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How To Take Apart Fukushima's 3 Melted-Down Reactors
the_newsbeagle writes "In Japan, workers have spent nearly three years on the clean-up and decommissioning of the ruined Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station. They only have 37 years to go. Taking apart the plant's three melted-down reactors is expected to take 40 years and cost $15 billion. The plant's owner, TEPCO, admits that its engineers don't yet know how they'll pull off this monumental task. An in-depth examination of the decommissioning process explains the challenges, such as working amid the radioactive rubble, stopping up the leaks that spill radioactive water throughout the site, and handling the blobs of melted nuclear fuel. Many of the tasks will be accomplished by newly invented robots that can go where humans fear to tread."
I figure a small 50-20 kiloton atomic bomb should do the trick...
Tunnel 100 ft. below the reactor and build a huge leak-proof chamber. Use controlled detonation to collapse the reactor, building, and all into this chamber. Fill it with water and close/seal it off. Build something cool on top.
If it's easy to build a leak-proof, earthquake-proof chamber than can contain high grade nuclear waste indefinitely, maybe all reactors should have this huge chamber, then all they have to do after an accident is fill it with water and cap it off, and maybe build a playground on top.
"Keep it contained" is a little optimistic. There is radioactive tea draining from the site to the sea. They are trying to use robots to install an ice dam in the beach to stop that, but have yet to begin installing it. It is unknown if it will actually work. They estimate they are losing 300 tons of fluid per day, of unknown composition but most certainly very radioactive. That is not "contained".
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Meh, you just need to engineer it so it blows UP.
Vertical, one shot, with enough pressure to propel each reactor at escape velocity.
I'd do the math for you, it's elegant, but there isn't enough space in this comment.
The "37 years remaining" reminded me of the old joke: A museum guide tells visitors "...and this ancient artifact is six thousand and thirteen years old". A tourist asks: "How do the scientists know that so precisely?" The guide responds: "I don't know how they did that, but when I got the job thirteen years ago, they told me it was six thousand years old". (Or something along the lines of this...)
Ezekiel 23:20