NationStates Jolt Archive

(Of course, bearing in mind that nuclear weapons are only meant to be safe so far as there isn't an actual war.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nuclear_accidents

Well, before reading all that, I had a pretty neutral view of nuclear power. Seems we've been slightly less than careful over the years, doesn't it? It's a miracle something worse hasn't happened. Even just a glimpse at how long the list is is pretty frightening - and take a look how many have occured past the year 2000.

My favourite:

March 11, 1958 – A B-47 from Hunter Air Force Base in Georgia, en route to an overseas base, drops an unarmed nuclear weapon into the yard of Walter Gregg and his family in Mars Bluff, near Florence, South Carolina. The trigger explodes and destroys Gregg's house, injuring six members of his family. The blast forms a crater 60 feet (20 m) wide and 30 feet (10 m) deep. Five houses and a church are also damaged. Residents carry away radioactive pieces of the bomb for souvenirs, which have to be retrieved by an Air Force cleanup crew. Five months later the Air Force pays the Greggs $54,000 of his estimated $300,000 loss.
---


Generous, eh? You just dropped a nuke on his house and injured 6 members of his family, not to mention spraying his property with radioactive waste...yet you only pay him 1/6 of his estimated loss. How charitable. I guess his house shouldn't have been there in the first place. Heh.

I just took a look at the 2000's incidents. Its scary to see that quite a few occured in the US. Many of them seem entirely based on aging plants and poor/skipped matinence.

If human beings weren't so utterly prone to laxity, fraud and subversion, I would say Nuclear power could be used effectively. As it is, I say this particular source of energy needs massive amounts of funding and attention as it goes into a Sunset program.

Nothing in the world is completely safe.

I just took a look at the 2000's incidents. Its scary to see that quite a few occured in the US. Many of them seem entirely based on aging plants and poor/skipped matinence.

If human beings weren't so utterly prone to laxity, fraud and subversion, I would say Nuclear power could be used effectively. As it is, I say this particular source of energy needs massive amounts of funding and attention as it goes into a Sunset program.

It's possible to design a nuclear reactor to be safe, even if abused by idiots. There's a pebble bed design in Germany, and a breeder design at Argonne National Labs.

Clinton's first act as President was to dismantle the Argonne reactor immediately.

We haven't built a new nuclear plant in decades - hence the aging. We can't even do some of the refurbishing or refueling because of the lawsuits. Want to open your containment and replace some of the shielding - nope, can't do that because of the lawsuits.

Not saying that some of the plants are not poorly maintained by mismanagement - but the litigious atmosphere surrounding nuclear plants makes it a non-viable proposition to upgrade, replace, or build new nuclear plants.

Red wire...or green wire? -SNIP- **boom**

As I said, external factors have caused nuclear power to become effectively a non-option in the US. Between Human error and Human Litigation, the cost of doing business is too high. Lets settle the issue then with a well-funded sunset program.

Not entirely unlike what we are trying and mostly failing to do with Russia's nuke-related goods. Get the stuff taken care of, sealed away, and as much out of danger as possible.

I just took a look at the 2000's incidents. Its scary to see that quite a few occured in the US. Many of them seem entirely based on aging plants and poor/skipped matinence.

If human beings weren't so utterly prone to laxity, fraud and subversion, I would say Nuclear power could be used effectively. As it is, I say this particular source of energy needs massive amounts of funding and attention as it goes into a Sunset program.

Yeah. Nuclear power is efficient and clean when used responsibly, but seriously, incidents like this...

March 2002 – Workers at the Davis-Besse nuclear plant in Ohio were replacing a cracked Control Rod Drive Mechanism nozzle when they discovered a football-sized hole eaten 6 in (150 mm) into the steel outer shell of the reactor vessel head. This only left a 3/16 in (5 mm) stainless steel liner to hold back 87,000 U.S. gallons (330,000 liters) of radioactive water at a pressure of 2000 psi (14 MPa). The damage occurred over a period of nearly six years due to a cracked CRDM nozzle leaking borated water (weak acid) onto the reactor head. On April 22, 2005 the Nuclear Regulatory Commission proposed a 5.4 million dollar fine against FirstEnergy, the plant owner, for failure to clean the reactor vessel in 2000. System engineer Andrew Siemaszko was also banned from working in the industry for five years due to his falsification of reactor vessel cleaning logs in May 2000. An excellent drawing of the problem can be found on the NRC website.


...Only make me think of Homer Simpson.

On April 22, 2005 the Nuclear Regulatory Commission proposed a 5.4 million dollar fine against FirstEnergy, the plant owner, for failure to clean the reactor vessel in 2000.

Weren't they also involved in that huge eastern-midwest/east-coast blackout a year or so ago (maybe a year or two...)? Or am I misremembering?

Yeah. Nuclear power is efficient and clean when used responsibly, but seriously, incidents like this...
<snip>
...Only make me think of Homer Simpson.

You have to design the system to protect against intentional idiocy. It's possible.

I see the main problem as one of waste disposal. If you reduced the litigation, and solved the idiot problem, you could build a lot of safe plants - but you're going to have to get rid of waste no matter what - and no one wants to bury it in their backyard.

Fusion would be nice, though. Still have a waste problem - when the plant is finally torn down after decades of use, the fusion reactor will be radioactive.

Ehh. I never liked nuclear power. I like it even less, now that I've read this.

"April 10, 1963 – The nuclear submarine USS Thresher (SSN-593) sinks east of Boston, Massachusetts, with 129 men onboard during sea trials. A year earlier, just before the end of its refit interval, the boat had been abused in a munitions test where it literally tried to approach explosions as closely as possible. The boat was refitted afterward, and sank on its sea trials. In a show of poor planning, the sea trial was conducted where the bottom was below the hull's crush depth. In the yard, destructive tests of a few silver-soldered pipe connections had failed. At the time, nondestructive testing was unknown, and no test records were available. The investigators believed that the sinking was caused by the failure of a major through-hull silver-soldered connection, such as a tertiary-loop cooling inlet, and that the reactor and its design were not responsible. The reactor was not recovered."

Actually, the USS Thresher was lost due to moisture in it's high-pressure air system. During an EMBT Blow (Emergency Main Ballast Tank Blow) test. Moisture caught in the system, iced around the valve leading to the ballast tanks, causing blockage.... Without HP air to blow the tanks, the vessel sank backwards (being at too steep an angle for its diving and driving planes to be effective).... The accident resulted in a Preventive Maintenance addition to bleed water from the HP air system on all naval subs.

Weren't they also involved in that huge eastern-midwest/east-coast blackout a year or so ago (maybe a year or two...)? Or am I misremembering?

Perhaps; I'm not a US citizen so my knowledge of that incident is sketchy.

You have to design the system to protect against intentional idiocy. It's possible.

Yeah. We need to look into things like this *now*, before eventually some idiot causes extreme damage. Our luck won't last forever.

I see the main problem as one of waste disposal. If you reduced the litigation, and solved the idiot problem, you could build a lot of safe plants - but you're going to have to get rid of waste no matter what - and no one wants to bury it in their backyard.

True. I guess the solution is finding legitimate uses, perhaps within the powerplants themselves for a lot of the waste. Finding a way to get rid of the isotopes that last for a million years is probably the most important thing. We can handle a couple of hundred years, but I doubt we can store something safely for much longer.

Fusion would be nice, though. Still have a waste problem - when the plant is finally torn down after decades of use, the fusion reactor will be radioactive.

Yeah, but less of a problem than what it is today, I would imagine.

Nuclear powerplants have NEVER been involved in the massive blackouts here in the US.

As far as production of power goes, they've been more reliable than other methods of producing power (short of hydro).

They also provide 24 percent of the power, and the percentage is higher at night.

Weren't they also involved in that huge eastern-midwest/east-coast blackout a year or so ago (maybe a year or two...)? Or am I misremembering?

The massive blackout a two years ago was due o Hurricane Isabel... Prior to that it was faulty, improperly maintained distribution lines. (High Wire)

I'd much rather live in the vicinity of a nuclear plant then a coal burning plant. Have you even looked around for lists of accidents and mishaps at conventional plants? I bet you the list is longer.

I'd much rather live in the vicinity of a nuclear plant then a coal burning plant. Have you even looked around for lists of accidents and mishaps at conventional plants? I bet you the list is longer.



That's absolutely true. How about you folks that are anti-nuke do that? You'd be more likely to recieve unhealthy radiation from that coal plant! There is no accident proof method to provide energy. Take a look into the far reaching health issues of coal mining and burning facilities. Petroleum refineries and mining/drilling operations are full of disaster stories also.

I've personally seen the lists of safety features incorporated into The Argonne National Laboratories EBR-II (expirimental breeder reator). It was a safe reactor. Most of it's life was spent conducting safety tests. They would intentionally try to melt that thing down!!! There was no plan that could be created that circumvented it's safety protocols. i.e. An army of Homer Simpson clones couldn't touch it.

Not only was it designed to never fail it was also what is known as a breeder reactor. The remaining waste after reprocessing was extremely small and easy to contain with a substantially reduced half-life. Try to look at all sides of an issue before you condemn nuclear fission.

That's absolutely true. How about you folks that are anti-nuke do that? There is no accident proof method of provide energy. Take a look into the far reaching health issues of coal mining and burning facilities. Petroleum refineries and mining drilling operations are full of disaster stories also.

I've personally seen the lists of safety features incorporated into The Argonne National Laboratories EBR-II (expirimental breeder reator). It was a safe reactor. Most of it's life was spent conducting safety tests. They would intentionally try to melt that thing down!!! There was no plan that could be created that circumvented it's safety protocols.

Not only was it designed to never fail it was also what is known as a breeder reactor. The remaining waste after reprocessing was extremely small and easy to contain with a substantially reduced half-life. Try to look at all sides of an issue before you condemn nuclear fission.


It was also the first priority of the first Clinton Administration to shut EBR-II down. No Democrat wanted a working, safe, nuclear reactor because that would mean you couldn't oppose their construction.

It was also the first priority of the first Clinton Administration to shut EBR-II down. No Democrat wanted a working, safe, nuclear reactor because that would mean you couldn't oppose their construction.



The combo of Clinton + Gore was truly frightening wasn't it?

The combo of Clinton + Gore was truly frightening wasn't it?

What I found frightening is that for the first two years, they acted like extremists, and then right after that, they turned around, and for the next six years, fucked their own constituency in the ass so hard it wasn't funny.

Many people I knew who worked for the EPA Acid Rain division who had such high hopes for Clinton and the Democratic Party watched their enforcement efforts get laid waste not by the Republicans in Congress - but directly by orders from Clinton.

He also screwed homosexuals - Clinton didn't understand that if you give an "order" it leaves commanders with no discretion to keep anyone - they "MUST" throw them out - his order resulted in the most massive throw-out of gays from the US military in its entire history.

He ended welfare as we knew it.

He attacked seven different countries without provocation.

Even Michael Moore says he's the greatest Republican President since Ronald Reagan.

But the nuclear thing - intentionally dismantling a proven safe reactor design and forbidding further work in that area - that struck me as stupid.

I'd much rather live in the vicinity of a nuclear plant then a coal burning plant. Have you even looked around for lists of accidents and mishaps at conventional plants? I bet you the list is longer.

Sure, I don't dispute that (In fact, it would be rather obvious considering that there are more conventional plants than nuclear ones);

But the consequences of a malfunction or accident in a coal-burning plant are MUCH less than in a nuclear plant.

Funny how France is the second largest producer or nuclear energy (more than half the production of the USA, for a much smaller and less populated country), and the third nuclear power (or maybe fourth, since China could have built more nukes now) but I see only one incident related to France here, and because of radioactive watch parts from China.

Maybe the Americans should be told that nuclear power is dangerous and they have to be careful ? Haha

Sance']Funny how France is the second largest producer or nuclear energy (more than half the production of the USA, for a much smaller and less populated country), and the third nuclear power (or maybe fourth, since China could have built more nukes now) but I see only one incident related to France here, and because of radioactive watch parts from China.

Maybe the Americans should be told that nuclear power is dangerous and they have to be careful ? Haha

Or maybe your government is better at keeping things quiet ;)

Sure, I don't dispute that (In fact, it would be rather obvious considering that there are more conventional plants than nuclear ones);

But the consequences of a malfunction or accident in a coal-burning plant are MUCH less than in a nuclear plant.
If Coal-burning plant includes the ones that are in the same kind of rotted-out-no-maintenance-allowed condition, well... you realize, if you live downwind from a Coal-plant, you're breathing radioactive waste, right? You DO know that, don't you?

Most Coal contains radioactives in fairly high trace amounts. those radioactives don't just disappear when the smoke goes up the flu.

Heavy metals, too.

No, you don't have to worry about accidents at Coal-plants, you have to worry about coal plants even when they aren't having the boiler blow, or the fuel-pile catch fire...

Incidentally, Tchernobyl was an early-model design, similar to the Hanford-N, but more primitive.

TMI's big incident irradiated a single room in the plant.

Coal dust is explosive...

If Coal-burning plant includes the ones that are in the same kind of rotted-out-no-maintenance-allowed condition, well... you realize, if you live downwind from a Coal-plant, you're breathing radioactive waste, right? You DO know that, don't you?

Most Coal contains radioactives in fairly high trace amounts. those radioactives don't just disappear when the smoke goes up the flu.

Heavy metals, too.

No, you don't have to worry about accidents at Coal-plants, you have to worry about coal plants even when they aren't having the boiler blow, or the fuel-pile catch fire...

Incidentally, Tchernobyl was an early-model design, similar to the Hanford-N, but more primitive.

TMI's big incident irradiated a single room in the plant.

Coal dust is explosive...


Now, now, please don't be condescending. Yes, I do know that coal contains trace amounts of radioactives. Our bodies also naturally contain trace amounts of radioactives.

However, all of the fuel in a nuclear powerplant is radioactive. If something goes wrong, then you are releasing a hell of a lot more than just trace amounts into the environment. Therefore there is a far greater need for safety in a nuclear plant than in a coal plant, as the environmental effects of a catastrophe are much, much worse. I have stated before in this thread that "nuclear power is efficient and clean when used responsibly". But seriously, you can't possibly think that the masses of accidents and safety violations in that article are acceptable- we're lucky that there hasn't been another Chernobyl or something close to it.

Hundreds, maybe thousands die in Coal Mines every year. :( Just try and count the number of mine accidents around the globe and the number of people die because of it, if there's such stats available.

Nuclear is currently safer that it used to be, and it's getting safer with better technology.

Or maybe your government is better at keeping things quiet ;)

Hehe maybe. To be fair there has been at least one incident I know of at Saint-Laurent-des-Eaux around 1980, of level 4 out of 7 on the INES scale according to the French wikipedia. The reactor was closed for about 2 years.

I'm all for nuclear energy btw, using fission until we know how to use fusion.

Sance']Funny how France is the second largest producer or nuclear energy (more than half the production of the USA, for a much smaller and less populated country), and the third nuclear power (or maybe fourth, since China could have built more nukes now) but I see only one incident related to France here, and because of radioactive watch parts from China.

Maybe the Americans should be told that nuclear power is dangerous and they have to be careful ? Haha

Per Capita, the US is the largest utilizer of Nuclear power (and also the first with nuclear power in major industrial-military usage... thx to Rickover, Hyman G. ADM-USN (ret).).... Almost 1/2 of the Reactors in operation in the US are "Experimental" and "Prototypes" (used mostly for training).....

There have been far more "fatal" non-nuclear accidents than nuclear ones (like the Bonefish incident, where the vessels diesel-fuel tank ruptured...). Having served in the US's nuclear navy; I was far more worried about radiation exposure from the sun, than from working near an operational nuclear reactor.

"April 10, 1963 – The nuclear submarine USS Thresher (SSN-593) sinks east of Boston, Massachusetts, with 129 men onboard during sea trials. A year earlier, just before the end of its refit interval, the boat had been abused in a munitions test where it literally tried to approach explosions as closely as possible. The boat was refitted afterward, and sank on its sea trials. In a show of poor planning, the sea trial was conducted where the bottom was below the hull's crush depth. In the yard, destructive tests of a few silver-soldered pipe connections had failed. At the time, nondestructive testing was unknown, and no test records were available. The investigators believed that the sinking was caused by the failure of a major through-hull silver-soldered connection, such as a tertiary-loop cooling inlet, and that the reactor and its design were not responsible. The reactor was not recovered."

Actually, the USS Thresher was lost due to moisture in it's high-pressure air system. During an EMBT Blow (Emergency Main Ballast Tank Blow) test. Moisture caught in the system, iced around the valve leading to the ballast tanks, causing blockage.... Without HP air to blow the tanks, the vessel sank backwards (being at too steep an angle for its diving and driving planes to be effective).... The accident resulted in a Preventive Maintenance addition to bleed water from the HP air system on all naval subs.


Whoever wrote that thing on THRESHER is a moron. The idiot said that the sub was diving below crush depth. What an idiot, the THRESHER was at a depth of 1,300 feet when she was about to blow ballast. 1,300 feet is the listed test depth for a THRESHER class (now called PERMITclass by most) boat. It was a depth that she was supposed to reach without problem and is safe enough from crush depth. You are 100% correct on the ice in the pipes. That is why SUBSAFE was started and the whole sub fleet was refitted to avoid a similar problems. By 1968 only 3 boats lacked the post-THRESHER refit. One of which was the doomed SCORPION, but her demise is now believed to have been the result of a faulty torpedo battery that caught fire and caused a low-order detonation of the 300 lb torpex warhead and couldn't be prevented by the post-THRESHER refit.

"April 10, 1963 – The nuclear submarine USS Thresher (SSN-593) sinks east of Boston, Massachusetts, with 129 men onboard during sea trials. A year earlier, just before the end of its refit interval, the boat had been abused in a munitions test where it literally tried to approach explosions as closely as possible. The boat was refitted afterward, and sank on its sea trials. In a show of poor planning, the sea trial was conducted where the bottom was below the hull's crush depth. In the yard, destructive tests of a few silver-soldered pipe connections had failed. At the time, nondestructive testing was unknown, and no test records were available. The investigators believed that the sinking was caused by the failure of a major through-hull silver-soldered connection, such as a tertiary-loop cooling inlet, and that the reactor and its design were not responsible. The reactor was not recovered."

Actually, the USS Thresher was lost due to moisture in it's high-pressure air system. During an EMBT Blow (Emergency Main Ballast Tank Blow) test. Moisture caught in the system, iced around the valve leading to the ballast tanks, causing blockage.... Without HP air to blow the tanks, the vessel sank backwards (being at too steep an angle for its diving and driving planes to be effective).... The accident resulted in a Preventive Maintenance addition to bleed water from the HP air system on all naval subs.


Whoever wrote that thing on THRESHER is a moron. The idiot said that the sub was diving below crush depth. What an idiot, the THRESHER was at a depth of 1,300 feet when she was about to blow ballast. 1,300 feet is the listed test depth for a THRESHER class (now called PERMITclass by most) boat. It was a depth that she was supposed to reach without problem and is safe enough from crush depth. You are 100% correct on the ice in the pipes. That is why SUBSAFE was started and the whole sub fleet was refitted to avoid a similar problems. By 1968 only 3 boats lacked the post-THRESHER refit. One of which was the doomed SCORPION, but her demise is now believed to have been the result of a faulty torpedo battery that caught fire and caused a low-order detonation of the 300 lb torpex warhead and couldn't be prevented by the post-THRESHER refit.

Sance']Funny how France is the second largest producer or nuclear energy (more than half the production of the USA, for a much smaller and less populated country), and the third nuclear power (or maybe fourth, since China could have built more nukes now) but I see only one incident related to France here, and because of radioactive watch parts from China.

Maybe the Americans should be told that nuclear power is dangerous and they have to be careful ? Haha

Maybe so. Maybe Americans need to build plants that aren't using 1940's technology.

For all my frequent bagging on the French, their Nuclear Industry is a model of efficient design and good management, and they're smart enough to know that just because you stop building it, doesn't mean the problems will go away by magick.

Unfortunately, modernisation of the Nuclear industry in the U.S. has been stalled and fought on a constant basis, to the point where technological improvements like the EBR-II (Argonne Number Six) reactor are killed to satisfy the tree-hugging-dirt-worshippers, while utter stupidity like Yucca Mountain is pushed forward.

Whoever wrote that thing on THRESHER is a moron. The idiot said that the sub was diving below crush depth. What an idiot, the THRESHER was at a depth of 1,300 feet when she was about to blow ballast. 1,300 feet is the listed test depth for a THRESHER class (now called PERMITclass by most) boat. It was a depth that she was supposed to reach without problem and is safe enough from crush depth. You are 100% correct on the ice in the pipes. That is why SUBSAFE was started and the whole sub fleet was refitted to avoid a similar problems. By 1968 only 3 boats lacked the post-THRESHER refit. One of which was the doomed SCORPION, but her demise is now believed to have been the result of a faulty torpedo battery that caught fire and caused a low-order detonation of the 300 lb torpex warhead and couldn't be prevented by the post-THRESHER refit.

She was doing a deep submergence EMBT blow test (at test depth), which is a requirement for all subs in their "trials".... She was, however, doing it in deep water (past the shelf); however, that is normal...

Your opinion on the Scorpion, however, is wrong... The US Navy already knows, and has known for some time what caused the demise of the Scorpion; it does have to do with a weapon onboard the Scorpion, however, the "cause" is an aspect of weapon safety designs which are "classified" (though I do know about them), and can't be released to the public. The Scorpion tragedy is still covered in the Advanced Underwater Tactics schools. Needless to say, a faulty weapon was the culprit, it's called a "Hot Run" (a weapon going "live" inside the torpedo tube)... The ship made an attempt to use other safeties built into the weapon, to shut it down (which I can't reveal the procedure, since it's classified), and they failed.... The weapon detonated inside the tube, causing, to be blunt, and as we joke in the sub force... For water to get into "the people tank" (pressure hull).

Re: USS Thresher,

If you guys think there's an error with what is written in the article; remember that wikipedia is written by ordinary people, and you are able to correct it. It's how the whole thing holds together.

Re: USS Thresher,

If you guys think there's an error with what is written in the article; remember that wikipedia is written by ordinary people, and you are able to correct it. It's how the whole thing holds together.

Yes, I know, and it's sad that no one checks this source, or has corrected it to date... The Thresher incident, and it's peculiars are non-classified common knowledge amongst sub-enthusiasts, and just about anyone who has worked with, or for BUPERS, and with or for the US Submarine force...

- FT1/SS, USN (1991-1997) [Served aboard the USS Hampton (SSN-767) 1993-1997, Weapons Department, Fire Control Division...]

She was doing a deep submergence EMBT blow test (at test depth), which is a requirement for all subs in their "trials".... She was, however, doing it in deep water (past the shelf); however, that is normal...

Your opinion on the Scorpion, however, is wrong... The US Navy already knows, and has known for some time what caused the demise of the Scorpion; it does have to do with a weapon onboard the Scorpion, however, the "cause" is an aspect of weapon safety designs which are "classified" (though I do know about them), and can't be released to the public. The Scorpion tragedy is still covered in the Advanced Underwater Tactics schools. Needless to say, a faulty weapon was the culprit, it's called a "Hot Run" (a weapon going "live" inside the torpedo tube)... The ship made an attempt to use other safeties built into the weapon, to shut it down (which I can't reveal the procedure, since it's classified), and they failed.... The weapon detonated inside the tube, causing, to be blunt, and as we joke in the sub force... For water to get into "the people tank" (pressure hull).

For many years it was assumed that it was a hot run that killed Scorpion. The hot run theory states that the CO got the "hot torpedo" call from the torpedo room and he fired the torp out of one of the tubes and then ordered a 180 degree turn. The proponents of this theory then claim that the old Mk-37 torpedo tracked the largest target available, which was SCORPION. THey believe that she was killed by her own torp. Dives to the wreck however show no evidence of an exterior torpedo impact.

I don't believe this theory. If you have read "Blind Man's Bluff," it was recently revealed that an MK-37 torpedo battery heated up to extreme temperatures for no apparent reason. The battery caught fire and burned at a temperature so hot that 3 scientists on the opposite end of the room were burnt. The fire was hot enough that if there had been a warhead in the torp, it would've detonated in what is called a low-order detonation of the warhead. It is believed by many that such an event occured with one of the Mk-37 torps on the SCORPION. There have been a few other cases of the Mk-37's battery causing a fire, but they were put out before the warhead cooked off.

For many years it was assumed that it was a hot run that killed Scorpion. The hot run theory states that the CO got the "hot torpedo" call from the torpedo room and he fired the torp out of one of the tubes and then ordered a 180 degree turn. The proponents of this theory then claim that the old Mk-37 torpedo tracked the largest target available, which was SCORPION. THey believe that she was killed by her own torp. Dives to the wreck however show no evidence of an exterior torpedo impact.

I don't believe this theory. If you have read "Blind Man's Bluff," it was recently revealed that an MK-37 torpedo battery heated up to extreme temperatures for no apparent reason. The battery caught fire and burned at a temperature so hot that 3 scientists on the opposite end of the room were burnt. The fire was hot enough that if there had been a warhead in the torp, it would've detonated in what is called a low-order detonation of the warhead. It is believed by many that such an event occured with one of the Mk-37 torps on the SCORPION. There have been a few other cases of the Mk-37's battery causing a fire, but they were put out before the warhead cooked off.


You never impulse a hot-run... I however, cannot get into any details... For obvious reasons...

Per Capita, the US is the largest utilizer of Nuclear power (and also the first with nuclear power in major industrial-military usage... thx to Rickover, Hyman G. ADM-USN (ret).).... Almost 1/2 of the Reactors in operation in the US are "Experimental" and "Prototypes" (used mostly for training).....

That's not really what nationmaster.com (for example) says :

In total they're the largest, consuming almost twice more nuclear energy than France :
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/ene_nuc_ele_con

But per capita, USA is ninth and consumes about a third as much as Sweden :
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/ene_nuc_ele_con_cap

Sance']That's not really what nationmaster.com (for example) says :

In total they're the largest, consuming almost twice more nuclear energy than France :
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/ene_nuc_ele_con

But per capita, USA is ninth and consumes about a third as much as Sweden :
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/ene_nuc_ele_con_cap

Those are really interesting stats, thanks!

I like nuclear power. Or, it's not great, but imo we don't have any better option today. Nuclear power is clean and effective. Sadly, in Sweden we are starting to close down nuclear power stations, the one I live really closed to was shut down this week. Why, I'm not completely sure, but some political parties has been pushing for that for a long time (oddly enough especially the Green party) and also Denmark wants them gone (this nuclear power station is just across the strait from Copenhagen). I think it's stupid. I consider the global warming to be a much bigger threat than the risk of an accident. The storage of the radio active waste is of course a problem.

Coal plants do produce more radiation than nuclear fission reactors due to high amounts of radon uranium and thorium in coal. It burns up flies into the air; little boys and girls downwind from it breathe up and die in a hospital 4 months later due to thyroid cancer. Though I am exaggerating the world isn't black and white, good and bad. Nuclear fission is a necessary evil, but the lesser of two evils. I found a site using data from 1982 and EPA readings on thorium and uranium concentrations in coal, a typical coal plant per year releases 5.2 tons of uranium, into the air and 12.8 tons of thorium, also into the air. I don't know about you but I'd rather live near a nuclear reactor which has its radioactive material contained rather than having it float up the smokestack into my oxygen supply.

Remember these elements also decay into various dangerous elements such as radium, radon, polonium, bismuth, and lead. So by extrapolating current coal consumption increases we can expect by 2040 477,027,320 millicuries released in the United States via coal fired plants.

For comparison, according to NCRP Reports No. 92 and No. 95, population exposure from operation of 1000-MWe nuclear and coal-fired power plants amounts to 490 person-rem/year for coal plants and 4.8 person-rem/year for nuclear plants. Thus, the population effective dose equivalent from coal plants is 100 times that from nuclear plants. For the complete nuclear fuel cycle, from mining to reactor operation to waste disposal, the radiation dose is cited as 136 person-rem/year; the equivalent dose for coal use, from mining to power plant operation to waste disposal, is not listed in this report and is probably unknown.

The amount of radioactive material present in coal has a greater energy potential than the coal being burned. The thermal energy of coal is approximately 6150 kilowatt-hours(kWh)/ton. The thermal energy from fission of uranium-235 released in coal combustion amounts to 2.1 x 10E12 kWh. 10E12 is 10 to the 12th power or 12 more zeros behind that ten. The thermal energy of coal is on the 4th order of magnitude, the thermal energy of the uranium released by the coal is on the 12th order of magnitude, that means that the uranium can produce 100,000,000 times the amount of energy coal produces. If uranium-238 is bred to plutonium-239, using these data and assuming a "use factor" of 10%, the thermal energy from fission of this isotope alone constitutes about 2.9 x 10E14 kWh or 10,000,000,000 times the energy produced by coal. If the thorium-232 is bred to uranium-233 and fissioned with a similar "use factor", the thermal energy capacity of this isotope is approximately 7.2 x 10E14 kWh, or 105% of the thermal energy released from U.S. coal combustion for a century. The thermal energy then is 100,000,000,000 times that of coal! Assuming 10% usage, the total of the thermal energy capacities from each of these three fissionable isotopes is about 10.1 x 10E14 kWh, 1.5 times more than the total from coal. World combustion of coal has the same ratio, similarly indicating that coal combustion wastes more energy than it produces.

Coal plants are releasing nuclear fuels whose commercial value for electricity production by nuclear power plants is over $7 trillion, more than the U.S. national debt! My, my, how much money do we waste on coal? Now lets talk about how much radioactive material is released by each plant, the plants use about 540 tons of uranium, coal plants however release, without using a drop of it, 801 tons of uranium. Add 1971 tons of thorium which can be bred into fission material, and the release of nuclear components from coal combustion far exceeds the entire U.S. consumption of nuclear fuels. The same conclusion applies for worldwide nuclear fuel and coal combustion.

With today's EPA regulations on coal plants much of the radioactive materials in coal have been trapped before escaping into the atmosphere. You may say that is good, but remember, where does that material do? Coal plants put this ash, in ash ponds, similar to immersing irradiated material like gloves and equipment in nuclear power plants, and some plants just stack the ash, allowing the wind to pick it up. Also we haven't even discussed other various heavy metals in coal ash, like iron and alluminum, can you imagine piles and piles of uranium, thorium, radium, radon, polonium, bismuth, lead, iron and aluminum, that we are just wasting?

And the worst is yet to come. Spent fuel rods, and irradiated materials created by nuclear power plants are treated as nuclear waste and buried for years and years until a more suitiable location like Yucca mountain is made for more permanent disposal. Large quantities of uranium and thorium and other radioactive species in coal ash are not being treated as radioactive waste. These products emit low-level radiation, but because of regulatory differences, coal-fired power plants are allowed to release quantities of radioactive material that would provoke enormous public outcry if such amounts were released from nuclear facilities. Nuclear waste products from coal combustion are allowed to be dispersed throughout the biosphere in an unregulated manner. Collected nuclear wastes that accumulate on electric utility sites are not protected from weathering, thus exposing people to increasing quantities of radioactive isotopes through air and water movement and the food chain. If a nearby nuclear power plants started putting grinded up uranium fuel rods into your air, you'd bitch about it night and day, but coal power plants are allowed to do the equivalent (burning coal creates radioactive ash; a very fine powder, which easily gets into the air).

So, now where do you want to live; near a coal plant or a near a nuclear plant?