Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Phil,
when you refer to "passive systems",are you talking about a cooling system that does not rely on circulator pumps? I don't know anything about nuclear reactors,but in hydronic heating systems,you use circulator pumps.You also have a flow valve.If the circulator pump doesn't work,you just open the flow valve and the heat flows out of the boiler into the radiators or baseboard.You would think a nuclear reactor cooling system would have a similar system so when the pumps don't work,you open a valve by hand and the water will flow by gravity to the cooling towers.
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

So, apparently, they are using helicopters to dump water into the reactors? Maybe I'm missing something here, but wouldn't that mean that some part of the reactor is exposed to the open air? Which would indicate an exceptionally bad situation, wouldn't it?
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Justice C. Bigler said:
So, apparently, they are using helicopters to dump water into the reactors? Maybe I'm missing something here, but wouldn't that mean that some part of the reactor is exposed to the open air? Which would indicate an exceptionally bad situation, wouldn't it?
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Justice,

This has been an exceptionally bad situation since the beginning.

Spent nuclear fuel rods are adjacent to the reactor vessel, they are the biggest risk of radiation to the populace, and their cooling pool is where one would want to dump water.
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Jack Arnott said:
Hello again Phil,
So, since you put this up I have been wondering.
What do you favor as the best model for nuclear reactors to be run?

1) Government regulated private facilities
2) World Order oversight of private facilities
3) Government run facilities
4) Private facilities
etc.

Regards, Jack
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Hey Jack, sorry I missed this. I think a global oversight of reactors would be a hard task, as the nuclear power generating nations can't even all cooperate on the GEN IV reactor design collaboration. But, in the post cold war era, I think a renewed level of cooperation between the rosatom, NRC, etc. should be expected, and is desireable.

I don't favor purely private facilities, or purely government, when you have only one body solely responsible, the potential for the culture to become insular and miss important things is too great. I feel this is pull of the gravity of human nature that lies outside of the public private boundary lines.

Government regulated private facilities, what we have currently in the US, seems to me the best of the examples above. Unlike the minerals division in the Gulf oil spill, the NRC has real "boot on the neck" power over the utilities and their plant operations. They can quickly make your life miserable as a nuclear utility, and cost you an amazing amount of money. The NRC is in your plant, literally, daily to keep an eye on you.

Now I have friends that work for the NRC, and it can be a nightmare to get anything done inside the organization. They have spent the last decade trying to simplify the organizational structure, and my friends indicate they have made some progress. They grow ever better at predicting potential problems as engineering science progresses.

The nuclear power industry in the US established the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations (INPO), which is based in here Atlanta. INPO is the industry's private NRC clone that tries to pre-emptively out-inspect the NRC. INPO, and the NRC's big stick that drove its founding, both came out of TMI. Unfortunately that was a reactionary measure, but the result certainly has been good for the US nuclear industry.

Out of the Japanese situation, I think it is likely that all GE BWR Mark 1 reactors will no longer qualify for license renewals, and the utilities that own them should expect to send them all towards mothballs. I also think that Westinghouse will have to do even more justification of the AP1000 before the design receives its design license.
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Randy Gartner said:
Phil,
when you refer to "passive systems",are you talking about a cooling system that does not rely on circulator pumps? I don't know anything about nuclear reactors,but in hydronic heating systems,you use circulator pumps.You also have a flow valve.If the circulator pump doesn't work,you just open the flow valve and the heat flows out of the boiler into the radiators or baseboard.You would think a nuclear reactor cooling system would have a similar system so when the pumps don't work,you open a valve by hand and the water will flow by gravity to the cooling towers.
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The Cooling towers and turbines play essentially no role in the containment of a nuclear accident, they are some of the first things cut off from the reactor. Also the pressures inside a nuclear reactor a far too high to inject water merely by the force of gravity-induced head pressure.

A passive system would look like (and I am sure I am oversimplifying) a mixture of natural convection inside the reactor vessel, coupled with pumps driven by the reactor steam to cool the reactor in an internal circulating loop, then this internal circulating loop water would be passively cooled with something like a gravity-fed water source.

Fluid flow is a complex problem, and the simulation of the convection behaviors inside of a reactor was beyond the slide-rules of the engineers who designed most of the current nuclear reactors. The next generation will fare better.

In my opinion, perhaps the biggest problem with current nuclear technology is the generating scale is simply too large. The dog has a massive tail to wag it. There are many small reactor designs on the drawing boards that could provide power to a local area, have excellent passive safety behavior, and would have manageable heat fluxes in the case of a thousand year incident.

Hitachi, Toshiba, Hyperion Power, and other are working on designs that produced less than 50MW of electricity, are buried in deep in the ground, and make more sense, at least to me.
 
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Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Phil Graham said:
In my opinion, perhaps the biggest problem with current nuclear technology is the generating scale is simply too large. The dog has a massive tail to wag it. There are many small reactor designs on the drawing boards that could provide power to a local area, have excellent passive safety behavior, and would have manageable heat fluxes in the case of a thousand year incident.

Hitachi, Toshiba, Hyperion Power, and other are working on designs that produced less than 50MW of electricity, are buried in deep in the ground, and make more sense, at least to me.
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The big problem with small nuclear is that the economics haven't made sense. When you have huge regulatory costs that are typically on a per-project basis, there's a large incentive to build big plants that will recoup the fixed costs more quickly.

I agree that smaller generating stations improve things (grid stability and transmission line capacity come to mind), but in the current regulatory climate, they don't make sense.
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Rob Timmerman said:
The big problem with small nuclear is that the economics haven't made sense. When you have huge regulatory costs that are typically on a per-project basis, there's a large incentive to build big plants that will recoup the fixed costs more quickly.

I agree that smaller generating stations improve things (grid stability and transmission line capacity come to mind), but in the current regulatory climate, they don't make sense.
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Rob, I think that's exactly right.

The Manhattan Project scaled (literal) lab bench tests to full giant factories in a time frame likely never to be duplicated. To go from miligrams to tonnes of anything in the space of months is a beyond amazing achievement.

I think after the war, and the bravado, wore off, people realized what a big genie was stuffed in this bottle.

TMI caused wholesale changes to facilities that were being built, as they were being built. US nuke operators, generally, have done a serviceable job since TMI. And they do better every year. The fraction of power generated by the nuke plants creeps up every year, even though new facilities are not being built. They are simply learning to run what they have better.

I think the NRC move towards streamlining reflects the idea that they know the paperwork is an added cost factor that would be better spent on safety design.

Clearly Japan is going to cause them to do a thorough re-evaluation of a lot of things with the current class of plants. Realistically I can see the following changes made for existing plants.

1. Aggressive movement of SNF to dry casket storage at an appreciable distance from the reactors.

2. Re-visiting SNF fuel pond locations in reactors where they are close to the reaction containment vessel.

3. Decomissioning of the old reactors (e.g. GE BWR Mark 1)

4. Uprating and hardening of on-site power to deal with residual core heat from fission products.

5. A thorough evaluation of "weakest link" points as the primary concerns

6. Require better hydrogen suppression in the older facilities, to prevent explosions.

I look forward to reading the commentary from the NRC on the small reactors that are starting to knock on their door. I think when they make it through the approval process they will be really exceptionally well vetted, even by existing standards.
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

As a follow up to this The NRC just approved Toshiba's AP1000 design. There are about a dozen power plant projects waiting on this in the US. There are still critics of the shield building (strength) but the modified design now uses passive cooling systems that rely on gravity feed and convection cooling, instead of a electrical pumps and valves. That require electricity and control systems to work. While water probably gets pumped into a reservoir, this is easier to manage than the design widely used in Japan that was severely challenged when electrical power was lost.

I am still enthusiastic about a leapfrog technology to a self-quenching nuclear cycle (probably not the correct name for it), but I appreciate the more conservative view to use technology that is well known and fully vetted. It is interesting to see Germany completely abandon nuclear, for other energy sources, but it is difficult to tell from a distance if this was done based on scientific merit or political mood.

Not to connect too widely spaced dots, but there is something called the "automation paradox", where safety systems used to manage overly complex processes can sometimes fail, and then there better be an experienced human nearby to take the controls. Reportedly the Air France mid ocean crash occurred because, the plane dropped out of auto-pilot due to difficult conditions, and the two of three pilots in the cockpit at that moment were not skilled enough to handle the situation. So going to the simpler passively cooled nuclear plant design makes a ton of sense. I think there may be further simplification available, but I am not a nuclear expert among all the other things I am not expert about.

Getting our nuclear industry moving again is not a bad thing with all the coal plants being shuttered due to regulation (of course less mercury emission is not a bad thing either). In the meanwhile natural gas is cheap and plentiful, so that can pick up some of the coal plant slack keeping our electrical grid supplied.

JR
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

John Roberts said:
In the meanwhile natural gas is cheap and plentiful, so that can pick up some of the coal plant slack keeping our electrical grid supplied.
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Of course, one of the reasons why natural gas is plentiful is because of fracking which also may have some serious environmental and health consequences.
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Greg Cameron said:
Of course, one of the reasons why natural gas is plentiful is because of fracking which also may have some serious environmental and health consequences.
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That appears to be more of a regulatory business risk than justified public health concern. Most, not all fraking is being done down at depths much deeper than water tables, and fluids injected themselves are not toxic. The linkage being drawn by environmentalists, is hydrocarbons leaking and contaminating local wells and aquifers. That is already a naturally occurring phenomenon in regions where hydrocarbons are plentiful at shallower depths, (we've probably all heard stories of homeowners wells that catch on fire in PA or whatever), so this is not a clear straight-line cause and effect from fraking. The exception that doesn't justify this rule (IIRC) is in colorado where there is some fraking activity at shallow enough depths that it "could" be associated with groundwater contamination (maybe.. it's not so extremely unlikely in that region).

A more interesting (to me) concern is the connection between fraking and tectonic activity, and this seems like an interesting side effect of disturbing deep rock formations that requires some philosophical analysis, i.e. if fraking relieves stress from a tectonic plate interfaces with small movements (small earthquakes), is this not better than waiting for one big one later? Of course popular opinion, amplified by ambulance chasers who love to sue some deep pockets for earthquakes, is to postpone all tectonic events into someone else's future. A case where that had an immediate impact is (IIRC) in Switzerland, where deep rock drilling and water injection to extract "free" geothermal energy, was linked to local earthquake activity, in a region where the buildings are several centuries older than the California earthquake survivable building standards, so easily damaged, incurring huge costs that outweigh the benefit of relatively cheap energy. There are one or more geothermal plants in CA,, hmmmm, San Andreas fault, anyone? Again a bunch of small shakes is surely better than fewer big 'uns there too.

My judgement, which is just one man's (semi) informed opinion is that fracking is mostly harmless as long as practiced at depths well away from aquifers, and active tectonic activity especially around old-build construction (i.e. maybe don't frak around the coliseum in Rome or ruins in Greece).

Of course opinions very, so don't take my word for any of this, you can easily do your own research. Just don't take the environmentalist screed at face value without similar scrutiny.

JR

Note: not only are we finding new nat gas reserves we didn't know existed, we are also finding good old fashioned oil in places where the government hasn't suppressed drilling activity. They recently had to change the direction of an oil pipeline because we had so much oil in middle america (Cushing OK), and that was depressing local US oil prices (just there). By reversing the oil pipeline direction so we could pump it down to the gulf (where all the refineries are), the mid west drillers could get world market prices for their oil too. Getting oil to market is always a major concern. The Keystone pipeline proposed to carry Canadian oil down to our refiners seems like a no brainer, but apparently opinions vary about that too. Since that seems mostly political, I won't go there. I wish we had an easy way to burn our huge coal reserves cleanly (AFAIK that isn't very easy). We have a lot of coal that would nice to eventually use. While it seems US coal mining practices remain in the semi-dark ages too, this seems like a ripe application for robots (who don't need to breath). Of course coal mining in countries like China is far worse than here.
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

John Roberts said:
Most, not all fraking is being done down at depths much deeper than water tables, and fluids injected themselves are not toxic.
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That's what the party line was and the gas industry refused to reveal the ingredients in the fluid until congress forced them to. Turns out there is quit a soup of bad stuff in there. Thanks to Mr. Cheney, the industry was exempt from the clean water act. That will change soon hopefully. Skip down to the part titled "Chemicals used in fracturing."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydraulic_fracturing

Greg
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Greg Cameron said:
That's what the party line was and the gas industry refused to reveal the ingredients in the fluid until congress forced them to. Turns out there is quit a soup of bad stuff in there. Thanks to Mr. Cheney, the industry was exempt from the clean water act. That will change soon hopefully. Skip down to the part titled "Chemicals used in fracturing."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydraulic_fracturing

Greg
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What party am I spewing some line for? I don't even have any stock investments in NG because I am afraid of possible regulatory moves. For the record I do own some oil stock (but not exxon who has a NG operation).
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If that list of chemicals is troublesome you don't want to read about the slurry they throw down oil wells.

The fraking fluid is 98+% water... some acid up front, later, and it didn't see it listed on that wiki page, they use guar gum a food thickening agent and stuff like that, to help seal up the fissures. Sand and silicon, no doubt some small amounts of nasty stuff.

The concern is about this goop leaking back up and out of the drill hole, and how they re-process the used well water at the well head. These processes use a lot of water, and that's another real issue in many parts of the world.

The oil industry has a well deserved bad reputation for environmental abuse from dumping toxic oil drilling waste in LA, MS, and there's a huge case down in SA that's been tangled up in the courts for years.

Fraking IMO in not inherently dirty or dangerous. Of course the oil industry because of it's past bad behavior needs to be kept on a short leash, and I suspect the regulators have been all up in their tail pipes.

Surely you don't suggest the current administration is looking the other way and giving them a free pass.. If they had a smoking gun, they wouldn't be pulling their punches. What are they saving it for?

The government is getting ready to file some criminal charges related to the BP/RIG/et al Macondo well disaster... the negligence in that case (IMO) was criminal and caused loss of human life as well as disrupted the regions economy, but AFAIK they are going to get busted like Martha Stewart was for lying to the FEDs on some reports. Whatever, they took Al Capone down on income tax evasion. I guess the public needs a pound of flesh and a perp walk for closure.. The manufacturer who supplied the faulty well head blow-out preventer was already sued and made a large settlement.

Lets say opinions vary about fraking, I've shared mine.. Perhaps less dangerous than geo-thermal, one of those clean, green, ones.

JR
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

John Roberts said:
That appears to be more of a regulatory business risk than justified public health concern.
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Uh. Not really, John. I guess you're more tolerant of the stuff being pumped into the ground than I am. But because that's a value judgment, lets skip to the heart of the philosophical argument:

If "it" (whatever "it" is) hasn't been proven harmful, does that mean it is safe? If it hasn't been proven safe, does that mean it is harmful? This is, I believe, the dividing line. Some folks err on the side of caution while others seek proof of harm.

As for the little surplus in the Cushing, OK area... If the local market can buy all the crude that can be pumped out of Jed Clampitt's back yard, refine it and sell most of it locally, I'd say that's a perfect example of small, local markets doing exactly what they should to be self-sustaining. The exploration and production companies might wish for more, but changing where the crude is refined and how it's transported only means that the folks from whose back yards this oil comes, pay more for what is essentially a local product.
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Dude, you're killing my buzz... maybe tomorrow I'll try to explain the benefits of efficient markets, and stuff like that.

Hope you had a good christmas, and have a good new year. I'm feeling better about 2012.

JR
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Buzz killer? You're calling me a Pin 1 lift? A transformer? Hehehehe...

I suggest E. F. Schumacher's "Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered."

Here's to hoping 2012 is better!

Tim Mc
 
Re: Attempting to bring clarity to the nuclear problems facing Japan

Tim McCulloch said:
Buzz killer? You're calling me a Pin 1 lift? A transformer? Hehehehe...

I suggest E. F. Schumacher's "Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered."

Here's to hoping 2012 is better!

Tim Mc
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Perhaps we can get the congress and the white house to read Schumacher's "Small is beautiful", I sure wouldn't mind a smaller more efficient government.

I am thinking more in terms of Adam Smith's "The wealth of nations", well before Reagan's trickle down economics, Smith described how trade allowed farmers to get more money for their crops, and how that benefited the whole community as that wealth flowed through the local economy. Now I don't expect much sympathy for Jed Clampett getting paid world prices for his oil, in OK, but I see this as similar. Your Schumaher would consider oil as capital and the western economies as unsustainable. Our recent flirtation with the end of our economies as we know them, had little to do with resource use, but does resonate with his bigger is not better.. So I can see the merit of breaking up our several still "too big to fail" banking institutions.

Sorry for the veer folks, I was just trying to offer an update on the nuclear power generation industry.

JR

edit/ It is interesting to look at the expiring ethanol tax credit and import tariff through Schumacher's lens. This looks like a $6B savings for taxpayers (thank you for that), while they haven't relaxed the mandate for how much renewable fuel must be blended into our gas, so ethanol isn't likely to go away. Corn based ethanol is now using more corn than for feed/food, and cellulosic ethanol despite even higher government subsidies has just not been able to ramp up to deliver in any credible quantity. Hopefully if we can import some cane based ethanol from Brazil, that will relieve some of the pressure on our food supply, but I need to check if the mandates insist on the renewable fuel being home sourced. The global warming crowd finds ethanol dirtier than petroleum based fuels, so this gets interesting in that context. Competing "feel good" causes.

Predictions are that pump prices may increase a few cents, as ethanol makers charge more to make up for the lost tax subsidy. I really don't like ethanol, and am apprehensive about pushing it up to 15% from the current 10% max. I bet those folks caucusing in Iowa are a little uncomfortable about discussing this issue, where the corn grows as high as an elephant's eye and where a lot of that $6B subsidy ends up. Interesting times. /edit
 
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Re: Thanks Rob

Rob Timmerman said:
Since this has come back up, there was a nice writeup in the November issue of IEEE Spectrum on what happened.

http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/nuclear/24-hours-at-fukushima
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Rob,

I had not seen this, so thank you. More than anything this helps me understand why the emergency feedflow systems for the other two reactors didn't continue to do their collective jobs. The problems at reactor 1 contributing to the other two makes sense. I feel relieved that my completely armchair assessment so many months ago wasn't too far off base given the info at the time.
 
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