TEPCO Readies Plan To Bring Reactor Under Control
Kyusaku Natsume writes "TEPCO has released details of their plan to bring Unit 1 of Fukushima Daiichi under control, to improve the working conditions inside the reactor building of this unit and install a new cooling system. From the success of this operation maybe we will know how they will address the emergency in the remaining damaged nuclear reactors."
Wonder what they plan to do about Unit 2, 3 and the spent fuel pool in 4?
Tim, Fix the damn fortune database already!
TEPCO failed at not having prepared for the scenario when the plant suffers complete blackout, including all backups being flooded. That's all.
That is not all.
They had 8 to 24 hours (I forget) to bring and connect additional power generators or charged batteries to the site before the existing batteries failed, but they didn't do it despite knowing what the stakes were.
They failed to vent the hydrogen from the reactor buildings. They thought to vent the vessels to the buildings but didn't vent the hydrogen from the buildings. This lead to significant avoidable additional damage from explosions and probably raised the amount of radiation released to the environment.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
No, TEPCO failed because they relied on a design that requires active input to stay safe. Any measures you think of to improve safety for such a design come down to security by 'Allow by default' and closing holes after exploits. Since it is impossible to keep up with all possible circumstances, this means the design is unsafe.
Mart
"I know I will be modded down for this": where's the option '-1, Asking for it'?