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[Deleted member 80556]

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4 (each article cites many more websites)

Just when it couldn't get worse with all the stupid mistakes that have happened so far related to the nuclear plant.

Quotes from the articles:

An operation with potentially "apocalyptic" consequences is expected to begin in a little over two weeks from now - "as early as November 8" - at Fukushima's damaged and sinking Reactor 4, when plant operator TEPCO will attempt to remove over 1300 spent fuel rods holding the radiation equivalent of 14,000 Hiroshima bombs from a spent fuel storage tank perched on the reactor's upper floor.

Fukushima Reactor 4
While the Reactor 4 building itself did not suffer a meltdown, it did suffer a hydrogen explosion, is now tipping and sinking and has zero ability to withstand another seismic event.

Arnie Gundersen, a veteran U.S. nuclear engineer and director of Fairewinds Energy Education, warned this summer that "They are going to have difficulty in removing a significant number of the rods," and said that "To jump to the conclusion that it is going to work just fine is quite a leap of logic."

Gundersen offered this analogy of the challenging process of removing the spent fuel rods:

"If you think of a nuclear fuel rack as a pack of cigarettes, if you pull a cigarette straight up it will come out — but these racks have been distorted. Now when they go to pull the cigarette straight out, it’s going to likely break and release radioactive cesium and other gases, xenon and krypton, into the air.

[...]

"The problem is that this pack of cigarettes is crumpled, and the process must done manually. Therefore, the likelihood that some of the fuel rods will break is high."

The fuel rods must be kept submerged and must not touch each other or break.

“The operation to begin removing fuel from such a severely damaged pool has never been attempted before. The rods are unwieldy and very heavy, each one weighing two-thirds of a ton,” fallout researcher Christina Consolo.

Worst case scenario:

The World Nuclear Report, released in July 2013, said “the worst-case scenario” will require evacuation of up to 10 million people within a 250-kilometer radius of Fukushima, including a significant part of Tokyo.

EDIT: Reuters: Removal of Fukushima's spent fuel on target: U.S. Energy Secretary (Thanks, Ether!)

A "significant milestone" is at hand for cleanup of Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant, with spent nuclear fuel removal likely to start on schedule, the U.S. Energy Secretary said on Friday after a visit to the site.

"It appears that spent nuclear fuel will begin to be removed from Unit 4 as scheduled in mid-November," Ernest Moniz said in a statement. "This will be significant milestone for Tepco and the Japanese government and in the process of decommissioning the site.

 

[ComputerMKII]

Someone has made a huge mistake

 

[ezekial45]

Do they have another option?

 

[ShaneDude]

What.The.Fuck

 

[daviyoung]

why are there two "worst case scenarios"?

 

[Lamel]

I don't see the billions of people thing happening honestly, but yeah a lot of damage to Japan is possible.

 

[Deleted member 80556]

why are there two "worst case scenarios"?

Just two quotes talking about the same thing.

EDIT: But one is a lot more exaggerated. I was wrong, sorry.

 

[daviyoung]

Just two quotes talking about the same thing.

but one is a lot worse than the other

 

[DieH@rd]

Billions people dying? Nope.
Large area of Japan being fucked? Yes.

Do they have another option?

To wait few hundred million years for those fuel cells to stop being as radioactive as they are now.

 

[metalslimer]

Billions? lol This does pose a big risk Tokyo though

 

[Prez]

Just two quotes talking about the same thing.

That doesn't make any sense. If billions of people would die, those 10 million people would have to be evacuated to Europe to be safe.

 

[Feep]

Even my pro-nuclear stance is being weakened by this shit. Newer designs are nearly foolproof, but fools are really, really good at fucking shit up.

 

[Deleted member 80556]

but one is a lot worse than the other

I think the person who was interviewed might have been a bit hyperbolic and nervous. Think on the 80's when the Chernobyl catastrophe happened, thousands of people got diseases because of the radiation cloud that traveled across Europe, if I'm not wrong.

EDIT: Guys, if you want I can take down that billions of people dying quote. Seemed exaggerating for me too.

 

[PJV3]

That doesn't make any sense. If billions of people would die, those 10 million people would have to be evacuated to Europe to be safe.

Daily Mail meltdown event.

 

[The Boat]

Fucking hell, this is really scary.

 

[Blader]

Just two quotes talking about the same thing.

Billions of people dying implies a threat that would require much much more than just evacuating 10 million people in the area.

 

[Ether_Snake]

Not one of those sources sound highly credible.

That being said, they better not fuck this up...

Reuters: Removal of Fukushima's spent fuel on target: U.S. Energy Secretary

A "significant milestone" is at hand for cleanup of Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant, with spent nuclear fuel removal likely to start on schedule, the U.S. Energy Secretary said on Friday after a visit to the site.

"It appears that spent nuclear fuel will begin to be removed from Unit 4 as scheduled in mid-November," Ernest Moniz said in a statement. "This will be significant milestone for Tepco and the Japanese government and in the process of decommissioning the site."

 

[Deleted member 80556]

Not one of those sources sound highly credible.

That being said, they better not fuck this up...

Reuters: Removal of Fukushima's spent fuel on target: U.S. Energy Secretary

Thanks for the source, I also took down the exaggerated quote. It wasn't smart putting it in the first place.

 

[Tal Shiar Agent]

Christ, I understand that being an island nation means that you have limited resources and it gets very expensive to import fuel, but when your country also lies on a major, active fault it is probably best to not build nuclear reactors and spend the extra money to import coal or invest in solar, wind, and wave energy.

 

[Dynamite Shikoku]

I sure wouldn't want that job

 

[toadsworth]

What a nightmare. Nuclear energy can be so volatile, scary stuff.

 

[bonercop]

Even my pro-nuclear stance is being weakened by this shit. Newer designs are nearly foolproof, but fools are really, really good at fucking shit up.

Same. I've been a strong advocate for nuclear power for a long time, but the completely fucked up way the authorities in Japan handled this has kinda made me a lot less certain in my convictions.

 

[dalin80]

I want to know the logistics of how they are going to do it, can't put anyone above the rods or they will melt like the poor bastards the soviets sent to fix chernobyl, my best guess a converted chinook on remote control with a giant claw mounted to the bottom. The worlds most expensive claw grabbing game.

 

[demon]

Jesus japan fucked this up bad. This is scary stuff.

 

[Mr. F]

I haven't been following but recall the news story recently that they severely understated the severity of the situation. Was there any consequence to that? I would imagine the international response to be a lot harsher for something that has such huge implications if it continues to go wrong.

 

[rrs]

Same. I've been a strong advocate for nuclear power for a long time, but the completely fucked up way the authorities in Japan handled this has kinda made me a lot less certain in my convictions.

If there was a decent "oh shit" plan in place and tests of said plans, the disaster might had been way less than it is now.

 

[Snowman Prophet of Doom]

Anybody notice how all this Fukujima panic seems to ONLY pop up on non-credible sites and blogs?

The mainstream media blows, but if there were REALLY anything here to be concerned about, they'd be milking it for every dollar they could.

 

[Tal Shiar Agent]

Same. I've been a strong advocate for nuclear power for a long time, but the completely fucked up way the authorities in Japan handled this has kinda made me a lot less certain in my convictions.

Japan is run by the Liberal Democratic Party, which is very conservative and occasionally nationalistic. They are the same party that embraced and reinforced the "Japan as Victim" school of thought regarding World War II and refuses to acknowledge war crimes. They also elected a Class-A war criminal as Prime Minister (Nobusuke Kishi).

So to expect the government of Japan to take accountability for their shortcomings is unrealistic.

 

[maniac-kun]

I realy hope the worst case scenario will never happen.

 

[Freeza Under The Shower]

Even my pro-nuclear stance is being weakened by this shit. Newer designs are nearly foolproof, but fools are really, really good at fucking shit up.

Yeah, have to say I can see why Germany just went ahead and canned the whole sector while they were at it.

But the other part is that in terms of CO2 output there's really not much choice in the matter. It's certainly not very threatening in case of the US, Russia, or other nations with large areas of land that can be left vacant, were vast distances can be created between the disaster area and human population.

An event the size of Chernobyl would even more devastating in West-Europe and even that wasn't a picknick to begin with. No, that wasn't a Stalker reference. At least not intended.

 

[Tablo]

This is scary shit, I might have a mental breakdown if the worst case happens ;_;

Nuclear power is great, when you don't keep 40+ year old reactors running...New reactors have crazy modern safety standards, the problem is it's way cheaper to keep running the old unstable ones :/

 

[maniac-kun]

Here is a mainstream media site reporting about the issue:

http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/...staebe-sollen-umgelagert-werden-a-930872.html

 

[Flek]

uh when do they want to remove the fuel rods?
edit: ok mid nov

 

[Fornaximus]

Even my pro-nuclear stance is being weakened by this shit. Newer designs are nearly foolproof, but fools are really, really good at fucking shit up.

I'm in the same boat. People will always find a way to fuck things up. I believe in nuclear energy, but the people in charge of it really need to take it more seriously.

 

[dalin80]

uh when do they want to remove the fuel rods?

Answered

 

[maniac-kun]

Whats scary about this old reactos is that this is how they operate if there is a failure:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzDpG9rBs2Y

It was accidently filmed when a german tv crew was visiting there.

 

[Dragoon En Regalia]

I've never figured The Japan Times to be a less-than-credible source for news, especially compared to other news outlets in the country.

This sounds incredible, however, and the idiot kings running TEPCO are absolutely not fit to deal with this sort of task. I'm giving up hope for the Japanese government, too—both organizations are going to ruin Tohoku.

 

[EarsOfASnake]

Even my pro-nuclear stance is being weakened by this shit. Newer designs are nearly foolproof, but fools are really, really good at fucking shit up.

People make a mess unfortunately. It doesn't exactly instill me with confidence when something as potentially dangerous as this can be treated with such a lack of care.

 

[GraveHorizon]

Can't they just design some sort of sponge creature to eat the deadly radiation? Or build a giant lead dome around the Fukushima site?

 

[demon]

Can't they just design some sort of sponge creature to eat the deadly radiation? Or build a giant lead dome around the Fukushima site?

I say they just carve a big circle in the earth around the site, attach a rocket to it and launch it into space.

 

[Orbis]

Here is a mainstream media site reporting about the issue:

http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/...staebe-sollen-umgelagert-werden-a-930872.html

That article plays down the threat considerably. As does this one:
http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/...h-internationale-hilfe-annehmen-a-927753.html
The latter suggesting that the bigger threat is another earthquake causing a collapse and serious damage, thus the need to move them. Also:

Opponents of nuclear power currently warn again increasingly warning that another accident in the spent fuel pool could have catastrophic consequences. The thousand times the radioactivity of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima could be released, it means a global catastrophe could be the result.

But experts believe that this is highly exaggerated. Although the fear was great in the months after the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, the spent fuel pools that could trigger another disaster. The reason fuel rods have many months after they are taken out of the reactor, a huge decay heat. Had escaped from the damaged spent fuel pool cooling liquid, the former fear that the fuel would melt and at times, even form a critical mass. , the result would probably have been an uncontrolled chain reaction .

Walter Tromm at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), this danger has, however, now for over: "Normally, fuel rods after three years, sometimes even earlier, so far cooled that they can be retrieved from the spent fuel pools and dry storage," says the expert for nuclear reactor safety SPIEGEL ONLINE. This should now apply to most of the fuel from the spent fuel pools.

I know they're incompetent. But they wouldn't be so stupid to go ahead with this if the 'apocalypse' scenario described in those articles were true. Perhaps they were true 2 years ago, but I guess that's why they've waited until now.

 

[MikeDown]

Hmmm, maybe Japan shouldn't have built a nuclear plant in a region that is prone to violent earthquakes.... Oh and don't think I don't see you hiding in the corner, California.

 

[Sage00]

Hmmm, maybe Japan shouldn't have built a nuclear plant in a region that is prone to violent earthquakes.... Oh and don't think I don't see you hiding in the corner, California.

Their entire country is prone to violent earthquakes. It was the tsunami that crippled the plant anyway, not the earthquake.

 

[666]

Sorry GAF but some of you mightn't be able to waltz into Japan in your Fedora and claim your cute subservient Japanese who likes sad, white, cartoon obsessed men like you've planned.

 

[CHusson91]

Sorry GAF but some of you mightn't be able to waltz into Japan in your Fedora and claim your cute subservient Japanese who likes sad, white, cartoon obsessed men like you've planned.

How is this relevant to the topic at all?

 

[DarkKyo]

How is this relevant to the topic at all?

I guess he's trying to be edgy but he really picked the wrong topic to mock nerds in.

 

[vas_a_morir]

Sorry GAF but some of you mightn't be able to waltz into Japan in your Fedora and claim your cute subservient Japanese who likes sad, white, cartoon obsessed men like you've planned.

This is probably one of the more douchey posts I've seen in a while.

 

[acrid]

Sorry GAF but some of you mightn't be able to waltz into Japan in your Fedora and claim your cute subservient Japanese who likes sad, white, cartoon obsessed men like you've planned.

What does this even mean?

 

[vas_a_morir]

What does this even mean?

He hates nerds, so he posts on a nerd forum.

 

[iamaustrian]

Whats scary about this old reactos is that this is how they operate if there is a failure:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzDpG9rBs2Y

It was accidently filmed when a german tv crew was visiting there.

This reminds me seriously of a bunch of homers.
"Ding ding" warning signal appears.
dudes start searching the manual(!) for problem describtion.
Can't find anything.
"Ding ding" stops; guys: *laugh* (in camera)

Sidenote for non-german speaker: the warning signal appeared later during filming again. The company told the tv channel not to show incident footage. They did nevertheless