Fukushima: Mark 1 Nuclear Reactor Design Caused GE Scientist To Quit In Protest

[RamboLiberal]

Source: ABC News

Thirty-five years ago, Dale G. Bridenbaugh and two of his colleagues at General Electric resigned from their jobs after becoming increasingly convinced that the nuclear reactor design they were reviewing -- the Mark 1 -- was so flawed it could lead to a devastating accident.

Questions persisted for decades about the ability of the Mark 1 to handle the immense pressures that would result if the reactor lost cooling power, and today that design is being put to the ultimate test in Japan. Five of the six reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, which has been wracked since Friday's earthquake with explosions and radiation leaks, are Mark 1s.

"The problems we identified in 1975 were that, in doing the design of the containment, they did not take into account the dynamic loads that could be experienced with a loss of coolant," Bridenbaugh told ABC News in an interview. "The impact loads the containment would receive by this very rapid release of energy could tear the containment apart and create an uncontrolled release."

The situation on the ground at the Fukushima Daiichi plant is so fluid, and the details of what is unfolding are so murky, that it may be days or even weeks before anyone knows how the Mark 1 containment system performed in the face of a devastating combination of natural disasters.



Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/fukushima-mark-nuclear-reactor-design-caused-ge-scientist/story?id=13141287

[CLANG]

1. Production Test. Great idea!

[nalnn]

2. G.E.

"We bring good things to light"

Anyone remember that one?

[Lucinda]

3. Actually I believe some of these were Mark 2

In the CNIC briefings I watched the past couple of days, one of the containment designers was there and he talked about some of the reactors using the number 2 containment type. If I remember correctly - it was the 1 & 3 reactors.

[AtheistCrusader]

9. Only reactor 6 at this site is a Mark 2.

It was offline when the earthquake struck, along with 4 and 5, for maintenence or refueling.

#4 is apparently just having problems with the storage pool. No word on whether 5 or 6 are having problems at all.

[No Elephants]

4. They gave us Ronnie AND radioactivity?

[Auntie Bush]

5. Nice to know some people have a conscience and foresight!

[defendandprotect]

6. GE -- and nuclear power plants -- bringing good things to life????

[DailyGrind]

7. I heard a similar story of an engineer that worked on the Nimitz Freeway

he knew it was unstable but couldn't do anything about it. Felt like crap when it crashed down in '89.

[FBaggins]

8. Yet three of them have gone for days with badly damaged cooling

... including hours without any water on the fuel rods at all.

There have been no end of problems, but so far the containment doesn't appear to be one of them.

[AtheistCrusader]

10. Containment on #2 is in question.

Not so much the reactor containment, but the suppression pool, which connects into/passes through the containment.

[thereismore]

11. The reaction has been stopped. This pressure scenario isn't going to happen.

The spent fuel in the 3rd floor is more of a problem.