Fukushima reactor core No. 1 is now running 30% hotter than normal temperatures.

[girl gone mad]

Just to give an update on some bad information that was posted here on DU last week which claimed the reactor temperatures had been brought down to only 1% of their average temperatures, Reuters reports today that reactor no. 1 has reached 380-390 Celsius. It's designed to run at 302 Celsius.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/22/us-japan-quake-idUSTRE72A0SS20110322?WT.tsrc=Social%20Media&WT.z_smid=twtr-reuters_%20com&WT.z_smid_dest=Twitter

I thought they had stabilized the cores, now I am not certain.

[sasha031]

1. it pisses me off this is off the radar now

start another war, change your focus!!!

this is huge and why isn't getting the attention it deserves.

[marions ghost]

3. yeah it's dropped off the news

we're not getting anything much at all from American media. Shoved to the back burner. All Libya all the time.

How are people in Japan doing? We have no idea.

[Raschel]

7. I agree. I heard a blip on TV that said radiation has reached the east coast here. Has anyone else

heard that?

[Agony]

2. Ehhh.. some stable some not so much... graphic chart status of the 6 reactors from yesterday

http://www.jaif.or.jp/english/news_images/pdf/ENGNEWS01_1300796691P.pdf

Sweet! Huh! This is from an organization whose byline is "Nuclear Power, with no Emission of Carbon Dioxide, Contributes to the Prevention of Global Warming!"


Agony

[ELY08]

4. I got a question???

I'm just a plumber, but how are they pumping in sea water to a CLOSED system to cool these reactors????
Wouldn't they have to dump the same amount out????
Where is this water going, on the ground. back in the ocean????
Am I missing something????

[Agony]

5. open the chart in my post above and check out the line "Reactor Pressure Vessel Integrity"

unknown

also
"Might Be "Not Damaged"" might be "not damaged"? wtf?

[Scruffy1]

12. Plumbers know stuff-unlike news talking heads.

Not only that anyone that knows anything about boilers knows that the salt will soon block the cooling as it concentrates due to boiling. It looks to me like the last hope is encapsulation which has other problems.

[Thunderstruck]

6. Oh, is that little Japan nuclear thing still going on?

[Raschel]

9. Radiation still leaking, source unclear....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x719675

[roamer65]

8. IMHO...reactor 3 is substantially breached...

and eventually will require a "sarcophagus" just like Chernobyl. Remember that one was running MOX fuel.

[TNLib]

10. But they dumped all that water, didn't that take care of that little problem?

:sarcasm:

[Lucky Luciano]

11. Shouldn't 30% hotter be in terms of Kelvin rather than celsius?

Even then, I am not sure if 400K is twice as hot as 200K? Do molecules exhibit twice as much energy at 400K over 200K? Not really truly sure what temperature means!

If you have access to a Bloomberg terminal (library possibly), you can type:

JCAT <Go> for different kinds of updates, but the best most relevant updates come from watching the real time news for TEPCO:

9501 JP Equity <Go>


That said, it is tough to find good fresh news on the net and it is very frustrating....and I am going to Kobe on April 1 (500 mile to the SW) barring a significant deterioration of the situation.