@praguepainter … represents a subset of the material available for dispersal due to cracked containment chambers from the cores themselves. – 03:24 PM GMT
@praguepainter Counterpunch asserts that all three units have melted down. My understanding is that only unit 1 and 2 are in meltdown. – 03:30 PM GMT
@praguepainter Unit 3 is the one with the mixed experimental fuel and of even greater concern should it be in meltdown. – 03:31 PM GMT
@praguepainter so, while I do think that TEPCO is unlikely to be able to effectively resolve the situation or to communicate honestly – 03:32 PM GMT
@praguepainter and therefore an international response may be valuable in developing a more effective resolution to the failures – 03:32 PM GMT
@praguepainter the threat to the environment from the broken plants is likely to remain quite localized. You and I: not directly affected. – 03:34 PM GMT
@praguepainter Does it affect Japan and Sendai province? Hell yes. Does it affect Japanese fisheries? Hell yes. Are TEPCO crooks? Hell yes. – 03:36 PM GMT
@praguepainter Is it likely that Japanese government and corporate culture will have a hard time fixing the problem? Hell yes. – 03:37 PM GMT
@praguepainter speak of the devil: google.org/publicalerts/a… – 05:29 PM GMT
@praguepainter I was involved in some epic Metafilter threads that week, before there was any decent science coverage. – 05:30 PM GMT
@praguepainter we located a bunch of primary source material and got all educated up on the plants. It was scary, scary shit. – 05:31 PM GMT
@praguepainter but then there were no uncontrolled fires and the fuel pools were kept wet, barely. so then we started looking at dispersal. – 05:31 PM GMT
@praguepainter but you are quite right, another tsunami would be bad. – 05:33 PM GMT
@_py info page: google.org/publicalerts/a… – 05:34 PM GMT
@_py tsunami.gov/product.php?id…. /// no tsunami expected – 05:39 PM GMT
@praguepainter tsunami.gov/product.php?id… // no tsunami expected – 05:39 PM GMT
@praguepainter yes.. uh, hang on – 06:00 PM GMT
@praguepainter GE: gereports.com/the-mark-i-con… – 06:02 PM GMT
@praguepainter the cooling ponds on the upper floors were the primary area of concern for uncontrolled reaction – 06:02 PM GMT
@praguepainter because as the water boiled off, there was a possibility of an uncontained, uncontrolled reaction – 06:03 PM GMT
@praguepainter the cooling ponds underwent repeated storage-pattern reconfiguration to increase the amount of spent fuel kept in them – 06:04 PM GMT
@praguepainter which reduced the space between the spent fuel units and reduced the amount of water available to dampen reactivity & temp – 06:05 PM GMT
@praguepainter so the amount of possible fuel in the pools exceeded the amount in the reactors. The pools still have the spent fuel in them. – 06:07 PM GMT
@praguepainter not sure if they are still open to the air. possibly. but at least they are keeping water on them. – 06:07 PM GMT
@praguepainter I believe so, at least in the case of the cooling pools. Just look at the buildings, the damage would affect the stored fuel. – 06:11 PM GMT
@praguepainter an analysis of the spent-fuel fire possibilities based on a danger assessment conducted in 1983: ianbradshaw.co.uk/multimedia/fuk… – 06:12 PM GMT
@praguepainter so while they recognized it as a danger they dismissed how difficult it would be to get water in place – 06:13 PM GMT
@praguepainter in 2003, the possibility was considered as a TERRAH vector: belfercenter.hks.harvard.edu/publication/36… – 06:14 PM GMT
@praguepainter activists called for changes to cooling pool storage in 2005 specifically w/r/t these GE designs: nirs.org/press/04-20-20… – 06:17 PM GMT
@praguepainter bunch of info on this issue from activist perspective here, excellent primary doc links: nirs.org/reactorwatch/s… – 06:18 PM GMT
@praguepainter fuck yes. NRA dismissed requested rule changes entirely. The fucks. – 06:19 PM GMT