Japan Earthquake

Japan Earthquake | Page 2607

@Edano @M.I.A. Curium doesn't decay directly to xenon. Radioactive xenon can be produced through the decay of uranium, plutonium or iodine. However, I'm not acquainted with the whole decay sequence so I cannot say for sure that curium isn't involved in the process, although I doubt it for several reasons.
en.wikipedia.org
by Pedro Jesus 11/4/2011 3:35:19 PM

@Peter Melzer but free tempered neutrons are bad, not what we want to see.
by Edano 11/4/2011 3:35:46 PM

@you want to say: they induce a chain reaction.
by Edano 11/4/2011 3:38:00 PM

@Edano LOL, curious enough, according to that Wiki article, xenon acts in nuclear reactors as a neutron absorber. Ironic
?
by Pedro Jesus 11/4/2011 3:39:06 PM

@Pedro Jesus "xenon poisoning" it is called.
by Edano 11/4/2011 3:39:48 PM

@Edano I didn't know about that. That Wiki article is a nice read. =)
by Pedro Jesus 11/4/2011 3:41:54 PM

if i remember it correctly, if a scrammed nuke is restarted too fast, the residing xenon captures the neutrons and hinders the chain reaction, so that the engineers in error may pull out the control rods too far, and when xenon vanishes, the reactor is suddenly too high. this happened at chernobyl during their initial "experiment".,
by Edano 11/4/2011 3:43:10 PM

@Edano You shud chk this out. Very cool and useful. On the right hand side is a pre- and post- decay chain function for element you plug in. Wish I found this way before, whether it helps with capture/decay or not. www.wolframalpha.com

by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 3:44:34 PM

Some good information about the xenon matter, supporting my commentary yesterday. www.world-nuclear-news.org
by Pedro Jesus 11/4/2011 3:45:05 PM

Dean talked about xenon poisoning the other day related to this. They have to deal with it in a reactor shutdown.
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 3:45:10 PM

@M.I.A. i do :)
by Edano 11/4/2011 3:45:12 PM

wiki is pretty informative en.wikipedia.org "...spontaneous fission is feasible over practical observation times, only for atomic masses above 232 u." And: "For uranium and thorium, spontaneous fission mode of decay does occur, as noted, but it is not seen for the majority of radioactive decay which is by alpha decay, and so it is usually neglected except for the exact considerations of branching ratios when determining the activity of a sample containing these elements." And: "Spontaneous fissions release neutrons as all fissions do, so if a critical mass is present, a spontaneous fission can initiate a self-sustaining chain reaction. " That is the worrisome part!
by Peter Melzer 11/4/2011 3:47:00 PM

@lillymunster that's why you can't simply shutdown and restart a nuke like a car.
by Edano 11/4/2011 3:47:19 PM

@Edano I'm sorry, didn't clarify that if you put in an element without atomic number, there's the widget on right side
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 3:47:42 PM

what a pity have to leave for mom's birthday .... :)
by Edano 11/4/2011 3:50:58 PM

@Edano have fun. I am going to try to compile determined info on this tonight (my time).
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 3:57:35 PM

On the EPA radnet failues. I am still trying to determine if there was wrongdoing in the contracts that company received. What is clear is that they were NOT fulfilling their contract obligations to maintain RadNet equipment. No quarterly data has been posted since they took over the contract. NONE. There were also many stations that were broken when Fukushima hit and even more that were completely uncalibrated before the disaster. There was a big scandal when they finally calibrated them that the EPA was doctoring radiation data. This is a pretty clear case of government waste. We have a contractor who is getting paid and not providing the service they were paid for. Dean may know the proper channels in the US to file citizen complaints. I will do some digging but there are a couple of places people can send in complaints on govt waste.
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 4:01:09 PM

Nuclear fusion and nuclear fission are two different types of energy-releasing reactions in which energy is released from high-powered atomic bonds between the particles within the nucleus. The main difference between these two processes is that fission is the splitting of an atom into two or more smaller ones while fusion is the fusing of two or more smaller atoms into a larger one. Cm has a higher atomic weight than Pu and U. If your adding electrons and creating a heavier element, isn't it fusion, not fission? Help, I'm confused, again.
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 4:03:25 PM

As to krypton-85 en.wikipedia.org : "When uranium-235, or another fissile nucleus fissions, it usually splits into two large fragments (fission products) with mass numbers around 90-140, and two or three neutrons. About three atoms of krypton-85 are produced for every 1000 fissions (i.e. it has a fission yield of 0.3%).[4] This is only about 20% of the total fission product of mass 85, as most decay from a short-lived excited state of 85Kr directly to 85Rb without passing through the longer-lived nuclear isomer." And:" A large nuclear power plant produces about 300,000 curies of the isotope per year, most or all retained in the spent nuclear fuel rods. Nuclear reprocessing currently releases Kr-85 to the atmosphere when the spent fuel is dissolved. It would also be possible to capture and store it as nuclear waste or for use." With a half-life of roughly 11 years, the measured Kr-85 could be released from leaking spent fuel rods.
by Peter Melzer 11/4/2011 4:03:54 PM

@M.I.A. , in principle yes. But you do not add electrons to the nucleus, rather alpha-particles, that is helium++ ions = two protons plus two neutrons.
by Peter Melzer 11/4/2011 4:06:29 PM

But atomic weight refers to the nucleus, doesn't it? I thought electrons had virtually no mass> Forgive my slowness, I'm trying....
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 4:08:06 PM

@M.I.A. , you add protons and neutrons, not electrons, to the nucleus to make curium.
by Peter Melzer 11/4/2011 4:09:57 PM

Found it Bradshaw was still undersecretary in Sept 2008 - there are a number of DOD contracts her company received before that time in 2008. She's busted.
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 4:12:01 PM

@Peter Melzer "This is only about 20% of the total fission product of mass 85, as most decay from a short-lived excited state of 85Kr directly to 85Rb" If it's so very short-lived, and they measured alot, must be alot of fissioning going on very recently. (unless I don't get it again)
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 4:12:16 PM

@M.I.A. wiki en.wikipedia.org says: "It decays into rubidium-85, with a half-life of 10.756 years and a maximum decay energy of 0.687 MeV. Its most common decay (99.57%) is by beta particle emission with maximum energy of 687 keV and an average energy of 251 keV. The second most common (0.43%) is by beta particle emission (maximum energy of 173 keV) followed by gamma ray emission (energy of 514 keV)." 0.687 MeV = 687 KeV pertains to the 10.756 year half life. The long-lived 99.57 percent will pile up in the fuel rods and is released when they begin to leak. Thus, we would not know whether the krypton tepco detected stems from an ongoing chain reaction, unless they identified the short-lived decay (unfortunately the wiki does not list a half-life) of the 0.43%.
by Peter Melzer 11/4/2011 4:32:05 PM

Anyone have ideas how I could find this? EPA had many stationary monitoring stations that went offline frequently during the first weeks of the disaster. Now if you go back and look at the graphs those offline gaps are gone? Any idea how I could find out instances or reports that would document the outages?
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 5:06:32 PM

Okkaayyy. here's the probability of spontaneous fission: U238- 0.000545%, U235- 7.X10^-9%, U234- 1.73X10^-11%; Pu242- 0.00055%, Pu238- 1.9X10^-7%, Pu244- 0.121%; Cm242- 6.2X10^-6%, Cm244- 0.000137%.
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 5:12:51 PM

Tepcoseems more likely to win the lotto than have spontaneous fission Lol
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 5:14:02 PM

@M.I.A. , perhaps it is unspontaneous fission after all, :)
by Peter Melzer 11/4/2011 5:27:07 PM

@M.I.A., Peter: There are a lot of variables going on at Fukushima that no one understands. Nuclear science is not an exact science, it is a statistical one. The most likely solution for that xenon at #2 is natural decay from iodine, but we've seen many fantastic alternatives, even re-criticality. At least, it is exciting to follow.
by Pedro Jesus 11/4/2011 5:34:58 PM

@lillymunster Does this help? www.epa.gov
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 5:39:58 PM

@lillymunster Nevre mind, only goes up to 2009
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 5:42:43 PM

Which probably means it's not in the National Archives yet :-(
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 5:43:39 PM

Here's a likely one oaspub.epa.gov
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 5:44:50 PM

@Pedro Jesus TEPCO has been claiming there is no iodine 131 detected at the plant. The fine print outlines that anything below a certain level gets labeled as ND (non detected) and they write it off as NONE to the public. But then we see things like the iodine 131 found in October rice harvests. Also this from TEPCO that shows there IS iodine 131 being produced at the plant. So could this be the source of the xenon? Or is it a different type of iodine that creates that type of Xenon www.tepco.co.jp
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 5:50:25 PM

@M.I.A. that EPA page is still useful - it is another incarnation of what I found in another EPA page - no quarterly data has been being collected since 2009.
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 5:51:29 PM

@MIA used the EPA query form - put in 2010 to 2011 - the only data showing up for air filters is the data collected in March 2011 in the weeks after Fuku blew up. Nothing for 2010. I think the assumption that quarterly data is not happening is accurate. It also explains why we never saw the promised Aug EPA quarterly data.
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 5:54:39 PM

Radioguy is the one who'd know what was working or not. His web on fuku is etherworlds.com ozcatradio@gmail.com
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 6:01:32 PM

www.epa.gov
by M.I.A. 11/4/2011 6:04:08 PM

Another unintended consequence. No cattle products around fuku - manure is piling up everywhere. mdn.mainichi.jp
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 6:06:26 PM

in looking further at these contracts they were not with corps of engineers they were DOD army contracts for her company while she was undersecretary of DOD - doh!
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 6:11:13 PM

@lillymunster, there are 3 RadNet Fixed Monitor Station Status Map in this article, 4.2., 4.4., 4.7.
pstuph.wordpress.com
by Liz 11/4/2011 6:18:43 PM

@Liz there were lots of complaints of stations offline in March - can't find data for it - epa has changed their docs.
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 6:20:19 PM

@lillymunster Here's one I sent an email to complain about and never recv'pics\_SpringfieldMoradnet.jpg[/IMG]
by M.I.A. via I1207.photobucket 11/4/2011 6:32:47 PM

From a 2009 Radnet quarterly report - EDI may not be doing all the collecting for the quarterly reports. Lack of reports may be partially EPA not doing their job.

All sampling for the RadNet monitoring system (formerly ERAMS) is performed by volunteer
collectors who are frequently members of health departments or related environmental agencies
of their respective states. The National Air and Radiation Environmental Laboratory (NAREL),
on behalf of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, would like to acknowledge the time and
effort of these volunteer collectors, who are so essential to the successful operation of RadNet.
The efforts of the sample collectors are especially appreciated during times of emergency
operation when sampling frequencies are increased and schedules are sometimes demanding.
by lillymunster 11/4/2011 6:33:31 PM