Update on Reactor Status - Our Best Guess

A couple of things we have suspected recently (as have many others in the business) have apparently been confirmed by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission's assessment as reported by the NY Times. Simply put, things are still very serious:

* The amount of seawater dumped into the reactor containment along with the melting fuel has caused a situation where it seems unlikely that much cooling water is circulating around and thus cooling the fuel. The fuel in a normal situation in a reactor has extremely tight tolerances for water to pass between the rods. The water removes the heat from the fuel in the same way coolant works on your car engine. Now if you can imagine dumping large quantities of seawater into an incredibly hot frying pan - you would see the water instantly turn to steam leaving behind the thick salt residue. Since seawater is usually in the rough region of 36,000 ppm salt - the buildup from the massive volumes of seawater boiling off would cause clogging of these tight water passages. You don't need to be a nuclear scientist to see this.

* The buildup of Hydrogen gas is still a big concern. The Hydrogen (and Oxygen) is generated as a result of the interaction of the water molecules with gamma radiation (this is the very simple version). In a normal plant, the Hydrogen build up is managed through controlled systems - in the Japanese disaster this was not possible resulting in a couple of explosions and subsequent releases. The US NRC seems to believe that the Hydrogen issue is a continuing problem.

* Finally - and our biggest concern - the spent fuel pools are exposed to the air and cooling is not restored. No one really knows what may or may not have been released from the pools at this point.

Unfortunately, the authorities and TEPCO are still in the emergency response phase of the disaster and much of this information including where the released materials dispersed will not be known until the recovery phase begins.

I know there are experts and technicians standing by around the world ready to help. We continue to pray for our friends in Japan.

Public Seminars Available Soon

We are planning to conduct seminars in Tokyo in the very near future. We are working on the final details including sponsoring organizations. We will conduct the seminars in English initially and are working on Japanese translations and instructors. (Volunteers would be great!) The seminars will be free to the public - we also hope to complete a deal with a local media group to provide the information online.

Beyond these free seminars, we are preparing basic short courses for presentation to any interested local governmental officials in the area of Tokyo and north toward the location of the disasters. Stay tuned for details.

The concept of the course is to provide basic information on the disaster along with practical information on public protection and disaster management techniques.

What We're Finding in Japan

We are preparing to release some information in the next couple of days. Should be interesting (at least to the HP geeks out there) - we will post some google map data also. I know there have been a few "crowd sourced' radiation surveys floating around but these should be viewed with skepticism as anyone can publish to these and lots of posters have agendas. I also have a difficult time believing that thousands of average Japan citizens have at their disposal accurately calibrated and appropriate radiation detection equipment. So - buyer beware on the crowd sourcing.

Here's a bit of information. One of our earliest observations in the Tokyo area is that the contact ground surveys (gamma, beta, alpha) are elevated. However, once the top layer of soil is scraped away, the soil below seems to exhibit lower (ie background) readings. The implications of this are obvious but require more data. As we go through our QA / QC process we can shake out exactly what we are finding.

Metropolis Magazine - Japanese English Language Info

There is an IT guy in Japan who is doing a great job of taking readings around Tokyo with a scintillation detector and a G-M tube type detector. He is blogging the results here. For any Health Physics folks - we are having a small albeit interesting discussion on the comments section. Some of the folks in Japan are perfectly safe-feeling at 2.2 uSv / hr general area gamma readings in Tokyo (about 220 microR / hr). Shows you some perspective I guess.

Site shows radiation readings in Tokyo

Here is a site with a webcam showing constant readings in Tokyo. Very interesting.

Yes - It CAN happen here....

The issue we have been asked about most often is - could this happen here? The answer is a most definite YES.

The main problem the Japanese are experiencing now has less to do with the actual reactors and much more to do with a problem very common to every nuclear plant in the United States. The problem is what to do with spent fuel (used up fuel rods).

When a civilian nuclear plant "refuels", the plant workers change around the configuration of the fuel rods in the reactor and replace the oldest rods with new fuel rods. The spent fuel rods are highly radioactive and extremely dangerous. In the U. S. we have never reached a consensus as to how to dispose of or store these rods so all U. S. plants have a spent fuel pool along with a spent fuel storage building (most) where the rods sit. These spent fuel rods require cooling water just like the reactor core except in many cases, the spent fuel is not stored in facilities anywhere near as robust as the actual core. In the BWR's in Japan (and several of which I am familiar in the U. S.) the spent fuel actually sits in a pool ABOVE the reactor.

Once the cooling flow is lost to the spent fuel pool and the fuel is uncovered, regardless of any other situations, the buildings become too dangerous to approach much less to work in. Exposure to spent fuel rods would cause very quick death. The protective suits you see workers wearing on the photos and videos coming out of Japan do not provide ANY protection from this type of radiation - only from contamination (see earlier post). There is NO suit or other magical device which can make it safe for humans to get near these reactors once the fuel is uncovered.

So what can they do now? I am not familiar with any remote systems which might be able to mitigate the damage by flooding the fuel and reactor but most of the actions you may have seen are what we would call "hail mary passes". If luck doesn't turn for the Japanese, a large swath of the country may be uninhabitable for many many years.

Article by Marvin Resnikoff

Here is an article on the front of the Huffington Post by Marvin Resnikoff. I have known Marvin for many years - he is highly sought for his expertise in the field. Worth a read.