A fuel rod is inserted into a reactor vessel inside the No. 1 reactor building at Kyushu Electric Power's Sendai nuclear power station in Satsumasendai, Kagoshima Prefecture, on Wednesday. Kyushu Electric Power Co started loading uranium fuel rods into a reactor on Tuesday, marking the first attempt to reboot Japan's nuclear industry in nearly two years after the sector was shutdown following the 2011 Fukushima disaster.
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47 Comments
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SauloJpn
Looks like the beginning of the sequel of a terror movie...
Aizo Yurei
Those that do not learn from history...
Star-viking
A good start!
gogogo
Please remove them! You DO NOT have local consent to use this reactor.
Did they model the lighting after a movie set?
USNinJapan2
About. Damned. Time.
GW
Doesn't look like they are wearing much if any protective gear!!
Star-viking
Hi GW,
The fuel is kept underwater - blocking most of the radiation.
GW
Yeah but what if something gets rock & rolled, remember 3/11!
Wakarimasen
All this needs is a bond villain. While I think that Japan can't really survive without nuclear power, the symbolism of the rod being inserted against the will of the locals is too obvious to ignore....
Disillusioned
What? No hard hats?
Yeah, a pretty photo of a disaster waiting to happen.
Star-viking
GW,
It would need to be a very big quake!
cleo
And Japan never has very big quakes, so no worries?
Star-viking
cleo
When it's the tsunamis that cause the damage, I would say few worries. More worries for the towns and cities hit by quakes.
cleo
Like most nuclear power plants in Japan, the Sendai plant is located on the coast. Explain again why tsunamis aren't a problem?
Star-viking
Zichi, Cleo,
GW was talking about earthquakes.
As for tsunamis, they, and earthquake damage, are now dealt with comprehensively.
cleo
I have no idea what that sentence means. How do you 'deal comprehensively' with 30 to 40m of water sloshing up and over you and 5 kilos inland? and more importantly, over up-and-running potential meltdowns?
Has Fukushima been 'dealt with comprehensively'?
Star-viking
Cleo
You build tsunami walls that can cope with possible tsunamis.
Why, are they going to recommission it?
cleo
You mean like the wire fence on the beach outside the Sendai NPP that turns into a pile of tetrapods in the sea, that can be seen on Google maps satellite view? What possible tsunami would a wire fence keep out?
https://www.google.co.jp/maps/place/Satsumasendai,+Kagoshima+Prefecture/@31.8306106,130.1856632,283m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m2!3m1!1s0x353e2318884dc3c3:0x4c027ceb3403d935
I certainly hope not. But it would be nice to know they'd resolved all the problems there before they work on possibly recreating the same problems at the other end of the country.
Star-viking
Zichi,
With a 300 foot high tsunami, nuclear power plants would be the least of Japan's concerns.
Cleo,
Point 1: Google Maps is not continuously updated. Point 2: You have no elevation data there. Point 3: I said possible tsunamis. Point 4: There's a 15 metre high wall at the Sendai plant. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/be4db1de-57c1-11e4-b47d-00144feab7de.html#axzz3fSqlt7gN
cleo
It's not years out of date, either. How long does it take to build a good strong high tsunami wall? More than a couple of months, I imagine.
zichi gave you the elevations. (though I think he inadvertently slipped in an extra 0 on the height of his tsunami) 15 metres above sea level. The 1605 Nankaido earthquake sent a 30m tsunami at Kyushu.
See above. What are they going to do, wait until the tsunami warning sounds and they're sure a tsunami is coming, and then start frantically building?
Not according to zichi's information.
cleo
zichi, I stand corrected - I read 300 feet as 300 metres. Basically a mountain falling into the sea. gulp.
But hey, no worries, it was a one-off, that kind of thing isn't ever going to happen again.
...is it?
cleo
zichi, you're right - it's never going to happen - but if it's happened once, it can happen again. The 1605 earthquake I mentioned earlier generated a huge tsunami all the way from the Boso Peninsula to Kyushu.
Star-viking
Zichi, Cleo,
It's interesting when you read about the Mt. Unzen mega tsunami:
A volcano in a bay suffering a face collapse, the rock falling into the bay and causing a mega tsunami in the bay
Google Maps shows no bay at the Sendai Plant, and no large volcanos facing it.
As usual, you are extrapolating historical facts without digging into the situation behind those facts.
Star-viking
Zichi,
Not facing the Sendai Plant, not facing the Sendai Plant, not facing the Sendai Plant, not facing the Sendai Plant, and not facing the Sendai Plant.
I remember the 11/3 earthquake and tsunami - thankfully the tsunami did not miraculously go around Tohoku and hit the Japan Sea Coast.
Well, apart from the wall.
Star-viking
Zichi,
The Nankai Trough is on the Pacific side of Japan, the Sendai Plant is on the Japan Sea side.
Tsunamis have to account for topography, they do not have teleportation powers.
Perhaps the wall at the Sendai plant is 13 metres + 2 metres above sea level. Now what the tsunami at Fukushima Dai-ichi was is irrelevant - it is what the Sendai plant faces which is relevant. All you have been able to provide on the matter are historical tsunamis whose mechanisms or reach in no way threaten the Sendai plant...unless volcanoes can do back-flips over mountain ranges to explode in the sea?
Star-viking
Zichi,
Shifting the goal posts again? We were on the topic of tsunamis, not volcanic eruptions. As for Kyuden - your previous link, as usual, contains the information you seek: a 9.1 Mag earthquake in the Ryukyu is part of the safety plan for the plant.
We are post-disaster now. Lessons have been learned. As an aside, why do you think that no-one in authority in civil protection believed a local-source tsunami was possible on the Pacific Coast of Tohoku?
What "full 40 metre one"?
I believe any tsunami that is large enough to threaten the plant from the Pacific would have to be enormous. Such a tsunami would cause such death and destruction on the Pacific Coast of Japan that whatever happened on the Japan Sea Coast would pale in comparison.
I'm sure if that occured, with casualties in the 10s to 100s of millions, we'd still have people crying about radiation rather than crying over the graves of the dead.
Star-viking
Zichi,
the "Ryukyu Arc" is the correct term. It is a volcanic island arc, it does not make a statement about the actual level of volcanic action. Only 4 of the 10 volcanoes are active: Iwo-Tori Shima, Suwanose-jima, Kuchinoerabu-jima, and Kikai.
Looking at the middle picture at the bottom of page 18 of the document you posted, there is a wall to protect the sea-pumps, and a 13 metre wall protecting the plant.
The major lessons of the accident have been learned. That's what I meant by post-disaster.
Back-up generators are a requirement.
Tsunamis do need to have sources. They are also affected by topography, both surface and underwater. They do not magically appear. Kyuden seem to have revised their defenses to deal with a 9.1 magnitude tsunami. That seems prudent.
cleo
But historically no NPP has ever been put out of action by a volcanic eruption. That means it could never happen. Never in a million years. No point worrying about something that isn't going to happen, is there?
Star-viking
I am sure the NRA can consult and can employ vulcanologists.
Star-viking
Yes, a tsunami generated by a 9.1 mag quake.
Use the back-up generators.
Critical?
Yup, lessons learned - listen to outside agencies.
Star-viking
Zichi,
All NPPs need back-up generators. I would have assumed your engineering degrees would have told you that.
As for the Niigata plant "failing" the inspection:
Some failure!
As for outside agencies, largely the NRA and IAEA.