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Did A German Nuclear Plant Intentionally Leak Radioactive Waste? (thelocal.de)
mdsolar shares this report from a Berlin news site:
A former engineer at one of Germany's nuclear reactors has made an astonishing claim: that the plant intentionally pumped radioactive waste into the atmosphere in 1986. Speaking to the Westfalischer Anzeiger, 83-year-old retired engineer Hermann Schollmeyer apparently decided it was time to come clean, three decades after the incident he describes.
The official story had always been that radioactive waste was unintentionally leaked into the air at the THTR reactor in Hamm in May 1986, the western German newspaper reports. But Schollmeyer now claims that the plant used the cover of the Chernobyl -- which had released a cloud of radioactive waste over western Europe -- to pump their own waste into the atmosphere, believing no one would notice.
"It was done intentionally," Schollmeyer said. "We had problems at the plant and I was present at a few of the meetings."
The official story had always been that radioactive waste was unintentionally leaked into the air at the THTR reactor in Hamm in May 1986, the western German newspaper reports. But Schollmeyer now claims that the plant used the cover of the Chernobyl -- which had released a cloud of radioactive waste over western Europe -- to pump their own waste into the atmosphere, believing no one would notice.
"It was done intentionally," Schollmeyer said. "We had problems at the plant and I was present at a few of the meetings."
Basically they farted after the dog farted thinking no one would notice while blaming everything on the dog.
... to Germany's decision to abandon nuclear power generation for good. Nuclear power generation just means too much accumulation of risk potential in a small space and in the hands of few people. It only takes a very few morons, criminals or MBAs to unleash that risk.
Hi,
as a German, I have to say, this is not news. This was already known in 86.
At the time Chernoby happened, I was on holiday in Hungry. For the, the question was, travel back to Germany or is it safer to stay in Hungry until the radiaoctive cloud had settled.
One of my friends was working for the only nuclear reactor in Hungry, doing the external measurements outside their reactor.
So while I did not trust the offical readings, I could trust my friend with the radiation levels in aroudn the Hungry reactor and hence track the radioactive cloud from Chernoby as well.
While we did this, we already noticed somethign wrong. The radiation levels in Germay were raising way to fast in comparison to the ones in Hungry even if you added in some weather effects. The media attributed this to misrepresentation of the actual readings by the soviets but I had access to the acctual readings in Hungry and they matched the offical readings very well.
Later on, it turned out a German test reactor had leaked readioactive materials and did not report it hopping Chernobyl would cover it until people spoke up and informed the government.
mdsolar back with a new round of unprovable nuclear fearmongering clickbait
Look, these are the people who set up folding chairs and meticulously recorded the names of prisoners before gassing them. Or recorded the names of deserters who were caught and executed by firing squad just before the whole army surrendered in Stalingrad. I would not be surprised if every shell fired by every one of their AA guns was individually inspected, numbered and recorded by one soldier and signed off by his officer and countersigned by the officer's officer. They are that good in record keeping.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
For fuck's sake, if you love radiation so much, go drink some polonium tea.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
That doesn't make it right, especially when you're dealing with some of the most toxic elements on the planet. The nuclear industry is mistrusted for good historical reasons. What are they going to do about it?
Like, maybe, this one? Is there any evidence other than his statement?
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
See, you are showing your ignorance...
Anyone that has any education in radiology knows you dont put polonium into a tea. It's far to harsh for the delicate tea flavors. you use a black coffee or even a dark irish stout for the best flavor combination.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
A former engineer at one of Germanyâ(TM)s
Germany is a trademark now?
Oh, no, wait, Slashdot is just still absolutely fucking shit at Unicode and the editors aren't doing their job. My mistake!
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
All the means is nuclear is not the problems, private for profit corporations in charge of nuclear is the problem. That lowest tender mentality and the hunt for this quarters bonus with total disregard for the future and executives never ever being prosecuted, means corporations can simply not be trusted with nuclear power. All government owned and audited by the public, is the only sound way to go.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
I'm tired /. is still publishing lame and full of bullshit stories from mdsolar. There is no science content at all. Only pretention to uncover plots to kill us all. It seems obvious to me this guy is paranoid.
Achille Talon
Hop!
If even Germany can't keep its nuclear plant operators honest, then nobody can. That is a pretty big deal, actually.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
You may or may not have some sort of radiology education, but your joke is left un-funny by the fact that the most famous case of intentional polonium poisoning was done using tea.
Actually, not quite. It was built, owned and operated by organisations that were as close to private industry, as it was possible in the USSR back then.
The actual government was very unhappy with the things done at that power plant. Let me quote an interesting report by Andropov (head of KGB back then, USSR ruler later):
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
We have a report on a possible intentional release of radiation from an experimental nuclear reactor from 30 years ago. This has as much relevance to modern nuclear reactors as the safety issues of a Ford Pinto should have on deciding to purchase a brand new Chevrolet C1500. Even though this is irrelevant to modern nuclear reactors we will no doubt have people making this connection to modern nuclear power.
This is straight up fear, uncertainty, and doubt from top to bottom.
So, we have people that broke the law on intentionally releasing radioactive gasses. If this can be proven then they should be punished under the law. If this happens in the future then the people should be punished. It's quite simple really, we have laws on the handling of radioactive material and when they are broken people need to be punished. This should have no relevance to the decision on whether or not we should build more nuclear power plants than people disposing of coal waste illegally would have on deciding to build another coal plant.
The description of the incident tells me this was a pebble bed reactor, a system that was found to have problems of the pebbled fuel getting stuck in piping. This is why none are operating today and why no one proposes building another reactor like it. It was a failed experiment and we've moved on. It's unfortunate this happened but if we allow this incident to hold up investment in new nuclear power then we will continue to derive power from dirty coal, expensive solar, or unreliable wind.
With a few notable exceptions we have a very long history of safe and inexpensive nuclear power. If we use a metric such as joules of energy produced compared to the number of deaths then nuclear power wins by a very large margin. The occasional death from people falling from windmills, solar panel mounts, or coal boilers don't make the news because industrial accidents are not news. Nuclear power accidents make the news because radiation is scary and because nuclear power accidents are rare.
What didn't make the news as widely as it probably should have was a fire at a large solar power plant last week. It disabled a very large solar collector which is likely to be out of operation for a very long time. Given that the power plant has been in a very poor financial situation for a very long time it is quite likely this incident could put them out of business for good. I challenge people to even identify the power plant I'm referring to. Google it if you like but the name of this plant is not something that that many people would recognize even though Chernobyl, Fukushima, and Three Miles Island are power plants that many know.
In short, move along there's nothing to see here.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
That's the whole point of mdsolar posting this unsubstantiated crap and spreading the FUD. He is not just a random poster â" he has a pro-solar agenda (either ideological or simply for-profit) and nuclear energy is the main competitor.
Actually mdsolar is the de-facto might-as-well--be persona of billionaire T. Boone Pickens and several others who are driving the expansion of natural gas generation, to the utter destruction of all other reliable base load energy sources. Every solar and wind initiative is being built out with gas plants for 'support and peaking'. When the unreliables crap breaks and shuts down, when the subsidies dry up, when investors pull out, those gas plants will go on-line 24/7.
Case in point, Vermont just closed a nuclear plant that was generating ~70% of all electricity produced in the state... ~35% of the power used in the state... so they could bring in more electricity made from natural gas to run their electric heaters. They have nobly increased carbon emissions to help prove that CO2 is not the motivating factor behind these changes. They even import nuclear electricity from NH to show there are no hard feelings, or moral hang-ups. Vermont also leads the nation in all kinds of nanny meters, dark fiber and weird parasitic infrastructure that doesn't make an erg of energy, so they can calculate down to the micropenny how much it will all suck in the end.
The shutting of Vermont Yankee was a brazen act of social and corporate vandalism. It was a national treasure, a nuclear plant sited next to a hydroelectric power source that had the capacity (and direct connecting feeders) to black-start it. In any scenario of downed grids and interrupted fossil energy, VY could have been a beacon of hope and civilization. Now that region of Vermont will become a feudal electric barony gathered around the ~35MW output of the Vernon Dam.
In faux tribute to natural gas --- which imposes its own fragile infrastructure with as-yet unknown consequences, irreplaceable things are being destroyed.
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>