Another Crumbling Reactor Springs a Tritium Leak 466
mdsolar writes "The decrepit nuclear reactor Vermont Yankee has sprung a radioactive leak similar to those at other poorly run reactors in Illinois (Braidwood, Byron and Dresden), Arizona (Palo Verde), and New York (Indian Point). Greenpeace noted 3 years ago that radioactive tritium leaks even threaten Champagne from France. Tritium and its decay product helium 3 are incredibly valuable and there is currently a shortage of helium 3. What, besides shutting down leaky old nuclear plants, could be done to better control release of tritium into the environment?"
Big Deal...? (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's one solution... (Score:3, Interesting)
"What, besides shutting down leaky old nuclear plants, could be done to better control release of tritium into the environment?"
Maintain the plants and keep them in operation. Really, they won't hurt you; and the electricity they produce is cheap and clean.
Lame (Score:5, Interesting)
Good grief, could this /. article possibly be more biased? Who the hell does Slashdot think it is, the MSM? I thought the Internet was supposed to be an improvement.
Lets just agree with the idiots at Greenpeace.... on one condition, that if we agree the current plants are operating far beyond their original design life they agree with us that the solution is to replace them with modern safer reactors.
Re:Rose-colored perspective (Score:4, Interesting)
> To the advocates of nuclear power, Chernobyl isn't a demonstration of the danger of nuclear power...
I'm interested in hearing a contrary opinion, but really. It was a demonstration of something we all know, that if you try really hard to screw something up you usually succeed.
Chernobyl was a poorly designed Russian reactor that would have never been issued a permit anywhere in the Western world but that wasn't why it failed. We still don't know all of the details of what they were researching but the assholes had intentionally turned off what safety features it did have. It is really hard to design something so idiot proof that it can withstand a determined effort by trained engineers to subvert the safety cutoffs.
Re:Perspective (Score:5, Interesting)
1 Curie [fusrapmaywood.com] = 2*10^12 disintigrations/minute .65 picograms of Tritium per liter of water. This water is just marginally more radioactive than brazil nuts [isu.edu].
17,000 picocuries = ~~625 disintigrations/second
This level of radiation would require
As a Vermont resident... (Score:2, Interesting)
This isn't an isolated incident. Vermont Yankee has been plagued by problems like this, though generally less critical. There's been a photo circulating around of an incident a few years back, where one of the cooling structures fell apart. (Really... fell apart - the photo looks pretty sick, and you wonder what neglect gets it to that point.) I seem to remember that a few years back that lost some spent fuel rods, too. I don't remember how that turned out - I think it was a bookkeeping problem, and they were in the cooling pond all along.
Entergy took the plant over a few years ago, and people here weren't too happy about control going to some out of our region (Texas) firm. Plus I'm under the impression that there was supposed to be some sort of decommissioning fund being built up during operating years, so they could properly take care of the plant at end-of-life. Now there's something about no money to take care of shutdown costs, etc. (Sounds to me like raiding a pension fund, but that's probably unfair.)
Now with a rather checkered safety and maintenance record, they're trying to get an operating license extension. In addition, they're putting in for a rather hefty rate increase at the same time. People here aren't too happy.
Others have suggested building *safe* plants. Personally I blame the US Navy. I once heard that basically we have landlubbing ship/submarine reactors for our domestic electric power plants for the sake of the US Navy. The type of reactors we use in the US are great for power density, not so great for safety by-design, not so great for cleanup, etc. But the Navy gets the benefit of a "nuclear industry" that practices their kind of reactors. Nuclear training in the US is essentially all for Navy reactors. Unfortunately, this contributed to the death of the nuclear industry in the US. Had we gone with one of the inherently safe, inherently cleaner designs, or had we taken the French standardization-based approach instead of a whole pile of similar one-offs, we might still have a nuclear industry, cleaner air, cheaper power, etc.
Re:WTF is up with the summary? (Score:5, Interesting)
No. As a "greenie" since the 70's I can assure you greenpeace were blinded by ideology a long time ago.
I think this became pretty obvious when they started campaigning against chlorinated water a couple of decades ago. Despite the fact it has been repeatedly pointed out to them, it seems to have escaped their attention that chlorination was probably the single largest improvement in public health in the 20th century.
It happens to all political movements, they start off with a real issue and end up handling associated facts with the same respect fox news does. Often the founders end up either quitting in disgust (as is the case with GP) or being pushed out by the spin doctors. Organisations such as GP are also susceptable to having people form "tea parties" and go off doing their own thing under the organisations banner.
None of this means leaky reactors are not "news for nerds", that's just you sticking your fingers in your ears and singing "la, la, la, la" because you saw the word greenpeace. If TFA that I haven't read is a bullshit press release from GP then by the time it reaches the bottom of the front page there will be a dozen or more highly rated post that debunk it with sound logic, reputable references and a bit of humour.
BTW: You almost got it right, "Luddite" accurately describes some parts of GP policy but it's doubtfull the editor who posted TFA subscribes to it.
The hippies had no political power - thus bullshit (Score:3, Interesting)
There are some that have sucumbed to the "too cheap to meter" PR that will dispute the above problem and I can only suggest to them that they get some figures for an actual real single plant - not some rubbery agregate of numbers where the actual source data is unavailable (like the usual reply I get when I ask this). In the process of looking for this information you will see exactly what I mean, the reality doesn't match the PR.
The near future however holds out the prospect of smaller reactors that don't take anywhere near as long to build or cost anywhere near as much with a possibility of savings via mass production. If the Hyperion stuff is as good as advertised that will be one example, and the Chinese may also get there with pebble bed in the next few years now that they have a prototype.
Re:Self-inflicted (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:WTF is up with the summary? (Score:3, Interesting)
Here is the real rub. There are 11 of these reactors still running.
It should also be noted that other Russian designs are more similar to western design and many many times safer.