This is just one of 4 major hazards. And is the simplest of the four. And it has already been 31 months just to get here. The complete cleanup will take 40 years. Your report tells just a small part of the real story, but is what we have come to expect from a press which has downplayed the whole situation for years now.

The biggest problem is not the junk that fell on the 'floor'. The biggest problem is the junk that fell in the pool, onto the rods and assemblies.

And they have started the cleanup ... no matter your hyperbole about it being the simplest part ... which I very much doubt ... I would tend to think they have made decisions on what to clean up based on what they can get to and equipment in place used to remove material ...

Are you the blogger that has built the hyperbolic website that you are referring other bloggers to get information on Fuku ... ?

I think it is actually 44.

But it has to start somewhere and I just don't understand the bitching. Why not support the efforts? What EXACTLY is he trying to accomplish?

We KNOW it is a scary and difficult operation and nothing is being hidden from us. The article is NOT filled with errors and the fact that it doesn't cover EVERYTHING in one article is...so what?

"But nuclear regulators have called for "great prudence" because the pools still contain small pieces of rubble."

That is in the article.

This is just one of 4 major hazards.

Quite a bit more than four since the removal of melted cores in three units have their own calendars and the seven fuel-removal tasks are hardly the only hazards in the timeline... but the report just said "one of". How is that an error?

And is the simplest of the four.

Probably not. Unit 2 presumably still has its fuel handling equipment in place and wouldn't need as much up-front work - and many of the hazards you failed to count are already passed (and were simpler). Not that it matters... since this is again not an error in the reporting.

And it has already been 31 months just to get here. The complete cleanup will take 40 years.

So? Where did the report make an error there?

Your report tells just a small part of the real story

It reports the news of what was actually happening. When did "RE wishes they covered something else" become an "error"?

The biggest problem is not the junk that fell on the 'floor'. The biggest problem is the junk that fell in the pool, onto the rods and assemblies.

The pool is part of the upper floor of the building. The report doesn't identify it as a "problem"... merely that it was a necessary preparation for the fuel removal.

I posted it early this morning to LBN: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014650683

And it is a shame that other thread is still kicking around.

It is a very clear indication that there is a perverse psychology at work here when any positive news (however small a start) is ignored while the most dire screaming -even when inaccurate- is seen as "truth telling".

When building number 4 blew up, it did so because the rods in the pool overheated. The fuel pool was known to have lost water. After the explosion they had to use an exterior water pump to put water back into the pool.

There is evidence that some of the rods melted and fused with the metal in the tank. Becoming one with the tank, it could be said.

What scientists are saying is that absent cooling waters rods can generate tremendous heat, still. If an earthquake takes down the pool, they may not be able to contain the rods at all leading to a new catastrophe.

One of the problems #4 pool faces, is that while there are some old rods which have greatly decreased in possible heat generating properties, there is a whole reactor full of rods that had just been removed from the reactor before 3/11. Those rods are still quite capable of boiling water, and that is why the pool is said to have overheated like it did. Those rods are still quite hot. It takes 10 years for rods to cool enough to be dry-casked, iirc.

The rods removed from #4 will go into a larger pool on ground and more earthquake proof. Let's hope they are very successful.

What is your evidence that some of the rods melted and fused?

And, supposing, you can provide such evidence, what is your point? That this is a difficult operation? Check, it is. We agree.

So what errors are in the article? What do YOU think should be done that is not being done?

What is motivating you to push the "MSM is not telling the truth" thing?

Do you think Japan has anything but the strongest desire to improve the situation?

Do you honestly think that they are planning to save money by doing a shoddy job? That $$$ is more important to Japan than saving a big chunk of the country?

Yes. The press has been hiding the truth.

Just recently has the government of Japan been more forthcoming.

Don't take it out on me, bub, I just report what is going on.

I post a late breaking news story and you respond that it is a typical story filled with errors.

Yet you point to no errors.

So, excuse me for wondering what YOUR problem is.

You state that as if it is a known fact. In fact, evidence suggests that it is not true. The below contains photographic evidence suggesting that it was not caused by the means you state.

http://www.nsr.go.jp/disclosure/meeting_operator/BWR/data/20130514_10_siryo1.pdf

Now, before screaming that it is a lie/propaganda, let me suggest you should offer evidence which counters the photographic evidence in the report.

US Energy Chief offers Japan Help

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_JAPAN_US_NUCLEAR?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-10-31-06-16-32

TOKYO (AP) -- U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said he expects deepening cooperation with Japan over the high-stakes cleaning up and decommissioning of the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant.

The Fukushima plant has had a series of mishaps in recent months, including radioactive water leaks from storage tanks. The incidents have added to concerns about the ability of operator Tokyo Electric Power Co., or TEPCO, to safely close down the plant, which suffered meltdowns after being swamped by the March 2011 tsunami on Japan's northeastern coast.

"We expect the relationship in the area of decommissioning between TEPCO and our national laboratories to expand and deepen in the coming years," Moniz said in a lecture Thursday in Tokyo.

"Just as the tragic event had global consequences, the success of the cleanup also has global significance. So we all have a direct interest in seeing that the next steps are taken well and efficiently and safely," he said.

The help has been accepted.

I have noticed you have downplayed the whole scene and gone on a personal tirade with anybody who doesn't see it the same as you. Don't deny it.

The Energy Chief of the US has said this is a GLOBAL problem. Meaning it is my problem, too.

Tepco and the Japanese government is in a deep ass hole, not only money wise but they are faced with an insurmountable problem with the nukes bleeding into the sea and air.

Trying to make it look like it is not a problem is a fool's parade.

I posted a neutral article telling what is going on to counter the LBN article with 30 recs saying that Japan has delayed the operation -something you seem to have no desire to fix the misimpression of.

You seem caught between wanting to say that Japan has taken too long and saying that they are acting impetuously.

Can you make up your mind? Both cannot be true.

Fukushima job feared too perilous for Tepco
BY MIYA TANAKA
KYODO NOV 19, 2013

Tokyo Electric Power Co. has finally moved into the decommissioning process at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, despite doubt over its ability to manage a highly dangerous effort that will take decades.

The start Monday of removing fuel from the cooling pool high up in the damaged reactor 4 building was one of the few bright pieces of news to come out recently from the plant, which has been plagued with frequent radioactive water leaks and other troubles over the past year.

But the work poses another challenge to the utility, with its success or failure expected to affect the following process of retrieving the fuel from the pools for reactors 1, 2 and 3, as well as the melted fuel inside the damaged cores.

“Spent fuel has potentially a very large risk. . . . I am personally more worried about (handling) it than the radioactive water problem,” Nuclear Regulation Authority Chairman Shunichi Tanaka said in late October.

Tepco President Naomi Hirose has ...

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/11/19/national/fukushima-job-feared-too-perilous-for-tepco
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Last edited Tue Nov 19, 2013, 09:45 PM - Edit history (1)

Everyday at least 300 tonnes of radiated water from the destruction flows into the Pacific. That's about 100,000 gallons a day. Times 900+ days.

Reactor #3 is so badly radiated that humans can't get near it and robots die in minutes when set there. It has at times seen to be smoking away, releasing more and more radiation into the air.

Reactor #2 is similar. They keep dumping water into it to keep it cool and that water drains away into the Pacific. Same with reactor #1.

There are fields of tanks holding highly radiated water sitting on the hill above the complex and there have been many reports of those tanks leaking into a ditch that flows into, yep, you guessed it, the Pacific. Every time it rains, that ditch gets more water.

The fuel pools of all 4 reactors are pretty much the same: Bottoms are at least 50 feet from the ground. #4 tho, has some very hot nuclear waste in it that was, 3 years ago, going critical and boiling water. That waste can still boil water and after 3/11 it has been said that waste caused pool #4 to boil the water. Those waste rods are believed to have melted somewhat and that is why removing that mess has become such a problem that the US was called in to help.

Also, #3 and #4 have what they call MOX. Mixed OXide fuel. A Uranium and Plutonium mixture making the waste far more deadly than just Uranium by itself.

Indeed, some experts have said that is why #3 blew up like it did, and why #4 burned like it did: Because of the presence of highly volatile Plutonium. Duke power in the US tried some MOX in its plants and those plants almost blew up. So they stopped doing that. Tepco thought they were smarter and could handle that MOX fuel. Well, they can't, so they called in the US.

" The Japanese thought they were smarter and could handle that MOX fuel. Well, they can't, so they called in the US."

Yup, you're just an objective deliverer of the facts.

Edited to replace Japanese with Tepco.

"Tepco thought they were smarter and could handle that MOX fuel. Well, they can't, so they called in the US."

That is better. More accurate. Thanks, Bonobo, for pointing that out.

You're welcome.

It was very insulting and xenophobic sounding the way it came out.

Fukushima Protester Jailed for 21 days & Speaks Out

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017159201