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Fukushima reactors coped with the massive quake but were overwhelmed by the tsunami wave

April 2, 2011

It is becoming increasingly clear that the Fukushima nuclear plant successfully withstood quake accelerations which were somewhat higher than had been designed for but the real damage came from the tsunami which overwhelmed the defences of the plant and then knocked out all the emergency generators (13 of them in the basement apparently). That in turn knocked out all cooling pumps and cooling functions and then the die was cast…..

Latest IAEA updates on the Fukushima nuclear accident.

image IAEA - credit Google Earth

From JAIF:

The chief executive of General Electric has stressed that the GE reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant have no structural problems. Jeff Immelt spoke to NHK and other media outlets on Thursday. Some observers say the No. 1 and 2 reactors, the oldest types at the plant, have a flaw in their designs. He said the GE reactor has been in service for more than 40 years and is well tested and well-designed and has been upgraded over time. Immelt said in Washington on Thursday that he was aware of the doubts expressed about nuclear power plants. But  he said it is necessary to diversify energy sources at a time of rising oil prices. In the United States, more than 20 reactors are in use that have similar structure to the Fukushima No. 1 and 2 reactors. Questions were raised about their safety after the Fukushima reactors were damaged last month.

Meanwhile TEPCO released further information about the forces measured during the quake:

TEPCO says 3 of the plant’s 6 reactors were shaken on March 11th by tremors exceeding forces they were designed to withstand. Reactor No.2 suffered the largest horizontal ground acceleration of 550 gals, which is 26 percent stronger than the reactor’s design limit.

(A gal – is named after Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) – and is a unit of acceleration equal to 1 centimetre per second per second – 1 cm /s/s)

TEPCO says the readings were 548 gals at the No.5 reactor, about 21 percent higher than its design limit; and 507 gals at the No.3 reactor, topping the capacity by about 15 percent. The power company says the strength of ground motions were close to or within the design parameters at the remaining 3 reactors, and at all 4 reactors of the nearby Fukushima Daini nuclear plant.
The utility says it had been planning to reinforce the reactors so they could withstand horizontal shaking of 600 gals, after the government reviewed their quake-resistance standards 5 years ago. But the work was not finished.

In the event strengthening the earthquake resistance would not have helped. By all accounts the tsunami wave was more than twice the height of the existing wall defences.

Reactors 3 and 4: image TEPCO

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The dark side of black

March 31, 2011

From Kyodo News:

Radiation fears have prevented authorities from collecting as many as 1,000 bodies of victims of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami from within the 20-kilometer-radius evacuation zone around the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant, police sources said Thursday.

One of the sources said bodies had been ”exposed to high levels of radiation after death.” The view was supported by the detection Sunday of elevated levels of radiation on a body found in Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, about 5 km from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station.

The authorities are now considering how to collect the bodies, given fears that police officers, doctors and bereaved families may be exposed to radiation in retrieving the radiation-exposed bodies or at morgues, according to the sources.

Even after the bodies are handed over to the victims’ families, cremating them could spread plumes containing radioactive materials, while burying the victims could contaminate the soil around them.

The following are the latest casualty figures related to the earthquake and tsunami that hit northeastern and eastern Japan on March 11, according to the National Police Agency as of 9 p.m. Thursday:

Number of people killed 11,532

Number of people missing 16,441


 

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TEPCO stocks are on their way to losing all value

March 30, 2011

Shares in Tokyo Electric, commonly known as TEPCO, dropped another 17.7 percent on Wednesday to 466 yen and trading was later stopped.

Chart: tepco stock 20110330

It seems inevitable that TEPCO stocks will lose all their value and will be driven to zero – unless nationalisation comes first. Now even the largest shareholders are being hit:

Shares in TEPCO’s main bank, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group , which is also a large shareholder with a 2.7 percent holding, fell 2.1 percent.
Dai-ichi Life Insurance , which is the second-largest shareholder in TEPCO with 4.1 percent stake, rose 3 percent after Deutsche Securities said the impact of TEPCO stock price fall is limited on its embedded value, a measure of an insurer’s worth that includes the present value of future earnings from life insurance contracts.  However, Dai-ichi shares have fallen 18 percent compared with a 10.3 percent decline in the benchmark Nikkei 225 index .

There is a vacuum in the leadership of TEPCO. The President of TEPCO Masataka Shimizu has been hospitalized for high blood pressure and dizziness. Chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata will take over operation of the power company. He is 70 years old and faces an unenviable task.

Tsunehisa Katsumata: kyoto photo

Tsunehisa Katsumata served as President of Tokyo Electric Power Co., Inc., from October 2002 to June 2008. Mr. Katsumata has been the Chairman of Tokyo Electric Power Co. Inc., since June 2008. Mr. Katsumata serves as Chairman of the Board of Federation Of Electric Power Companies of Japan. He has been an Outside Director of Sompo Japan Insurance Inc. and NKSJ Holdings, Inc. since April 1, 2010. Mr. Katsumata has been a Director of Tokyo Electric Power Co., Inc. since June 1996. He serves as an Outside Director at KDDI Corp. He serves as Chairman of Evaluation Committee at Japan Finance Corporation.

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TEPCO leadership in disarray as share price drops to 47 year low and Government considers nationalisation

March 29, 2011

TEPCO staff along with SDF forces, police and firefighters at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant are making heroic efforts to get the radiation leakages under control. But they are being let down by the leadership of TEPCO. And the performance of their President  Masataka Shimizu has particularly come in for much criticism.

The company’s stock price dropped 18 % today as shares reached their lowest level in 47 years. TEPCO has dropped to about 20% of the value it had a few weeks ago. The total liabilities that TEPCO may have to face are a long way ftom being known and could exceed $25 billion. As a corporation they could not survive and the Japanese government is considering the nationalisation of just the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant as well as the nationalisation of the entire company as possible options. In any event there is little chance of the current stock holders of TEPCO  ever getting any return or even of holding on to any significant value in their ownership.

BBC reports:

Speculation is growing that the Japanese government may start talks to nationalise Tokyo Electric Power, which owns the Fukushima nuclear plant.

The company has said it will need to raise about $25bn (£15.6bn) to shore up its finances. The talk of Tepco being nationalised has been fuelled by a statement from cabinet minister Koichiro Gemba to the Reuters news agency that a discussion about bailing out Tepco was possible.

But Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said the government was not currently considering a nationalisation. “Although details cannot be seen such as how exactly the government is going to nationalise the company, as long as there are concerns that Tepco may be nationalised, investors don’t want to hold the stock,” said Hajime Nakajima of Cosmo Securities.

On Tuesday a flood of sell orders caused Tepco shares to stop being traded temporarily. A day earlier, the shares dropped to their lowest level in three decades.

Tepco shares have dropped to 566 Yen from a 52 week high of 2,500 Yen.

related: TEPCO was ready to give up and abdicate on 14th March

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TEPCO President goes AWOL – not seen in public since March 13th

March 27, 2011

While the toll of casualties keeps increasing it has emerged that TEPCO’s President Masataka Shimizu has gone into seclusion and has not been seen publicly since 13th March. In the meantime the leaderless TEPCO has retracted the very high radiation results from reactor #2.

The National police Agency’s figures for casualties from the earthquake and tsunami, as of Sunday night, exceeds 27,000 killed or missing:

Number of people killed 10,804

Number of people missing 16,244

At the Fukushima plant TEPCO has retracted the measurements of high radioactivity they announced earlier and give the impression, not so much of being clueless, but certainly of being without any coherent leadership.

NHK reports:

Tokyo Electric Power Company has retracted its announcement that 10 million times the normal density of radioactive materials had been detected in water at the Number 2 reactor of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.

The utility says it will conduct another test of the leaked water at the reactor’s turbine building.

The company said on Sunday evening that the data for iodine-134 announced earlier in the day was actually for another substance that has a longer half-life.

The plant operator said earlier on Sunday that 2.9 billion becquerels per cubic centimeter had been detected in the leaked water.

It said although the initial figure was wrong, the water still has a high level of radioactivity of 1,000 millisieverts per hour.

The perception of TEPCO being without leadership first built up when the President Masataka Shimizu tried to abdicate all responsibility for the site on March 14th and was severely told off by the Prime Minister and the government.

But it now emerges from Kyodo News that he has not been seen publicly since 13th March. He seems to have gone AWOL:

Masataka Shimizu, president of Tokyo Electric Power Co., which operates the crisis-hit Fukushima nuclear plant, fell sick March 16 and took some days off from the liaison office between the government and the utility firm, TEPCO officials said Sunday.

While Shimizu was away from the office set up at the firm’s headquarters, he collected information and issued instructions from a different room of the headquarters building to address the troubles at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station hit by the March 11 quake and subsequent tsunami, the officials said. He has already recovered and come back to work at the liaison office, they said.

A TEPCO spokesperson declined to elaborate on his health condition, but said he did not fall over or need to be hooked up to an intravenous drip.

Shimizu has not appeared in public since attending a press conference on March 13, two days after the catastrophe that wreaked havoc on northeastern and eastern Japan.

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Fukushima Dai-ichi: Reactor No.2 suppression pool leaking highly radioactive water

March 27, 2011

BREAKING!

Very high levels of radiation have been measured in water leaking from reactor #2. It is thought that the breach is in the suppression pool.

TEPCO, says it has measured radiation levels of 2.9 GBq/cc in water from the basement of the turbine building attached to the Number 2 reactor. The level of contamination is about 1,000 times that of the leaked water already found in the basements of the Number 1 and 3 reactor turbine buildings. The measurements indicated 2.9 GBq/cc iodine-134, 13 MBq/cc of iodine-131, and 2.3 MBq /cc for each of cesium 134 and 137. This is clear evidence that fission is continuing.

University of Tokyo graduate school professor Naoto Sekimura says the leak may come from the suppression chamber of the Number 2 reactor, which is known to be damaged. The chamber is designed to contain overflows of radioactive substances from the reactor.

All workers have been evacuated from the reactor #2 building.

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Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant: Reactor vessel integrity may be compromised

March 26, 2011

Leakage of water with high levels of radioactivity  raise the possibility that there may be cracks in the reactor containment vessels of Reactors #1,2 and 3.  One saving grace is that the pressure in the vessels remains high and would argue against a breach. However cracks below the water level that permit some water seepage  cannot be ruled out. It is also possible that the leakage of radioactive water is not from the vessel itself but from some of the surrounding valves or piping.

The Guardian:

A suspected break in the core of a nuclear reactor could have been responsible for a leak of large amounts of radioactive contamination at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant, Japanese nuclear safety officials said on Friday, in another setback to efforts to avert disaster at the stricken facility.

In the latest developments, officials have said seawater outside one of the units has registered 1,250 the normal level of radiation, while efforts are under way to pump radioactive water that has pooled around the reactor turbines into safe storage. The BBC has reported that short-term radioactive iodine has been detected at very high levels in the Pacific Ocean near the plant.

US naval barges have started rushing in supplies of fresh water amid concerns the seawater being used to cool down the reactors might be causing corrosion. …

On Thursday three workers were exposed to unusually high levels of radiation after stepping in contaminated water in the turbine building of the crippled No. 3 reactor, which they were trying to cool.

Two received possible beta ray burns to their legs. All three have been transferred to a special radiation treatment facility. Kyodo news reported that the two more seriously injured workers could have suffered internal radiation exposure.

“The contaminated water had 10,000 times the amount of radiation as would be found in water circulating from a normally operating reactor,” said Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for Japan’s nuclear safety agency.

Nishiyama said it was unlikely that the reactor had cracked, but conceded that the unusually high levels of radiation appeared to have originated from its core. “It is possible there may be damage somewhere in the reactor,” he said, adding that a leak in the plumbing or the vents could also be to blame.

GE BWR cutaway : image inside.mines.edu

NHK World reports:

A high level of radioactive iodine has been detected in seawater near Japan’s troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. The facility was hit by the March 11th earthquake and tsunami.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said on Saturday that iodine 131 in excess of 1,250 times regulated standards was found in seawater collected 330 meters south of a plant water outlet at 8:30 AM on Friday.

The agency says there is no immediate threat to people within the 20-kilometer evacuation zone. The agency adds that as seawater is dispersed by ocean currents the contamination level will decline.

Iodine 131 at146.9 times regulated standards was detected in seawater in the area on Wednesday.

Saturday, March 26, 2011 12:44 +0900 (JST)

Kyodo News:

TEPCO, is currently injecting fresh water into the No. 2 reactor core to prevent crystallized salt from seawater already injected from forming a crust on the fuel rods and hampering the smooth circulation of water, thus diminishing the cooling effect. It has begun injecting fresh water into the No. 1 and No. 3 reactor cores.

At the same time, the firm is trying to remove pools of water containing highly concentrated radioactive substances that may have seeped from either the reactor cores or the spent fuel pools, while also trying to restore power at the No. 2 reactor.

On Thursday, three workers were exposed to water containing radioactive materials 10,000 times the normal level at the turbine building connected to the No. 3 reactor building. On Friday, a pool of water with similarly highly concentrated radioactive materials was found in the No. 1 reactor’s turbine building, causing some restoration work to be suspended.

Similar pools of water were also found in the turbine buildings of the No. 2 and No. 4 reactors, measuring up to 1 meter and 80 centimeters deep, respectively. Those near the No. 1 and No. 3 reactors were up to 40 cm and 1.5 meters deep. ..

The U.S. Department of Energy said in its radiological assessment released Friday that by comparing aerial measurement data from Thursday with previous measurements, the data indicate peak exposure rates in the western side of the Fukushima plant are lower.

 

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Radioactive water leaks from 3 reactors – fresh water cooling started

March 25, 2011

The path to complete cooling and stability will not be smooth or easy at Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant. New complications and setbacks in Reactors #1,2 and 3 are leading to new strategies and actions. There will no doubt be many more such challenges in the days and weeks ahead.

Update 25th March midnight JST (1600 CET):

TEPCO said Friday it has begun injecting freshwater into the No. 1 and No. 3 reactor cores at the crisis-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant to enhance cooling efficiency, although highly radioactive water was found leaking possibly from both reactors as well as the No. 2 reactor.

The latest efforts to bring the troubled reactors at the plant under control are aimed at preventing crystallized salt from seawater already injected from forming a crust on the fuel rods and hampering smooth water circulation, thus diminishing the cooling effect, the plant’s operator said.

A day after three workers were exposed to water containing radioactive materials 10,000 times the normal level at the turbine building connected to the No. 3 reactor building, highly radioactive water was also found in the turbine buildings of the No. 1 and No. 2 reactors.

Early Friday, concern grew that the high-level radiation leak detected with the workers’ exposure Thursday could indicate possible damage to the No. 3 reactor vessel, but the government’s nuclear safety agency later denied the possibility, saying no data, such as on the pressure level, have suggested the reactor vessel has cracked or been damaged. The No. 3 reactor used plutonium-uranium mixed oxide fuel for so-called ”pluthermal” power generation.

While the high-level radiation is suspected to have come from the reactor, where overheating fuel rods are believed to have partially melted, it remains uncertain how the leak occurred, said Hidehiko Nishiyama, spokesman for the government’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.

He said further verification is needed to find out how the radioactive water reached the underground site where the workers were exposed. Huge volumes of water have been poured into the reactor as well as its apparently boiling spent fuel pool since they lost their cooling functions.

In addition to the infusion of freshwater to the No. 1 and No. 3 reactors, it injected seawater to the spent fuel pools of the No. 2 and No. 4 reactors through pipes, and firefighters sprayed a massive amount of seawater onto the No. 3 fuel pool, the utility said.

The government, meanwhile, encouraged residents within 20 to 30 kilometers of the plant to leave voluntarily, citing concerns over access to daily necessities, while maintaining its directives for them to remain indoors and for residents within 20 km of the plant to evacuate.

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Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant: Status on March 25th

March 25, 2011

It is 2 weeks today since the quake and Tsunami struck. The toll of dead and missing exceeds 27,000.

Progress continues steadily but painfully slowly at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant. The radiation levels are fluctuating but pose no health hazard to the general public. Containment vessel at Reactor #3 is damaged and may be causing radiation spikes.

From JAIF

  • The work to restore external AC power for units-1, 2, 3 and 4 is in progress. External AC power to the main control room at unit-2 will be available today. According to TEPCO, the reactor surface temperature at unit-1 increased to  approx. 400 ° C once (design assumption maximum 302 ° C).  Now it has dropped to 204.5 ° C (as of 06:00 on March 25).
  • Meanwhile,  in the turbine building at unit-3, drainage work is also in progress. (10:45, March 25)
  • On March 24, 2 workers, who were working to lay electrical cables in turbine building at unit-3, were sent to the hospital. TEPCO suspected that the nuclear fuel in the reactor or spent nuclear fuel at the pool was damaged and water contaminated with high radioactivity was leaked  to the workspace. Further investigation is now carrying on. These 2 workers were not wearing boots. Another worker wearing boots is safe. (07:15, March 25).
  • As for the coolant of reactors at Fukushima Daiichi, TEPCO would like to switch from seawater to fresh water as fast as possible. The first switch will be carried out at unit 3. (04:30, March 25)
  • Ministry of Defense announced that the Self-Defense Force helicopter measured the surface temperatures of Fukushima Daiichi units-1, 2, 3 and 4 from the air by using infrared rays and  found that the temperature of each units is below 20 ° C. Unit-1:17 ° C; Unit-2: 13°C; Unit-3: 11 °C; Unit-4: 17 °C (as of the morning on March 24). Especially, the surface temperature of the spent fuel pool at unit-3 dropped significantly to 31 °C, compared to 56°C on the previous day. (21:15, March 24)

From IAEA:

Unit 1: Workers have advanced the restoration of off-site electricity and lighting in the Unit’s main control room was recovered as of 24 March, 11:30 UTC. They are now checking the availability of the cooling system. While the pressure in the reactor vessel remains high, Japanese authorities are reporting that it has stabilized.

Unit 2: Engineers are working for the recovery of lighting in the main control room, and the instrumentation and cooling systems.

Unit 3: Around 120 tonnes of seawater was injected in the spent fuel pool via the cooling and purification line. The operation was carried out between 23 March, 20:35 UTC and 24 March, 07:05 UTC. Work was under way for the recovery of the instruments and cooling systems. However, it had to be suspended because three workers were exposed to elevated levels of radiation on 24 March.

Unit 4: The spent fuel pool was sprayed with around 150 tonnes of water using concrete pump truck. The operation was carried out between 24 March, 05:36 UTC and 06:30 UTC of the same day.

Units 5 and 6: Repair of the temporary pump for Residual Heat Removal (RHR) was completed as of 24 March, 07:14 UTC, and cooling started again 21 minutes later.

At the Common Spent Fuel, the power supply was restored as of 24 March, 06:37 UTC and cooling started again 28 minutes later. Work is now under way for the recovery of the lighting and instrumentation systems. As of 24 March, 09:40 UTC, the water temperature of the pool was around 73 °C.

As of 24 March, 10:30 UTC workers continue to inject seawater into the reactor pressure vessels of Units 1, 2 and 3 and are preparing to inject pure water.

 

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Two 7.0 quakes hit Burma — as predicted?

March 24, 2011

Update 25th March! Reports are now beginning to come in of over 50 70 killed.

In the light of  the recent predictions of increased earthquake activity especially in the period 22nd – 27th March, two large 7.0 quakes – as if on cue – have rocked north east Burma (Myanmar) close to the borders with Laos and Thailand.

The prediction was made by Jim Berkland and Piers Corbyn and points to solar effects as the trigger.

The are hit by the two quakes are remote  and even if large numbers of people and heavy infrastructure are not involved,  at magnitude 7.0 they are very powerful quakes and they may have been devastating for the people in this very poor region. One of the quakes was very shallow and may have caused much destruction.

One more major quake in the Pacific Rim region in the next 3 to 4 days will, I think, be a very strong indicator that we should be looking mainly at the sun in efforts to anticipate what triggers earthquakes. Tectonic plate movement clearly describes the build up of forces in the earth’s crust but what triggers particular quakes at particular times is largely unknown.

BBC reports:

map

Burma earthquake 24th March 2011

North-east Burma has been rocked by two 7.0 magnitude earthquakes, close to the borders with Laos and Thailand, the US Geological Survey has reported.

They struck seconds apart at 1355 GMT and were centred about 70 miles (110 km) from the northern Thai city of Chiang Rai, the agency said.

The first quake was shallow, at a depth of 6.2 miles (10km), while the second was much deeper at 142.5 miles (230km).

Tremors could be felt as far away as Bangkok and Hanoi. The area where the quakes struck is sparsely populated and remote. The BBC’s Rachel Harvey in Bangkok said it could be a while before the extent of the damage is known.

Seismic monitor

article image

chart from iris.edu

ABOVE chart from iris.edu

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