"The China Syndrome refers to a scenario in which a molten nuclear reactor core could fission its way through its containment vessel, melt through the basement of the power plant and down into the earth. While a molten reactor core wouldn't burn "all the way through to China" it could enter the soil and water table and cause huge contamination in the crops and drinking water around the power plant. It's a nightmare scenario,the stuff of movies. And it might just have happened at Fukushima.
Last week, plant operator Tepco sent engineers in to recalibrate water level gauges in reactor number 1. They made an alarming discovery: virtually all the fuel in the core had melted down. That means that the zirconium alloy tubes that hold the uranium fuel and the fuel itself lies in a clump---either at the bottom of the pressure vessel, or in the basement below or possibly even outside the containment building. Engineers don't know for sure, though current temperature readings suggest that fission inside the reactor core has definitely ceased for good (i.e. there will be no further melting).
Anecdotal evidence doesn't bode well for how far the fuel melted: Tepco has been pumping thousands of tons of water onto reactor 1 to try to cool it-yet the water level in the containment vessel is too low to run an emergency cooling system. That means the water is escaping somewhere on a course cut by molten fuel--probably into the basement of the reactor building, though it's also possible it melted through everything into the earth."
http://ecocentric.blogs.time.com/2011/05/16/was-fukushima-a-china-syndrome/