Issue 55, March 2011: Fill & Download for Free

On March 2011, Mainichi Daily News (Japanese newspaper) published an explosive article about Mongolia. In it, Mongolian Government together with the US and Japanese Governments were working on a secret agreement that would enable Japanese and US companies to store spent nuclear rods in Mongolia.The reaction was predictable. People went to the streets to protest. The president summoned the officials who participated in the meetings. Reportedly they were fired afterwards.Further on, he issued a decree prohibiting formal talks about "cooperation on nuclear disposal with any country or international organization," unless such negotiations are authorized by the country's National Security Council.[1]The US and Japanese embassies issued statements denying that they were in any negotiations to store spent nuclear rods in Mongolia.[2]As I wrote before, Mongolia has declared itself a nuclear weapons free zone. (Anand Nyamdavaa's answer to Do you support your country having nuclear weapons?) But it has a significant interest in nuclear power for peaceful purposes.Mongolia (2013) needs 9.6 million tonnes of coal per annum. This is equivalent to 3 kilograms of enriched uranium.[3] So the possibilities are enticing. There are however, two problems associated with nuclear power plants.Used rods and where to store them. No country would take them voluntarily. We have seen that Mongolia itself is not ready to accept them even from their own nuclear plantsFukushima nuclear plant meltdown. Mongolia understandably doesn't want similar situation to occur on its soil.It looks like Fukushima brought to still all or any new steps in this direction. The new policy is not to invest into nuclear technology until 2030. Mongolia instead has decided to invest in renewables.Mongolia has licensed six wind farms and 24 solar plants, which would be enough to meet the country’s renewable goals and create a surplus for exports. [4]Mongolia aims to have 20% by 2020 and 30% by 2030 of all energy needs to be supplied by renewables.[5]10 megawat solar plant close to Darkhan city55 megawat Sainshand wind farmFootnotes[1] Senior U.S. Official Denies Talk of Foreign Nuclear Waste Site in Mongolia[2] Mongolia, Japan Deny Plan To Set Up Nuclear Waste Storage Facility In Mongolia[3] Цөмийн цахилгаан станц ямар өртгөөр бүтдэг вэ?[4] Mongolia to boost wind capacity amid regional super grid hopes[5] Mongolia: New Project to Deliver Reliable Electricity and Scale-Up Renewables

Although there hasn't indeed been any discussion in the media about the spent fuel pools, it's not like nobody thought of it. Inside the ongoing discussion about Fukushima in http://bravenewclimate.com/2011/03/12/japan-nuclear-earthquake/, which is a site linked to a lot from Twitter, the topic had been brought up since Sunday the 13th, after the hydrogen explosion on top of reactor #1 and before the explosion on #3. Here are selected posts:#Joffan, on 13 March 2011 at 4:13 AM said:Any word out there on the spent fuel pool?#em1ss, on 13 March 2011 at 4:17 AM said:Nothing on the Spent Fuel Pool that I can find anyways…#Hank Roberts, on 13 March 2011 at 5:56 AM said:http://uvdiv.blogspot.com/2011/03/where-is-spent-fuel-now.htmlWhere is the spent fuel now?The spent fuel pool is on the top floor of the reactor building (assuming this is the same layout):GE Mark I BWR containment [Magdi Ragheb, U. Illinois at Urbana-Champaign]#Hank Roberts, on 13 March 2011 at 7:16 AM said:This may be reassuring. While the diagrams above show a “spent fuel pool” located immediately next to the top of the reactor bottle — that’s not longterm storage, it’s a handling point for refueling operations.Here is a description from late 2010 of the site and an assessment of its spent fuel storage — shows the building (though not where the building is on the site). Spent fuel is in dry casks, sealed and air-cooled. I don’t know what if anything would have been in the pool at the top of the reactor building and haven’t seen any pictures since the explosion to know what that situation is. But most of the spent fuel should have been well away from that. What the tsunami did to the storage is an open question though. How much water did hit the site?——Integrity Inspection of Dry Storage Casks and Spent Fuels… Storage Status of Spent Fuel at Fukushima-Daiichi NPS. ➢ Approx. 700 spent fuel assemblies are generated every year. ⇨Stored in spent fuel pools / dry …http://criepi.denken.or.jp/result/event/seminar/2010/issf/…/6-1_powerpoint.pdfThis may be the same document:http://www-ns.iaea.org/downloads/rw/conferences/spentfuel2010/sessions/session-ten-b/session-10b-japan-1.ppt.#em1ss, on 13 March 2011 at 11:55 AM said:They are not out of the woods and home yet with this unit, but following the industry established severe accident procedures seems to be working. Effectively protecting the public. This event is way beyond design basis as previosly discussed.The real concern now is the spent fuel pool which is likely exposed due to the Reactor building wall failures.The actual spent fuel pool walls are typically steel lined and significantly greater thickness concrete than the external building walls so structurally it is likely ok. The reactor building typically has blow out panels for a steam leak. Failure of actual walls indicates the magnitude of the hydrogen explosion beyond the analyzed pressurization from a steam leak.As long as they can maintain level in the pool no increase in rad levels should occur. If they lose level though, rad levels will rise dramatically on site and at the site boundary. Keep an eye out for significant rad level changes or actual reports of spent fuel pool status.#em1ss, on 13 March 2011 at 12:06 PM said:Hank also regarding spent fuel. It is normally first removed from the vessel and stored in the spent fuel pool for several years of decay. Then it is loaded into casks and placed into dry fuel storage vaults on a pad.#Hank Roberts, on 13 March 2011 at 12:41 PM said:(...)> spent fuelWhen used rods are first removed, I think they are temporarily put in the water tank container in the reactor building itself, up near the top of the reactor under the crane; I and others had earlier confused with the “spent fuel pool” but is only a brief holding area (no idea if it had any fuel rods in it as of this time–some bloggers out there were speculating that fuel rods stored there would be exposed after the explosion)The “spent fuel pool” is pictured in the powerpoint file I linked above (session-10b-japan-1.ppt), described as “A large-scale pool 12m x 29m x 11m(depth) fuels more than 19-monthcooling”; used to cool rods down; and after that there’s the dry cask storage.#em1ss, on 13 March 2011 at 1:19 PM said:(...)I am concerned about the spent fuel pool status. They must keep it full, re-establish cooling and ventilation boundaries to the environment.(...)#em1ss, on 13 March 2011 at 4:06 PM said:Here are some links showing why I am concerned about the spent fuel pool. Based on the latest photos this area has to be exposed and a complete mess. This is typically the upper most level in a BWR Reactor Building.http://www.nucleartourist.com/images/rflg-fl1.jpghttp://www.nucleartourist.com/images/rflg-fl2.jpgAdditionally this may be part of the smoking gun for the hydrogen explosion as reported during injection.http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/nuregs/staff/sr0933/sec3/195.html#James Krellenstein, on 13 March 2011 at 5:26 PM said:em1ss, I need your expert consult:if they drainded the spent fuel pool, what is the time to zirconium combustion? Can you give a update on the state of the reactor and cooling?#Hank Roberts, on 13 March 2011 at 6:00 PM said:> It looks like the only thing left is the> top of the drywell.That’s well above the top of the fuel pool. Look earlier in this thread, at the picture:http://i1107.photobucket.com/albums/h384/reactor1/BoilingWaterReactorDesign_3.jpgYou can see the deep pool to the right of the reactor bottle. It’s way below the level that blew off. There’s a yellow bar across the top of it, and little rectangles at the bottom that must represent fuel, deep down under the water level.That’s assuming the water’s still there — but that would be hard to miss.Still, it’s a shame everyone’s guessing. I started writing yesterday in the older topic titled “An informed public is key to acceptance of nuclear energy” — hoping this would happen.It’s not happening very well. Way too much opportunity lost to actually explain how things work, how they’re put together, how these designs have changed since 40 years ago — and as Barry notes, how this 40-year-old design held together in a quake far above its design maximum.Crisis/opportunity.#Hank Roberts, on 13 March 2011 at 6:11 PM said:A better diagram showing the location of the fuel storage pool, labeled in this diagram. I think this is a repeat posted earlier:https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/mragheb/www/NPRE%20457%20CSE%20462%20Safety%20Analysis%20of%20Nuclear%20Reactor%20Systems/Containment%20Structures.pdffromhttp://uvdiv.blogspot.com/2011/03/some-links-on-fukushima-daiichi-1.html#em1ss, on 14 March 2011 at 12:20 AM said:http://i1107.photobucket.com/albums/h384/reactor1/BoilingWaterReactorDesign_3.jpgAt the top of the building you see the refueling floor area. The crane for reactor dissassembly is shown in orange. The Spent Fuel Pool is below the refuel floor surface.The walls blown off the Reactor Building were essentially at refuel floor level and are not as robust as the balance of the building. The Spent Fuel Pool is a robust concrete structure that is steel lined.The water in the pool provides cooling and radiation shielding. Loss of water level in the Spent Fuel Pool would remove shielding and cause a significant increase in measured radiation levels on site and at the site boundary. That has not been reported as occurring yet.As long as water level can be maintained the pool will evaporate due to decay heat and remove heat from the spent fuel. Just have to maintain makeup water and level.How long the spent fuel has been in the pool since removal from the core determines decay heat load. Spent fuel is held for decay in the pool and when enough decay years have passed it is then loaded into dry fuel storage casks.The link below provides some US information on dry fuel storage. There are even U-Tube videos out there on it.http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/dry-cask-storage.html#Hank Roberts, on 14 March 2011 at 11:40 AM said:http://www.ucimc.org/content/meltdowns-grow-more-likely-fukushima-reactorsby Robert Alvarez“Robert Alvarez, an Institute for Policy Studies senior scholar, served as senior policy adviser to the Energy Department’s secretary and deputy assistant secretary for national security and the environment from 1993 to 1999.”“… Along with the struggle to cool the reactors is the potential danger from an inability to cool Fukushima’s spent nuclear fuel pools. They contain very large concentrations of radioactivity, can catch fire, and are in much more vulnerable buildings. The ponds, typically rectangular basins about 40 feet deep, are made of reinforced concrete walls four to five feet thick lined with stainless steel.The boiling-water reactors at Fukushima — 40 years old and designed by General Electric — have spent fuel pools several stories above ground adjacent to the top of the reactor. The hydrogen explosion may have blown off the roof covering the pool, as it’s not under containment. The pool requires water circulation to remove decay heat. If this doesn’t happen, the water will evaporate and possibly boil off. If a pool wall or support is compromised, then drainage is a concern. Once the water drops to around 5-6 feet above the assemblies, dose rates could be life-threatening near the reactor building. If significant drainage occurs, after several hours the zirconium cladding around the irradiated uranium could ignite.Then all bets are off.On average, spent fuel ponds hold five-to-ten times more long-lived radioactivity than a reactor core. Particularly worrisome is the large amount of cesium-137 in fuel ponds, which contain anywhere from 20 to 50 million curies of this dangerous radioactive isotope. With a half-life of 30 years, cesium-137 gives off highly penetrating radiation and is absorbed in the food chain as if it were potassium.In comparison, the 1986 Chernobyl accident released about 40 percent of the reactor core’s 6 million curies. A 1997 report for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) by Brookhaven National Laboratory also found that a severe pool fire could render about 188 square miles uninhabitable, cause as many as 28,000 cancer fatalities, and cost $59 billion in damage. A single spent fuel pond holds more cesium-137 than was deposited by all atmospheric nuclear weapons tests in the Northern Hemisphere combined. Earthquakes and acts of malice are considered to be the primary events that can cause a major loss of pool water.In 2003, my colleagues and I published a study that indicated if a spent fuel pool were drained in the United States, a major release of cesium-137 from a pool fire could render an area uninhabitable greater than created by the Chernobyl accident. We recommended that spent fuel older than five years, about 75 percent of what’s in U.S. spent fuel pools, be placed in dry hardened casks — something Germany did 25 years ago. The NRC challenged our recommendation, which prompted Congress to request a review of this controversy by the National Academy of Sciences. In 2004, the Academy reported that a “partially or completely drained a spent fuel pool could lead to a propagating zirconium cladding fire and release large quantities of radioactive materials to the environment.”#Hank Roberts, on 14 March 2011 at 11:47 AM said:This may be the study referred to:http://cipi.com/PDF/beyea2004%20spent%20fuel%20addendum.pdf.#Quixote2, on 14 March 2011 at 12:17 PM said:Here is the Alvarez study:http://www.irss-usa.org/pages/documents/11_1Alvarez.pdf#Hank Roberts, on 14 March 2011 at 1:06 PM said:Good brief discussion here:http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=600501Several people commenting gave a variety of links there:http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/nuregs/staff/sr0933/sec3/082r3.htmlResolution of Generic Safety Issues: Issue 82: Beyond Design Basis Accidents in Spent Fuel Pools (Rev. 3) (NUREG-0933, Main Report with Supplements 1–33)http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11263&page=38Safety and Security of Commercial Spent Nuclear Fuel Storage: Public Report (2006)Board on Radioactive Waste Management (BRWM)http://spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/energy/nuclear/japan-nuclear-accident-worse-than-worst-againJapan Nuclear Accident: Worse than Worst, AgainBill Sweet / Sat, March 12, 2011http://www.cfr.org/weapons-of-mass-destruction/nuclear-spent-fuel-pools-secure/p8967Are Nuclear Spent Fuel Pools Secure?Speaker: Kevin CrowleyJune 7, 2005, Council on Foreign Relations-------------------------------------------------------------------------------I would really want to know how these people are feeling, now that their fears have come true.

We actually have them quite a bit.Since 1973 there have been eleven referendums held in the UK, the majority of them have been related to the issue of devolution. The first UK-wide referendum was held in 1975 on the United Kingdom’s continued membership of the European Community (European Union).Previous referendums in the UK8 March 1973: Northern Ireland – Northern Ireland sovereignty referendum on whether Northern Ireland should remain part of the United Kingdom or join the Republic of Ireland (yes to remaining part of the UK)5 June 1975: UK – Membership of the European Community referendum on whether the UK should stay in the European Community (yes)1 March 1979: Scotland – Scottish devolution referendum on whether there should be a Scottish Assembly (40 per cent of the electorate had to vote yes in the referendum, although a small majority voted yes this was short of the 40 per cent threshold required to enact devolution)1 March 1979: Wales – Welsh devolution referendum on whether there should be a Welsh Assembly (no)11 September 1997: Scotland – Scottish devolution referenda on whether there should be a Scottish Parliament and whether the Scottish Parliament should have tax varying powers (both referendums received a yes vote)18 September 1997: Wales – Welsh devolution referendum on whether there should be a National Assembly for Wales (yes)7 May 1998: London – Greater London Authority referendum on whether there should be a Mayor of London and Greater London Authority (yes)22 May 1998: Northern Ireland – Northern Ireland Belfast Agreement referendum on the Good Friday Agreement (yes)3 March 2011: Wales - Welsh devolution referendum on whether the National Assembly for Wales should gain the power to legislate on a wider range of matters (yes)5 May 2011: UK – referendum on whether to change the voting system for electing MPs to the House of Commons from first past the post to the alternative vote (no, first past the post will continue to be used to elect MPs to the House of Commons)18 September 2014: Scotland – referendum on whether Scotland should become an independent country (no, the electorate voted 55 per cent to 45 per cent in favour of Scotland remaining within the UK.