Let's take a look at TEPCO's measurements of contaminated water in turbine building No. 2 reactor

[jpak]

http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/betu11_e/images/110327e15.pdf

The first column says "error" - based on what?

The source of this error is not stated.

Look at the column - "re-extraction" - re-extraction of which sample?

Look at the row "radiation dose" - no data in the last column - a re-extraction of an earlier sample?

Look at the time difference between the "error" measurement (1850 March 26) and the "reassessment" (1850 March 26) - no time difference

NOW PAY ATTENTION

These samples were taken at 8:50 on March 26 - and measured at 1850 March 26

Now look at the reassessment time - 1850 March 26 and the re-measurement time - 1250 March 27 - an 18 hour difference

The half life of I-134 is 52.2 minutes - after 10 hours it will decay to insignificant levels

I-134 "under the limit"

Mission Accomplished

yup

edit - some background. The presence of I-134 is clear and damning evidence that damaged fuel has re-attained criticality (uncontrolled fission chain reaction) and will continue to heat the contents of the reactor pressure vessel.

This is not good as further and perhaps catastrophic damage to the reactor may occur.

TEPCO could easily wish this away by holding the turbine building water samples until the 134-I decayed away

:tinfoilhat:

[kristopher]

1. K&R

[flamingdem]

2. Good work Sherlock, you're able to

get into the Tepco mindset now!

[jimlup]

3. Seriously good deduction...

This and other information coming out of TEPCO and Fukashima indicate to me that these people trying to contain this thing are in way over their heads and have been for some time. I think we're moving into the more serious phase now. Funny that the media has essentially lost interest in this unfolding and profound disaster.

[FBaggins]

4. "further and perhaps catastrophic damage to the reactor may occur"

May occur?

Hint... there wouldn't be any way to avoid it. And it would have already happened

There is no chance at all that you could have active fission going on in that core and the only symptom that you found was some I-134 in leaking water. None.

The catastrophic damage would have happened first.

[Statistical]

6. It must be that new super slow and only moderately warm fission.

Pretty radical new stuff. Rather than an a rapid and explosive release of energy it slowly warms the surrounding water over the course of weeks maybe even months. It is also rather stealthy none of the other obvious signs of fission like sustained neutron flux, predictable fission products or extreme pressure occur. The slow fission eats all of its own neutrons, pressure and short lived fission products. The one notable exception being I-131. For some reason the "slow fission" boogie man hasn't figured out to eat I-131 so if someone is really observant they can sleuth it out by looking for only this single telltale sign of the slow fission.

Of course creating this slow fission is complicated. It require 1 MOX fuel rod, 2 pounds of hysteria, a sprinkling of junk science, 200 disaster fetish posts, and 1 roll of tinfoil (heavy duty only).

[SpoonFed]

12. no content?

besides your hysterical nay-saying, do you have any content to add? nope.
where was that magical harmless neutron beam/neutron flux come from? go to?

[FBaggins]

15. Do you believe that the level of detected neutron flux...

...was at all consistent with active fission?

[Statistical]

16. Content is below. The "anslysis" in OP is junk science.

With 10 half lives 1 in 10000 would still remain.

If the amount in first sample was in the magnitude of 10^9 than 10 hours later 10^6 should remain and 10 hours after that 10^3 should remain. Hell even 10 hours after that (30 hours after initial test) 1 Bq / cm should remain.

Given even the least sophisticated equipment can detect concentrations down to uBq IF there was 10^9 I-134 in the first sample than it would remain detectable for days. After 50 half lives (roughly 2 full days) 2.9x10^9 Bq of I-134 would decay to 1 uBq of I-134 (below detection limit).

[kristopher]

19. Your interpretation seems to have missed something...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x284426

[Statistical]

5. Did you fail physics?. In 10 half lives you would still have 0.1% (1 in 1000) present.

While you may "consider" that insignificant, you would be wrong. CO2 concentration in the atmosphere has increased by much less than that is it insignificant? If Bill gates lost 99.9% of his money would you pass on the remaining 0.1% because it is insignificant ("only" $60 mil)?

In 10 half lives 0.1% (1 in 1000) of material will still remain.
The incorrect I-131 reading was 2.9 x 10^9 Bq. That is 2,900,000,000 Bq. If it figure was valid there should still be 2.9 x 10^6 present 10 hours later. Yet nothing was detected. 2.9 x 10^6 is well above detection threshold. Other istopes with weaker decay energy were detected as low as 10^4 Bq magnitude. Tc-99 and I-131 both have decay energy of ~140KeV however if your theory was right that would mean the Tc-99 was detectable at 10^4 magnitude but the I-131 was undetectable at 10^6 magnitude.

The data doesn't bear out your flawed conclusions.

Tinfoil aside the data is very clear.
First column was incorrect data
Second column was corrected data from same sample (same data, same test, corrected mistakes)
Third column was a complete retest of same sample. (same sample, new test)
Fourth column was a new sample and new test. (new sample and new test)

Lastly look at the other two short lived isotopes. Te-99 and I-132. Both are formed by neutron capture which means they only appear in significant quantities when fission is present. There is no logical scenario where one would have an off the charts reading of I-131 yet other short lived fission products would be undetectable.

Finally the material (Bq) indicated doesn't match the dose detected (Sv). With the isotopes present the total material detected should indicate a dose in the 100Sv/hr magnitude not 1 Sv/hr yet that is what is what was detected by workers. I didn't do a cross sectional analysis so feel free to verify the results yourself (each isotope quantity * decay energy). However ballpark speaking you don't get only 1Sv/hour from 2.9x10^9 Bq of those isotopes. Given the workers aren't dead it is likely the dose is correct and the material incorrect. That mismatch is likely what first clued someone in that the data must be invalid.

None of the data supports your faulty conclusion.

[jpak]

7. A sloppier more obtuse report could not have been written

and I do not believe anything they say now

I stand by the OP

yup

[Statistical]

8. That is fine but ...

"None of the data supports your faulty conclusion."

That still applies. There is nothing in the report to support your false claim. Believing the numbers are completely faked is a whole different claim and not the one you made in your OP. Your claim that the I-131 would decay so by waiting they could honestly report none detected is not true.

The reality is that after 1 in 1000 would remain. That is indisputable. Given that the original reading was in the magnitude of 10^9 it would have to be in the magnitude of 10^6 10 hours later, and even 10^3 20 hours later. Neither were reported.

Thus ....
"None of the data supports your faulty conclusion."

Believing that TEPCO is simply lying wasn't your claim. Of course if they are simply lying they could have lied about the first number and we wouldn't even be having this discussion. 0.1% remaining isn't insignificant when the original value was in range of billions of disintegrations per second. Even the most basic equipment can detect disintegrations in the fractional Bq range (i.e. uBq and mBq) much less thousands or millions of BQ.

[jpak]

13. Ummm... I said I-134 NOT I-131 - reading comprehension

yup

Is tritium still an alpha emitter?

:D

[Statistical]

14. Oh wow you caught a typo. Is that is all you got?

replace I-131 with I-134 same point remains.

You made fault conclusion not supported by the facts, got caught and as usual resorted to name calling.

[jpak]

17. I can read

yup!

:evilgrin:

[intaglio]

9. Err

The "error" was 2 orders of magnitude according to TEPCo.

Which means you've made the case for the "Oh, look the sample was at those levels originally" faction you dispise.

Do you read Lewis Page?

[Statistical]

10. Did you read before responding.

Simple version:
A) IF the original sample was at 10^9 magnitude it would be in the range of 10^6 magnitude 10 hours later and 10^3 magnitude however neither of those levels were detected. Despite 3 different tests.

B) If the radioactive material was in the 10^9 Bq magnitude the surface exposure wouldn't be 1 Sv/hr it would be 100+ Sv/hr. No dose rate that high was detected, and the three employees didn't promptly die indicating that the exposure wasn't that high. If the exposure wasn't that high it is impossible for the amount of material to be that high.

As an example. The reported concentration of I-131 was 2.9E9 Bq per cubic CENTIMETER.
The workers were exposed to millions of times as much material.

Lets simply the problem to get a lower bound for the amount of exposure one could expect for that concentration.

Lets assume the closest the worker got was 1 meter from any material (unlikely) but we are being conservative to create a lower bound. Lets assume only the water in the 1 meter closest to the worker contributed any dose (ignoring all the thousands of gallons that while further away would contribute exponentially more radiation.

So 1 meter of contaminated water with ONLY I-131 in concentration of 2.9E9 Bq/cm would contain 2.9E15 Bq of I-131. If the worker never got closer than 1 meter from that the dose rate would be ~140Sv/hr. Instant death within 5 minutes. The workers didn't die hence it is impossible that the amount of material could be that high.

http://www.radprocalculator.com/Gamma.aspx

[Yo_Mama]

20. All great points

However I was reading some technical discussions about how the original measurement could have gone so wrong, and I doubt that you would have detected any I-134 at that small a concentration based on what they were saying.

Still, I think it is simpler to assume that you have very fatigued personnel trying to keep up with a desperate workload. It's not that surprising that mistakes would be made.

The best evidence that it was wrong was the huge volume of I-134 initially shown in the release and what has happened in the days since.

[Fledermaus]

11. I have no trust in TEPCO.

none

[Yo_Mama]

18. I noticed the same thing

But if they really did wait until 18:50 (10 hours after sampling) to test it, then that is proof positive that the initial test result was wrong.

You can't assume that they are lying, but quite a few people looked at those results when they were released in detail and said "WHAT?" It just looks odd.

Also the growing Lanthanum 140 on the last test (the sample taken the following day) indicates that there was some pretty recent activity.

Taken overall, it was not that reassuring.

[Name removed]

21. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.