Posted on 06/14/2011 7:41:13 PM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
TEPCO to cover reactor with polyester sheets
The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant will begin to cover the No.1 reactor building with polyester sheets this month to prevent the dispersal of radioactive substances.
The buildings of the No.1, 3, and 4 reactors were severely damaged by explosions and radioactive elements are still being released into the atmosphere. There are fears that heavy rain may hamper the workers' activities and that the rainwater may become contaminated with radioactive materials.
To prevent these situations, Tokyo Electric Power Company, or TEPCO, plans to enclose the reactor buildings with polyester sheets. The covering of the No.1 reactor building will begin later this month.
The roughly one-millimeter-thick sheets will be attached to the steel frames of the 54-meter-high building.
To minimize workers' exposure to radiation, TEPCO will use a special method with very few personnel. A large crane designed to ward off radiation will set up 62 pre-assembled parts at the reactor building. TEPCO aims to complete the covering operation in late September.
The utility plans to carry out similar work at the No.3 and 4 reactor buildings.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011 07:26 +0900 (JST)
“The roughly one-millimeter-thick sheets will ...”
That’s from the linked article.
I am new to Zero Hedge but I used to be employed as a marine biologist so I don’t buy the ‘nothing to see here, move along’ attitude re gulf. I saw disaster threads I disagreed with and drew the air of them with cross posts or identifying invalid conspiracy sites - but I don’t think everything is ok fine and I know the gov doesn’t want us to think, talk about it - just move along.
I myself am more worried about the dispersant that they dumped than the oil.
“Roughly” 1mm isn’t “1 mil.” Again, they’re idiots. 1mm is about 39 mils. The TEPCO outline doesn’t call out the thickness they’re proposing, and the news outlets covering this have shown themselves to be worse than useless. I seriously doubt that the media has the proposed thickness of the polyester sheet correct.
re: the Gulf.
It isn’t fine, OK, move along. Using the dispersants was probably a really bad idea, brought about by the desire to not see crude wash up on beaches. Making crude miscible with water probably resulted in crude that sank into deep, colder water, and that will retard the microbial action for years. Someone should be doing research into this so we don’t repeat mistakes. One of the bigger mistakes was allowing an administration staffed with academics to get their nose into this.
But it still isn’t the end of the world. Oil comes from the earth, not Alpha Centauri. It isn’t some alien substance, new and unknown to the earth.
Will there be a mess there for a time to come? Yes. Will it eventually return to something appearing normal? Yes. We used to have quite the amount of oil simply wash up on shorelines near Santa Barbara from oil seeps off-shore - these seeps finally dried up (mostly) when man started extracting oil from that oilfield and reducing the underground pressure.
1-mil thick isn’t very thick; I assume this is specially reinforced to stand up to wind.
It doesn’t stop radiation. It stops particles. The particles are radioactive, so this keeps those particles from getting airborne.
Polyester burns real purty!
Next they’ll have everyone take turns blowing on it to cool things down.
THanks for the info on 1 millimeter. I misread that as 1-mil and was surprised at how thin that would be.
I’ve noticed the same people who believe the sky is falling in Japan also think the sky fell in the gulf.
and it still humors me to see people quoting gunderson as a knowledgable, scientific unbiased source of information.
Thanks for the info about sheeting. When it was first proposed the obvious concerns were heat - it’s too hot to put concrete on it so let’s put polyester instead.
You know, I wouldn’t be as skeptical as I am if a) putting polyester over 3 core melt downs had ever been tried before and b) TEPCO wasn’t the one proposing it. After all their evasion and lying and their request to abandon all attempts to contain the reactors in mid March, I believe TEPCO has earned the snarks it gets.
The polyester lining is aimed at avoiding rain water to rinse the debris on top of the three units, therefore increasing the aumount of radiactive water to be processed.
Typhoon session there coming soon.
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