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Tepco will conduct a fuel removal test at the No. 4 reactor building of the Fukushima power plant, delaying the start of the actual operation by up to 2 weeks. The test was requested by the Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organization and it also urged Tepco to have its work evaluated by Japanese and overseas experts formed by the International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning, an organization founded by Japanese government agencies, nuclear facility manufacturers and electric power companies.
Nuclear fuel assemblies weighing 400 tons - over 1500 extremely radioactive fuel rods, are suspended 100 feet in the air above Fukushima Daiichi’s Unit Four. “The amount of cesium 137 in the pool is equivalent to 14,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs," says Hiroaki Koide, assistant professor at Kyoto University Research Reactor Institute..........(This is from just one pool of fuel rods among many)
Tepco says it may start moving these fuel rods as early as November 8 and it could take a year, but that requires an optimism the company’s track record doesn’t warrant. Reactor fuel pellets are encased in long tubes made of zirconium alloy, which is extremely flammable when exposed to air. The United Nation’s International Atomic Energy Agency has confirmed that some of the rods caught fire. There’s no hardened containment over the Fukushima fuel pools, so radiation spewed directly into the atmosphere.
Fully aware of its corrosive effects, Tepco had little choice but to pour in seawater. The fuel rods are almost certainly embrittled and crumbling. Random debris has been seen in the pool. Unit Four’s structure is buckling and is tipping and sinking into the sea of m&d created by massive quantities of water which has been flowing down from the mountains and carrying contamination into the ocean.
Should the Unit Four pool crash to the ground, or an assembly be dropped, or a fuel rod crumble or break in transit, the ensuing radiation would cripple critical electronic equipment and require evacuation of all workers, as almost happened when Tepco contemplated abandoning the site altogether. There are over 11,000 fuel rods at Fukushima. More than 6,000 sit in a pool just 50 meters from the base of Unit Four.
Nuclear fuel assemblies weighing 400 tons - over 1500 extremely radioactive fuel rods, are suspended 100 feet in the air above Fukushima Daiichi’s Unit Four. “The amount of cesium 137 in the pool is equivalent to 14,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs," says Hiroaki Koide, assistant professor at Kyoto University Research Reactor Institute..........(This is from just one pool of fuel rods among many)
Tepco says it may start moving these fuel rods as early as November 8 and it could take a year, but that requires an optimism the company’s track record doesn’t warrant. Reactor fuel pellets are encased in long tubes made of zirconium alloy, which is extremely flammable when exposed to air. The United Nation’s International Atomic Energy Agency has confirmed that some of the rods caught fire. There’s no hardened containment over the Fukushima fuel pools, so radiation spewed directly into the atmosphere.
Fully aware of its corrosive effects, Tepco had little choice but to pour in seawater. The fuel rods are almost certainly embrittled and crumbling. Random debris has been seen in the pool. Unit Four’s structure is buckling and is tipping and sinking into the sea of m&d created by massive quantities of water which has been flowing down from the mountains and carrying contamination into the ocean.
Should the Unit Four pool crash to the ground, or an assembly be dropped, or a fuel rod crumble or break in transit, the ensuing radiation would cripple critical electronic equipment and require evacuation of all workers, as almost happened when Tepco contemplated abandoning the site altogether. There are over 11,000 fuel rods at Fukushima. More than 6,000 sit in a pool just 50 meters from the base of Unit Four.
