Activist: Calif. plant could be next Fukushima

Video from CNN, via You Tube.

Lest we forget this is a real possibility, as the plant is already hobbled, and the area is more earthquake prone than first believed.  And yeah, just because San Onofre is offline, doesn't mean a Reactor 4 situation isn't still possible, what with all that spent fuel just laying around..  All to boil water.. Enjoy your Sunday!

Fukushima Update: Some Good(?) News, Some Not So Good News..

Two from Fukushima Diary..  The Good News?  Ok, the kind-of Good News?

[Reactor4] Debris removal was finished, fuel will be taken out soon.

Following up this article..[LIVE] Tepco is removing the upper part of reactor4

Tepco finished the debris removal of SFP4. Now the PCV and SFP4 are completely exposed outside.
They are going to take out 2 of the new fuel assemblies soon.[Link] 

So..  Only 1551 fuel assemblies to go?  This comment is also..  Troubling..

look, I have photos of SFP4 in the top part of reactor 4 building from last year – IT IS GONE.. Spent Fuel Pool Four is no longer part of the building. We can clearly see the top of the reactor (big yellow dome)but where is the fuel pool which should be ABOVE the reactor ???Where is SFP 4 ??

Huh.

Not so good news:  Survey robot died in reactor 3



Related to this article..Robot destroyed within 2 hours in reactor 2



Survey runner robot stopped on the radiation measurement of torus room in reactor3.


From 11:00 to 15:00 of 7/11/2012, Tepco was taking radiation, visual and “sound” data in torus room of reactor3 by using a robot. The atmospheric dose was 360 mSv/h.


Human worker opened the door of the torus room to let the robot enter, it went around clockwise, but the communication was interrupted at the manhole located at the South-East of torus room.
The robot is cabled, Tepco hasn’t verify the cause yet. They only assume the cable might have been damaged on the way. Tepco can’t take the robot back either because the radiation level is too high.


The robot sent radiation and visual data until it stopped but because the sound data is recorded in it, it can’t be obtained until they get the robot back. They were planning to detect the water leaking point by recording the sound data.


They recorded the sound data when they conducted robot survey in torus room of reactor2 as well, but because the alarm of survey meter was too noisy, they couldn’t hear the sound of water flow.

I'd still like to know the circumstances around TEPCO busting ass to clean up Reactor4 much faster than scheduled.  As with all things Fukushima, the bad news still outweighs the good.

Reactor 4: Japan to speed up Fukushima nuclear plant cleanup

Fuel assembly removal was slated for late 2013.  Now they're moving it up by one year?  I wonder what factors changed their risk assessment and resulting actions?  Japan Today.  Excerpts:

Workers at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant will begin removing fuel rods from a damaged reactors a year ahead of schedule, a government minister said Thursday, a move to address concerns about the risk of a new quake that could cause a further accident and scatter more radioactive debris.

“We would like to start taking out undamaged fuel this year. Preparation is now under way,” Japan’s nuclear crisis minister, Goshi Hosono, told Reuters in an interview.
“Doing it quickly is important. But we also have to make sure those workers out there, who are struggling under harsh conditions, will not be endangered by trying to move things fast.”  (Fast, like the earthquake happened 15 months ago and we're just now getting around to dealing with Reactor 4's Spent Fuel Pool fast?  That fast?)

Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), operator of the plant, had said in April it aimed to begin removing the fuel rods from the No. 4 reactor at the end of next year.
That would have left large quantities of radioactive fuel rods outside the protection of strong containment vessels for two and a half years after the accident.
Experts say the fuel rods, now covered only by water and a white plastic tarp, could present a risk of a knock-on accident if the reactor building collapsed or the water supply used to keep the rods cool were disrupted by another earthquake.

Some 1,535 fuel assemblies—enough uranium fuel rods to power three reactors—are being stored in a pool atop the mangled No. 4 reactor building. The reactor, which was shut down for maintenance at the time of the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, was badly damaged by a series of powerful explosions that followed the disaster as power was cut off to the plant.


Hosono said last month during a visit to the Fukushima plant that he expected workers to begin removing fuel from the No. 4 reactor’s storage pool next year.
Work began in April to raise what amounts to a giant tent over the building to keep radioactive dust from scattering during the transport of the fuel rods.

TEPCO says its analysis shows the No.4 reactor building would hold up in a strong earthquake. But Japanese safety regulators ordered TEPCO to recheck its findings last month after measurements showed one of the walls of the reactor building was buckling out by about 3 centimeters.

This rescheduling and actual start of fuel assembly removal is really fast action coming from TEPCO.  Alarmingly fast.  This situation bears watching..

Estimating The Potential Impact Of Failure Of The Fukushima Daiichi Unit 4 Spent Fuel Pool

Subtitled:  A Local Problem for Japan or a Global Mega Crisis?  Holophi.  Just The Abstract as excerpt, as this is a long read:

Extreme opinions are being voiced about the risk of global catastrophe resulting from a possible collapse of the Fukushima Daiichi unit 4 spent fuel pool.  These claims are appearing mostly among the public through Internet media and other non-­‐official channels.  Officials sources remain largely mute on the subject or downplay the risks.  This report provides an approximate bounding of the risks using available data.  The results of this analysis suggest that a nominal release of 10% of the SFP 4 inventory of cesium and strontium would represent 3-­‐10 times the March 2011 release amounts, substantially increasing risk levels in Japan and impacting marine life.  Release of 100% of the SFP 4 inventory, or 30-­‐100 times the March 2011 release amounts, could result in significant global impact.

Holophi's analysis is not necessarily a doomsday scenario globally, but even in the best of Reactor 4 collapse scenarios, even if the Spent Fuel has cooled to prevent a radiological fire as opposed to a major heat release, any event spells massive contamination for the great majority of Japan, and possibly globally.  Holophi's modeling is based on quantity approximations of SFP 4's fuel assemblies and their relative remaining heat.  They also note there's no accurate way to approximate a collapse scenario of the pool and how these 1331 to 1535 fuel assemblies will fall the 30 meters to the ground.  Yeah, our Best and Brightest were so sure nothing bad would ever happen to their precious Reactors that they built the highly dangerous Spent Fuel Pool 90 feet above the ground.  Nice.. 

The absolute best case scenario is that SFP 4's fuel assembly removal will take place (Starting in Late 2013) before another earthquake, explosion, or another variant event completely destroys Reactor 4.  Remember, this analysis doesn't include data regarding Reactors 1, 2, 3, or any combination event thereof.  The overall outlook for Fukushima is still bleak/dire to catastrophic.