I had a future in Nuclear Power and was working at a Health Physics company in Atlanta, GA USA when the place went ballistic! Three mile Island had just happened. One of the physicists walked around in a daze saying "We didn't say it wouldn't happen, we said it would happen - it's just too soon."
Ironically, "The China Syndrome" was still playing at the theatre.
I became curious and punched some numbers. The odds of a 'catastrophic event' are couched in terms such as reactor hours. And there are some very interesting qualifiers. For example: If a reactor has ever been fueled and has been shut down the reactors hours are multiplied (by a factor that increases every year.) In other words a reactor that is shutdown is much more dangerous than a reactor that is running.
There are lots of reasons for the increased danger associated with a reactor that has been 'shut down'.
1) unloaded gun syndrome - If someone thinks a gun is unloaded they treat it with more respect
2) A team syndrome - Once the reactor is shut down the A team (best operators) take a rest (go to work, but aren't as intimately involved.)
3) Restart syndrome - There are items (such as nuclear poisoning, and latent heat) that help the reactor shut down from an equilibrium state. But these items dissipate after days and hours respectively, and the darn thing will come back to life. Chernobyl was in the process of being forced to restart after a hot shutdown. Various reasons, but I think they were trying to increase the Plutonium yield, and circumstances caused a 'nuclear event' that has not ceased to this day. I'm not saying its still radioactive, I'm saying that it is still generating an increasing number of neutrons. In other words, it's critical.
Anyhow, after crunching the numbers TMI went up at pretty much the expected time.
Do you think it hasn't happened here since then? You're wrong. It's just reported differently. Find the information for your local pile (nuclear reactor in Nukespeak) and read the local news outlets. Same situation, different words. It's not a conspiracy, it a cover up. It sure makes oil and definitely coal look very, very good.
Don't think for a minute that the Japanese meltdowns (multiple) are finished, and don't think it is controlled, and don't think that TMI and Chernobyl combined were within an order of magnitude of Japan. And, for goodness sake, don't think it can't happen here, it can, it did and it will again.
I have since left the Nuclear field and would prefer that Nuclear energy be abandoned.
MartinG said:
I just watched a documentary on Chernobyl and today it seems to have become a wildlife refuge. Its lush and green with a diversity of flourishing animals so much that over the last 10 years they have been introducing animals into the area to reboost the species.
Birth anomalies within the animals are not any more significant than in unpolluted habitats.
Regarding reforestation and animal repatriation. Do you think the government could stop the plants and animals from coming back to such a large area? It's difficult to keep deer out of a 5 acre corn field, even at the threat of death.
These things are returning because they can't be stopped. There will be all types of problems from this, but there is nothing that can be done. In other words - So?
d
