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@Peter Melzer yesterday they stated that the spent fuel pools will be emptied beginning in 3 years.

@lillymunster thank you !! it crashed down. you can now see more of the venting tower behind !

@Edano so far I can't see more tower via the TEPCO cam but I am just on my laptop and the TEPCO image is pretty low quality.

i can tell you the exact time of the crash. i was alone here with mona :)
Sunday July 10 2011, 05:14:33 UTC 18 hours ago off the east coast of Honshu, Japan 4.7 25.0 quakes.globalincidentmap.com
it happened on this aftershock (just for the record).

@lillymunster : i saw something had changed. but there was no dust. i had to look several times, but i noted the time.

cool:

Japan's reactor 'stress tests' should be shorter than EU's: Okada

OFUNATO, Japan, July 10, Kyodo

Democratic Party of Japan Secretary General Katsuya Okada indicated Sunday that Japan's safety assessment to be conducted on nuclear reactors before restarting them following suspension for regular checks should be shorter than the European Union's version of ''stress tests'' on which it will be based.

''A long-term test similar to the European Union's would have an impact on industries and people's daily lives,'' Okada told reporters while on a visit to Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture. ''The point is how to create Japan's version of the test.''

Although Okada had been reluctant to make the stress tests a precondition for resuming operations of reactors suspended for regular maintenance, he said, ''We have come to a point where we cannot gain people's understanding under current standards. We have no choice but to take the path of restarting them after they clear the stress tests.''
english.kyodonews.jp

I just thought of something reading these BWR containment documents. If a reactor has the RPV that is metal, the second bulb containment that is also metal but then the outer square (or round) building is the last line of containment in place of the concrete bulb they have at fuku what happens in a meltdown? If the outer shell of the building is your final containment nobody is getting inside to get at gauges, do nitrogen injection, get up to the SFP.

back

Four of the Illinois reactors have the same design and manufacturer as the first reactor to fail Saturday at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant northeast of Tokyo, said the Nuclear Energy Institute, the U.S. trade group for the industry.

The purpose of a reactor containment system is to create a barrier against the release of radioactivity generated during nuclear power operations from certain "design basis" accidents, such as increased pressure from a single pipe break. It is important to understand that nuclear power plants are not required by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to remain intact as a barrier to all possible accidents or "non-design basis" accidents, such as the melting of reactor fuel. All nuclear reactors can have accidents which can exceed the design basis of their containment.

But even basic questions about the the GE containment design remain unanswered and its integrity in serious doubt. For example, 23 of these BWRs use a smaller GE Mark I pressure suppression containment conceived as a cost-saving alternative to the larger reinforced concrete containments marketed by competitors. A large inverted light-bulb-shaped steel structure called "the drywell" is constructed of a steel liner and a concrete drywell shield wall enclosing the reactor vessel--this is considered the "primary" containment.. The atmosphere of the drywell is connected through large diameter pipes to a large hollow doughnut-shaped pressure suppression pool called "the torus", or wetwell, which is half-filled with water. In the event of a loss-of-coolant-accident (LOCA), steam would be released into the drywell and directed underwater in the torus where it is supposed to condense, thus suppressing a pressure buildup in the containment.

The outer concrete building is the "secondary" containment and is smaller and less robust (and thus cheaper to build) than the containment buildings used at most reactors.

An NRC analysis of the potential failure of the Mark I under accident conditions concluded in a 1985 report that Mark I failure within the first few hours following core melt would appear rather likely."

In 1986, Harold Denton, then the NRC's top safety official, told an industry trade group that the "Mark I containment, especially being smaller with lower design pressure, in spite of the suppression pool, if you look at the WASH 1400 safety study, you'll find something like a 90% probability of that containment failing." In order to protect the Mark I containment from a total rupture it was determined necessary to vent any high pressure buildup. As a result, an industry workgroup designed and installed the "direct torus vent system" at all Mark I reactors. Operated from the control room, the vent is a reinforced pipe installed in the torus and designed to release radioactive high pressure steam generated in a severe accident by allowing the unfiltered release directly to the atmosphere through the 300 foot vent stack. Reactor operators now have the option by direct action to expose the public and the environment to unknown amounts of harmful radiation in order to "save containment." As a result of GE's design deficiency, the original idea for a passive containment system has been dangerously compromised and given over to human control with all its associated risks of error and technical failure.