
Fukushima: Removal of nuclear fuel rods from damaged reactor building begins - matt4077
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/15/fukushima-removal-of-nuclear-fuel-rods-from-damaged-reactor-begins
======
searine
I've been following TEPCOs media site casually for years. They actually used
to have a really great media site showing the latest work being done on
decommissioning but its gotten more and more closed off over the years as
people care less and less. They used to post these really cool PDFs with
technical detail.

[https://photo.tepco.co.jp/en/index-e.html](https://photo.tepco.co.jp/en/index-e.html)
[https://www4.tepco.co.jp/en/news/library/archive-e.html](https://www4.tepco.co.jp/en/news/library/archive-e.html)

For example, the video referenced in the news article is the first video on
the TEPCO archive. Worth a watch, the screenshot really doesn't do it justice.

They still post media, but it tends to be more PR stuff of complete work
rather than ongoing work.

Here is another cool video :

[https://www4.tepco.co.jp/en/news/library/archive-e.html?vide...](https://www4.tepco.co.jp/en/news/library/archive-e.html?video_uuid=vy9uep38&catid=69631)

A robot inside Unit 2 scrapping up samples of the melted-down core. Talk about
cutting edge extreme environment robotics!

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petschge
Note that this is the fuel from the cooling pool of reactor building #3. The
cooling pool of reactor building #4 has already been emptied. And the we are
still not ready to remove the heavily damaged fuel from the reactor cores.

~~~
nihonde
It’s also worth noting that the cooling pool is not inside the protective
container that houses the cores. As such, if the water were to drain off these
pools, it would possibly render Tokyo uninhabitable for a very long time. That
danger was mitigated a while ago, but moving the spent and spare fuel is still
a major factor in making the site safe again.

~~~
vanattab
Tokyo Or Fukushima? Isn't Tokyo 150 miles south of the plant.

~~~
nihonde
Yes. Not sure why I’m being downvoted. There is no question that if the
spare/spent fuel were exposed to air, the resulting radiation would have
required evacuation of a 150+ mile radius. They originally brought in an elite
firefighting team to refill the pools for this exact reason.

~~~
DuskStar
No question that they would have evacuated, sure. But also little question
that it would not have been required.

~~~
arcticbull
It's interesting how fearful nuclear energy makes people. The worst disaster
in the history of nuclear energy, Chernobyl, will over the full course of time
cause 4,000 premature deaths as estimated by the IAEA. This figure includes
first responders sent in by the USSR with inadequate protections.

"A United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) study estimates
the final total of premature deaths associated with the disaster will be
around 4,000 mostly from an estimated 3% increase in cancers, which are
already common causes of death in the region." Interestingly, the most common
cancer it caused was thyroid (due to the Iodine-131 released), which has a 98%
survival rate. [1, 3]

Whereas, currently, burning of fossil fuels is killing 7.3 million (1825
Chernobyls -- 4x the total number of civil nuclear reactors on Earth) _per
year_.

"According to the World Health Organization in 2012, urban outdoor air
pollution, from the burning of fossil fuels and biomass is estimated to cause
3 million deaths worldwide per year and indoor air pollution from biomass and
fossil fuel burning is estimated to cause approximately 4.3 million premature
deaths."

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deaths_due_to_the_Chernobyl_di...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deaths_due_to_the_Chernobyl_disaster)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_accidents](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_accidents)

[3] [https://www.cancer.net/cancer-types/thyroid-
cancer/statistic...](https://www.cancer.net/cancer-types/thyroid-
cancer/statistics)

~~~
petschge
It is not just directly related deaths, but also the area of land made un-
inhabitable and the duration for which it will remain un-inhabitable. And the
fact that we have no workable way of dealing with the waste. Sure it only take
a small storage space, but it will be lethal for a million years to come.

~~~
petre
Wildlife gets another chance with the land being _uninhabitable_ by humans for
300 years until Cs137 and Sr99 pass 10 lifetimes. A million years is a gross
exageration. There are also people currently living in the Chernobyl exclusion
zone. They even have a name: samosely.

~~~
arcticbull
They actually continued to operate two of the other reactors _at the Chernobyl
power plant_ until Unit 2 was closed in 1991 and Unit 3 in 2000. [1] How crazy
is that?

[1] [https://www.world-nuclear-
news.org/Articles/Chernobyl-1-3-en...](https://www.world-nuclear-
news.org/Articles/Chernobyl-1-3-enter-decommissioning-phase)

~~~
petre
Well, it was the USSR.

'Gorbachev states, “The nuclear meltdown at Chernobyl 20 years ago this month,
even more than my launch of perestroika, was perhaps the real cause of the
collapse of the Soviet Union five years later”'

[http://www.historyisnowmagazine.com/blog/2017/8/21/the-
reaso...](http://www.historyisnowmagazine.com/blog/2017/8/21/the-reason-the-
ussr-collapsed-chernobyl-gorbachev-and-glasnost)

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neya
Here's the video footage for anyone who's interested:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3Jr4_MaCbA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3Jr4_MaCbA)

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ape4
Has this disaster improved robot tech. Might it help on Mars.

~~~
jansan
Before we think about Mars I suggest we should first get our shit together on
this little planet.

~~~
Symmetry
Why do people always respond this way to space exploration but not other
stuff? I seldom hear "Maybe we should stop making movies until we get our shit
together" even though Hollywood has a budget about the same size as NASA's or
slightly larger.

~~~
noonespecial
I used to say the same about the NFL vs cancer research. As in: "Perhaps we
should divert all of the money we spend on football each year into cancer
research until we cure it."

The fallacy is that even though both are ostensibly valued in "dollars", at
the scale they operate at (society wide), they are not necessarily fungible.
You might spend 1 football and get only 0.09 cancer researches. Or they might
not be interchangeable at all. I don't have the numbers even to start to make
that judgment.

Space is probably just an extreme example of this as it feels "expensive" and
seems to directly effect the life of most people very little.

~~~
throw0101a
> I used to say the same about the NFL vs cancer research.

As someone who works in a cancer research-related role, it's nice to not think
about work when I leave the office. I would also hazard to guess that many
cancer patients enjoy the distraction of various types of entertainment.

Now we can certainly do some refocusing, but I would generally hope that as a
civilization and species we can talk and chew gum at the same time.

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mistrial9
[https://www.dw.com/en/japan-slams-tepco-for-false-
informatio...](https://www.dw.com/en/japan-slams-tepco-for-false-
information/a-6485423)

it appears that there were three mainstream sources of radiation measurement
at the time of the accident, and in the following days, each showed a very
different set of readings. The subsequent panics, and scandals, are a
convoluted mess of conflicting data. In fact, a non-profit sent individuals to
the area in later months, buying them inexpensive radiation detectors, to get
another set of readings. True to political form around the world, this article
above seems to be "blasting" the Tokyo Power Company TEPCO for the _opposite_
of what happened ? at which point ? opaque

