Yep. The SL-1 incident up in Idaho...or Santa Susana over on the West Side of Los Angeles or Y12 in Oak Ridge. Your last statement is very true.
Very OT. Chernobyl and Fukushima
- Thread starter haymond1977
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Yep. The SL-1 incident up in Idaho...or Santa Susana over on the West Side of Los Angeles or Y12 in Oak Ridge. Your last statement is very true.
For those in the know. Say we were to get into a conflict to where someone could or would lob a missile at a nuke site, are these plants made to withstand such? My guess is if the crap ever hits the fan these sites would have bullseyes all over them.
Short answer is yes. You see all of that concrete on the outside, from the outside. It’s approx. 4’ thick at the base of the dome (@RaleighTiger mentioned this earlier). What you don’t see are the steel cable “tendons” that crisscross inside the concrete. That adds significant structural stability.
Not to mention the reactor is surrounded by more concrete on the inside of the dome and then a refuel pool, of water. Then about 4-5 stories of nothing but a crane and empty space between to top of the dome and the head of the reactor on the refuel floor. It have to be a big missle.
They are not required by the NRC to be designed to take a missile strike but they are designed to take a direct hit from an airplane (probably worse than most missiles). The concern is not a hit to the fuel itself, but it is the lose of the equipment that cools the fuel. Without cooling, the fuel melts and releases the radioactive byproducts of the fission process which are captured within the air gap of the fuel assemblies.
This was the problem at Fuk, the tidal wave took out the cooling mechanism and the fuel melted. The Fuk operators should have injected seawater into the steam generators however they waited to get approval from the home office in Tokyo because the seawater would have ruined the $500 million dollar steam generators.
As someone else mentioned, the US plants are required to keep equipment in proximity of the plant to inject cooling water in a variety of ways (called FLEX) to prevent the fuel melt.
I appreciate all the informed discussion. Usually I only get to talk about this stuff at work. Fun while we are waiting on the next 5 star.
Why? If you are talking about a nuclear armed missile, what would the destroyed reactor do that was not already done by the weapon itself?
In general, I believe, nuclear weapons target two things, military installations and large population centers.
Mutually Assurred Destruction strategy means, unless you are committing suicide for you and your country, that you have to take out the other country's armaments almost completely with your first strike. Which became, sometime in the 60's, virtually impossible.
However, insanity resulting in self-destruction should never be discounted(think North Korea).
Damn funny, and true. You won't see us nuclear guys hiring a zero star engineer just because he dad works there
Also targeting a nuke reactor building with conventional munitions instead of the power distribution node would be stupid. Reactor building is way more hardened and you target that directly it would be viewed the same as dropping a small dirty nuke and would be retaliated as such.
What kind of missile? If you're talking about a nuke, then the effect on the nuclear plant will be the least of our worries.
Lol not a nuke, maybe some sort of Sam type missle or bomb, something like the Palestinians keep lobbing into Israel
Might leave a black mark and some chipped concrete. Yawn.
The purpose of the containment building is to provide tertiary fission product barrier in the event of a LOCA which stands for Loss of Coolant Accident which is unrelated to a scud missile attack. There is a limited amount of time the plant is allowed to remain operable if the Containment is Damaged by the missile. The plant could possibly keep running until the next refueling outage but I'm sure there will be compensatory measures in place to ensure Containment remained operable for the purpose of LOCA. Containment structures are difficult to repair and they may decide to scuttle the plant. Look what happened to Crystal River.
Full-containment LNG tanks are the same way nowadays as they’re surrounded with an outer shell of reinforced concrete.
I hate to disappoint a lot of yal who watch the terrorist tv shows, but a lot of the stuff those shows propose is laughable. Not saying any of our infrastructure is impervious, but it’s also not like we have a bunch of nuclear or LNG facilities that can be ignited by some idiot with an RPG.
The Navy uses nuclear power on two things now - carriers and submarines.
Subs are kind of an all-or-nothing scenario. Either they are fine or blown to pieces.
Carriers are REALLY hard to get to the reactor spaces on.
Now - there is a concern if we litter the ocean floor with them but that is very unlikely. The Russians have left a few on the ocean bottom though......
I think the US has lost two - both to non-nuclear incidents. USS Scopion went down after hitting the ocean floor (I think) and USS Thresher which went down during a deep-dive test.
Most everything else (cruisers, destroyers, etc) is conventional power now - usually gas turbine.
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For clarification, Chernobyl did not explode BECAUSE of the design, although the positive moderator coefficient ALLOWED it to explode. Chernobyl exploded because of arrogance and ignorance of people in charge. They wanted to conduct a test to see how long they could keep the turbine running on decay heat steam to provide electrical power in the event of a loss of offsite power event that tripped the plant. The operators were directed (against their protests) to disable 5-7 (depending on which report you read) safety systems. These systems would have prevented the event but would have caused the test to fail, which was unacceptable to the design authority. It was this decision that started the ball rolling and the design made it impossible to recover because the was no time to restore the safety systems.
I’ve been to several RBMK reactors and they can be safely operated. As for me, I’ll take a Western designed reactor every day, but ( because of a more forgiving moderator coefficient, but it wasn’t the design itself.
Hope the series brings this out, it has been fairly accurate so far.
Go Tigers!
I’ve been to several RBMK reactors and they can be safely operated. As for me, I’ll take a Western designed reactor every day, but ( because of a more forgiving moderator coefficient, but it wasn’t the design itself.
Hope the series brings this out, it has been fairly accurate so far.
Go Tigers!
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Many more people have died from solar energy than from nuclear power plants in the U.S. Several men each year fall off roofs installing solar panels.
A fact.
A fact.
It's a stupid fact.
Like saying more people die from non drunk motorists accidents than drunk drivers so we should not give extra punishment to felony DUI. My favorite is the, more people die on shore than in the ocean from shark attacks. That's cause the people are on the shore! Doesn't mean you are safe swimming with a steak shirt on in the middle of the Atlantic.
More people have been bitten by non pit bulls so I guess they are a safe breed right?
Nothing can ever go wrong with housing 50 tonnes of spent uranium right? Because it has only happened to a few other countries, we should not be worried cause it has cost the US zero lives so far. Until it does.
Not an expert did an internship with EPRI .... main 2 things to worry about are where to store the spent fuel rods and terrorism .... other than that all good barring a 10.0 earthquake in the upstate.
You can always move if you can’t manage the anxiety / stress of living near one. CA has decommissioned all but a of theirs ... it’s in SLO.
Not quite correct, my friend. San Onofre is not decommissioned. It’s shut down. Decommissioning has absolutely not started yet.
Stupid fact? Not a stupid fact?
But it is a fact.
Nuclear power has an incredible safety record in perspective in the U.S. It is very clean. It has been safe and very, very likely will continue to be safe. It may well be the best and smartest solution for future energy needs. Solar energy and wind energy are extremely inefficient. They are nice little adjunctive sources of energy but will never be a broad solution for energy needs. Chernobyl, Fukushima, and Three Mile Island badly distort perception and cause fear about nuclear energy that is irrational.
I'm the exec-level corporate-designated liaison with the CCC. Tune into the live feed next month as we go for our Coastal Development Permit, the final hurdle to begin decommissioning. Thankfully, the Chief Nuclear Officer will be at the podium this time & not me. Fun will be had by all, I'm sure. Expect drama...lots of it.
Oh $hit small world lol ....god help you with that group .... how do you not lose your mind with them? Besides the paycheck ...
It's a balancing act for sure. Dealing with the CCC is unique...certainly different than the early days of my career in env. consulting dealing with DHEC or GaEPD, as examples. Much more complex. I try to do my best to view issues through their lens as well as my own corporate lens. I tactfully correct misconceptions & work toward solutions that attempt to resolve the major points on both sides. It's much easier to type about it right now than it is to actually implement...I respect what they (the staff) do because they certainly aren't in it for the money. Plus, they constantly get thumped on by the hardcore env. activists (both true believers and limousine liberals) for never doing enough. They know that I respect what they do (even if I don't always agree); not surprisingly, that respect allows for great candor in negotiating win-win scenarios. Despite some of the dumb shite I've posted on here, I find that if you smile, listen attentively, show respect even in the face of disagreements, and propose 50-50 solutions, you'll do OK. It's a pretty simple strategy, but a lot of people still don't "get it". Their arrogance and misplaced political pressure causes a lot of resentment.
Before this HBO series, all I knew about nuclear energy I learned from the Simpsons lol. I admit I had some similar fears as Haymond, such as the possibility of a meltdown or terrorist attack, but feel a lot better after reading this thread. Pumped for the series finale tomorrow.
An opinionated tv personality that is on a network that you have to pay to watch??? Not sure how that bothers you.
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