Fukushima apocalypse: Years of ‘duct tape fixes’ could result in ‘millions of deaths’

[PamW]

31. It's more complicated than that...

zeemike,

As a scientist, I knew you weren't a scientist because you are just adding up the amount of radioactive material.

No question; there's a lot of radioactive material there. The thing that you and scientifically INCOMPETENT groups like the Physicians for Social Responsibility are missing; is "how mobile are those radioactive materials".

Most of the radioactive materials are trapped in the ceramic fuel. They are like color pigments in glass. When ever I explain this, I think of some lovely blue glasses that my brother and I got for free at the soda counter of the local drug store near where we grew up.

Those glasses are blue because of blue pigment in the glass. When we pick up those glasses, even when wet; do you think we get blue pigment on our hands? NOPE!! The blue pigment is locked inside the glass; and unless the glass melts or is dissolved, or some other method; the blue pigment is trapped inside.

The SAME is true for that radioactive material. It is trapped inside the fuel ceramic. In order of the radioactive material to get out; the ceramic would have to melt. However, much of that spent fuel is so old that the radioactivity has subsided to the point where it doesn't have enough energy to melt the fuel. So the radioactive material that is in the ceramic will be trapped.

Now some of the radioactive material when it was created as fast moving material recoiling from a fission, came to rest in the thin annular gap between the fuel and the inside diameter of the zirconium cladding tube. If the zirconium cladding tube is broken; then that small amount of fission gas can certainly escape.

However, the vast majority of the radioactive material is trapped in ceramic that isn't "hot" enough to melt even if is taken out of water. This is like the fuel that can be put into dry casks; they don't need to have to be submerged in coolant because the heat generation has died down so much over the years they've been out of the reactor.

So the amount of radioactivity is only PART of the story. The other part is how much of that radioactive material can escape being trapped in the ceramic.

Because you only referenced the amount and not the mobility; that was what tipped me off that you are NOT a scientist.

The good thing about science is that it is true, whether or not you believe in it.

PamW