ScribbleLive

@dean yikes. I saw what a semi lng truck blowing up at an apartment complex did. A tanker full would do a ton of damage.

@Jim Carver I have been dealing with them. The are a hive of scum and villany. They spent more man hours trying to get out of replacing my dishwasher than it would have cost to pay it out. We kept having outages and surges, ruined lots of things over time. I kept filing complaints, they came up with lame excuses like we had a thunderstorm on a date we didn't have any weather events...

First the design of a plant in a LOCA (loss of cooling accident) needs to be explained a bit. In a LOCA, steam from the containment vessel (C/V) vents to the suppression pool (S/P) through a conglomeration of pipes and safety release valves. The S/P is the actual pool of water inside the torus. It is the most imp. part of the cooling function in a plant, fed by a recurring process of steam being 'blown down into it and being broken up into thousands of tiny bubbles that leach the heat fairly easily into the water. Steam dumped into the S/P is vented thru a MOV (motor-operated valve, which can also be manually manipulated) into the 250m exhaust stack. Hydrogen and noble gases (i.e Xenon) are non-condensable, NOR IS STEAM, if the S/P boils (100C). The steam is supposed to be vented from the S/P at 320kPa thru the stack, OR may leak into the secondary containment (the actual building) or the RPV (reactor pressure vessel) service floor. The building itself is not designed to handle high pressure. Here is the series of events (with a bit of commentary): On 11 Mar. at 2:46pm was the great EQ. The units scrammed (dropped control rodded to stop criticality). At 3:41 almost immediately after the tsunami, there was a loss of AC power and emergency deisel generators. At 4:36 the emergency core cooling system was lost, and they had the isolation condensers only to inject water (driven by 'decay' steam, not electric). At about midnight, they got the RCIC (reactor core isolation cooling system) up and working on battery power. Using same power source, at 3:48am they got the make-up condensate system to help cool. At 5:22am the S/P exceeds 100C and starts to boil. By 5:22am the function of the S/C (pressure suppression function) is lost. Around the same time, early on 12Mar., the C/V pressure rises to over 750kPa (possibly 840kPa), almost double it's maximum 'design accident basis'). This probably damaged the pump seals and possibly other egress points. [at this point they should have hustled to vent, full speed ahead and damn the bad press]. Because of the damage to the pump seals, water/vapor escaped from the pressure suppression system. This caused the water level to drop at approx. 11:00am. Radiation levels started to increase, causing more heat to build up. [as near as I can figure, water level dropped and fuel rods were exposed for several hours.] At about the same time, the safety release valve got 'stuck'. At 1:00pm, a worker was exposed to 106.3mSv/hr. [ I firmly believe this was due to him being sent to 'unstick' the safety release valve manually] At this point the reactor pressure was high, and venting commenced [guess the worker got the job done]. At 3:29pm, dose at the site boundary exceeded the limit. Then at 3:36pm, there's another quake. In subsequent reports, TEPCO says that after the 'big quake' [note: not the great quake] on 12Mar. there was heard a 'big sound' and 'white smoke was observed'. At between 8 to 10pm, they start injecting boronated seawater using the RCIC. [ I believe the exposed, over-heated, fuel rods caused 'flash steam' at this point. This could cause a stratification of steam and non-condensable noble gasses. This stratification would disrupt any normal convection cooling and cause the steam bubble going into the S/P to be more like smoke rings than tiny bubbles. That would effectively nullify the S/P as a cooling medium.] At 10:15pm there is another tremor, which halts the injection. Thus ends the first full day. By 3:00 am on 13 Mar., Tepco announces they will "exhaustively monitor in detail the possibility of radioactive material being discharged from the exhaust stack or discharge canal".

www.guardian.co.uk
The Chernobyl deniers use far too simple a measure of radiation risk

Those who downplay the dangers of nuclear energy are wrong to focus only on dose

@dean T. Boone Pickens plan is to use wind and run cars on NG. He's building the largest wind farm in the world.

@Jim Carver TY, I sure don't like typing! Don't wanna do it again.

@Jim Carver, Nancy, I'm waiting to click the Bloom Energy option on my PG&E bill... www.bloomenergy.com

@Reed TY Reed, I value your opinion :)

@Jim Carver Oh it is funny. They went into full panic mode when they realized I had server logs of every outage at the house for 3 years back. I'm not done with them. I need to go back and cross reference outages vs. historical weather. Will send that to the PUC.

@dean An oilman ready to chuck oil because of our dependence. I think he's on the right track, whether or not you agree with everything he says. It makes sense to me and the Texas experiment shows that we can do it. And also, they don't take years to put up either. Time value.

Excellent, again ty, Jim. Maybe the time line (at least) will prod other's thoughts/ideas.

Excellent work Marie. We'll save and link that and the other days summaries, hmm?

@marie rich Yeah, help to put it all together. There's a lot of pieces from different places need to come together. I don't even think tepco has it completely down.

@dean So are you suggesting there was a small, and then a large LOCA? btw, couldn't find steam tables. Not good w/ computer. :(

@dean I like your analysis tho. It just 'sounds' right.

@Rob, "Fuku LOCA" that sounds like a drink name.

ty, Dean. I'll chk it out.

@Rob in SF Doesn't seem to bother him tho.