# Still support nuke power plants? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 14, 2011, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647 "2011-03-14T11:56:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 41
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/801 "2011-03-22T03:47:02Z")
> [@Kevbo](#): > > Plutonium is normally present in spent Uranium fuel. This is one reason fuel rods are not all replaced at once. Some of the reactor fuel load is “spent” fuel that is there to get some of the Pu (and other stuff) burned out of it before going into the cooling pond. You need to cite or link to where you are getting this crap from. ---
**Author:** ![matt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@matt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/802 "2011-03-22T04:20:16Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > You need to cite or link to where you are getting this crap from. Why do you think it’s crap? [http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf69.html](http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf69.html) [http://www.oecd-nea.org/ndd/reports/efc/efc02.pdf](http://www.oecd-nea.org/ndd/reports/efc/efc02.pdf) (skip to 3.4.2.1 for a breakdown of content of a spent fuel rod) Or wiki isn’t bad: [Nuclear reprocessing - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_reprocessing) ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/803 "2011-03-22T04:25:27Z")
I quoted something you said. Where is the link or cite from whence you say you got it? Throwing up a bunch of links, I’ve seen that evasion before. ---
**Author:** ![matt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@matt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/804 "2011-03-22T04:35:55Z")
Firstly, you quoted **Kevbo** , not me. Secondly, all those cites indicate that spent fuel contains plutonium. I even gave you the relevant paragraph from one of them so you wouldn’t have to wade through too much material. Thirdly, for someone who has made uncited claims in this thread that smoking didn’t cause cancer before the 1950s, or that images of people sick or dead from radiation were coming out of Japan, you’re more than short of few cites yourself, pal. Fourthly, if you ask for cites and someone gives you three, how the hell is that then an evasion? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/805 "2011-03-22T04:37:51Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > I quoted something you said. Where is the link or cite from whence you say you got it? > > Throwing up a bunch of links, I’ve seen that evasion before. Me too, some guy that I think is called FXMastermind is fond of this.. Any progress on finding the cite for the leaked images of the dead victims due to radiation? ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/806 "2011-03-22T04:44:24Z")
People all around the world are very concerned about what is going n, especially at reactor 3. That is called a fact. Here are some more of them. Nuclear experts, feel ree to answer the questions. 1. What does the smoke and vapour being emitted from the various nuclear reactors at the plant actually contain? 2. What if one of the elements being discharged is plutonium – the deadliest substance known to man – which is extremely difficult to detect? **Universal Concerns** [ul] [li]Reactor 3 suffered significant damage after the quake and the tsunami waves on March 11th;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]The roof of the building was destroyed by a powerful explosion last week caused by an accumulation of hydrogen;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Reactor 3 raises the most concern since it runs on MOX or Mixed Oxide fuel – a mixture of plutonium and uranium;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]MOX is far more dangerous than uranium on its own; and[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]MOX is two million times more deadly than normal enriched uranium.[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Reactor 3’s recent smoke appears to have originated from the building’s side, where the spent nuclear fuel pool is located;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]The precise contents of the smoke and vapour at reactor 3, and other reactors, are as yet unknown;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]However, workers were evacuated from the nuclear plant after smoke appeared from reactor 3;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]No radiation spike has been detected so the common assumption is that all is fine;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Radiation levels are NOT up after the smoke release from reactor 3 which seems to have reassured the global financial markets for the moment;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Should the world relax if we don’t as yet know the precise contents of the smoke and vapour from reactor 3?[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]What if the release of elements in the smoke and vapour were not just radioactive iodine, caesium and uranium but a MOX combination including plutonium?[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]This would explain why the workers were immediately evacuated given the deadly nature of plutonium;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Plutonium is extremely difficult to detect because it emits limited gamma rays – unlike radioactive iodine, caesium and uranium – and it is deadly;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Plutonium release would not show up as a radiation spike;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Plutonium 239 is the deadliest element known to man;[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Half-life of Plutonium-239 in MOX is 24,000 years: Few milligrams of P-239 escaping in a smoke plume will contaminate soil for tens of thousands of years; and[/li][/ul] [ul] [li]Plutonium comes from Pluto: god of wealth and power and also the god of hell and death.[/li][/ul] **Conclusion** If the smoke billowing from the Fukushima reactor 3, amongst other reactors, does indeed contain plutonium, then this nuclear crisis has exposed Japan and the world to a much more extreme danger than the one originally envisaged. If so, we all ought to know about it. There should be some more specific investigations in regard to the contents. See? What is the source of such information? > **[Japan Nuclear Crisis: What About The Plutonium MOX?](https://www.businessinsider.com/japan-nuclear-crisis-what-about-the-plutonium-mox-2011-3)** See how easy that is? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/807 "2011-03-22T04:48:17Z")
Do you know the concept of “quoting”? We would not want others to assume that you typed all that now we? ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/808 "2011-03-22T04:51:07Z")
Evasion noted. ---
**Author:** ![matt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@matt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/809 "2011-03-22T04:59:53Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > See? > > What is the source of such information? > > [Japan Nuclear Crisis: What About the Plutonium MOX? - Business Insider](http://www.businessinsider.com/japan-nuclear-crisis-what-about-the-plutonium-mox-2011-3) > > See how easy that is? Ah, now I see where you’re coming from. Yes, if you copy-and-paste information from somewhere then you SHOULD post a link to that source. Fair enough. However, some people post information that is not copied-and-pasted from an online source, in which case if you ask for a cite, they have to find a suitable online cite supporting their contentions. That is not an evasion. **Kevbo** ’s post 774, where you asked for the source, was not a copy-and-paste. Additionally, **Kevbo’s** post 778 indicates that he has visited a boiling water reactor in the past, possibly in a professional capacity, so his information might stem from his work. In any case, he would have to locate an online cite to support his statements rather a source he copied-and-pasted from. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/810 "2011-03-22T05:01:12Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > Evasion noted. Piffle, you ignored all this in the pit: > **[Why Fukushima Daiichi won't be another Chernobyl](https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20257-why-fukushima-daiichi-wont-be-another-chernobyl/)** > > Read more: " Special report: After Japan's megaquake " Not 1986 again Six days after the earthquake that rocked Japan and left thousands dead, the nation is now struggling to avert disaster at its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Events have... > [@](#): > > Why Fukushima Daiichi won’t be another Chernobyl > > What happened at Chernobyl? > Staff at the plant were running tests to find out how well they could cope with a temporary shutdown of the reactor’s cooling system. The test went wrong and there was a power surge. The staff tried to shut the reactor down, but instead the nuclear reaction accelerated rapidly. > > “For a few seconds it was generating thousands of times the normal power output,” says Michael Bluck of Imperial College London. The extreme heat from the nuclear reaction triggered an explosion, which blew the roof off both the reactor vessel and the building containing it – exposing the reactor core to the outside world – and sending radioactive material hurtling into the atmosphere. > > Fires then started. Most were put out within hours, but the one in the damaged reactor burned for many days, spreading radioactive material still further. > > How bad was Chernobyl? > Chernobyl is the only event ever to be given the maximum rating of 7 on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale, which measures the severity of nuclear accidents. This means it released a major amount of radioactive material that covered a wide area. > > It’s too early to say how the Fukushima Daiichi incident will compare. The Japanese authorities provisionally put the event at level 4, a “local accident”. Earlier this week, however, the French nuclear agency rated the disaster as at least a level 5 or 6. > > What is different about the Fukushima Daiichi accident? > The Chernobyl reactor was actually running – albeit at low power – at the time of the accident there. By contrast the Fukushima Daiichi reactors automatically shut down as soon as they felt the earthquake, by inserting control rods so the nuclear reactions in their cores began slowing within seconds. This means that, from the outset, the amount of heat being produced was much smaller than at Chernobyl. > > So why couldn’t a runaway reaction happen at Fukushima Daiichi? > The Chernobyl reactor had a fundamentally different design to those at Fukushima Daiichi. Chernobyl ran on unenriched uranium, which is a fairly weak nuclear fuel. In order to use it, the reactor was designed in a way that made it easier for the nuclear reaction to accelerate. This allowed it to generate useful amounts of power, but it also left it vulnerable to running out of control. > > Fukushima Daiichi runs on more powerful fuels than Chernobyl did, mostly enriched uranium. In contrast to the Ukrainian reactor, its design minimises the nuclear reaction unless its human operators boost it. “You have to actually try to make it go,” Bluck says. > > Ordinarily the reactor cores are surrounded by water. Heat from the nuclear reaction boils the water, creating steam that drives turbines which generate electricity. In doing so, the water also helps to cool the reactor. > > But crucially, the water is also a “moderator”: it helps keep the uranium fission reaction going by slowing down neutrons produced by the reaction as they hurtle out of the fuel rods. Slow neutrons sustain the reaction, by liberating still more neutrons and heat from uranium atoms in the rods; fast-moving neutrons just pass straight through the other fuel rods without colliding with other uranium atoms. If the water heats up too much, however, bubbles form within it and these allow the neutrons to escape, slowing down the nuclear reaction. > > Effectively, if the coolant overheats, it starts shutting down the reaction without any human intervention. “It’s a brilliant solution,” Bluck says. > > Nuclear engineers call this a “negative void coefficient”, because having voids – bubbles – in the coolant slows down the reaction. By contrast Chernobyl had a positive void coefficient, so the reaction was more likely to accelerate. > > Could Fukushima Daiichi catch fire like Chernobyl did? > There have been some small fires on the site, all of which were put out rapidly. In one case the Japanese authorities initially said that one of the spent fuel ponds was itself on fire, but this was later retracted and it remains unclear what actually happened. In another case, the fire has been attributed to diesel engines pumping water into the reactors. All of the fires seem to have been outside the pressure vessels that contain the core of radioactive fuel rods. > > At Chernobyl the pressure vessel was breached and the reactor had no containment. There, the core itself burned fiercely, largely because it was made of graphite – which was used as the moderator. This did not make the accident more likely, explains Bluck, but once the reactor exploded the graphite made the situation worse, because it burned so readily. The fires carried radioactive material from the reactor core high into the atmosphere, where it spread far and wide. This could not happen at Fukushima Daiichi, as it does not use graphite as the moderator. I trust more a science writer than a philanthropist that who know what he is an expert of. ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/811 "2011-03-22T05:03:14Z")
I could have said the exact same thing as the article I quoted, and linked to, but then some idiot would challenge it and demand a cite or source or something. Or just ignore it. But then some people spout the most awful nonsense and have no source at all to back it up. (because it’s simply not true) ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/812 "2011-03-22T05:05:07Z")
Nobody who understands the reactors, fuel rods and design of the Japanese plants is saying it will be like Chernobyl. That is a straw man argument, and a distraction. The worst case scenario for the Japanese site is so much worse than Chernobyl, almost nobody even wants to really describe it. ---
**Author:** ![matt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@matt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/813 "2011-03-22T05:21:10Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > I could have said the exact same thing as the article I quoted, and linked to, but then some idiot would challenge it and demand a cite or source or something. Or just ignore it. Well nobody would challenge the questions - some of them are good questions worth asking. They might have challenged the toxicity of plutonium, or the difficulty of its detection, or whether MOX fuel is present in the sfp of reactor 3. Then you have to back up your contentions with cites - that’s how this place works. > [@FXMastermind](#): > > But then some people spout the most awful nonsense and have no source at all to back it up. (because it’s simply not true) This is a problem. I regard your claim that cigarettes did not cause cancer before the 1950s and became carcinogenic due to fallout from nuclear bomb tests to be an example of such awful nonsense. Here is a cite contesting this claim: > [@](#): > > Evidence linking smoking and cancer appeared in the 1920s (15). Between 1920 and 1940, a chemist named Angel Honorio Roffo published several articles showing that cancers could be experimentally induced by exposure to tars from burned tobacco (16). Roffo et al. further showed that cancer could be induced by using nicotine-free tobacco, which means that tar, with or without nicotine, was carcinogenic. From [http://cebp.aacrjournals.org/content/16/6/1070.full](http://cebp.aacrjournals.org/content/16/6/1070.full) Scroll down to the **Smoking Causes Cancer: When Did They Know?** section. ---
**Author:** ![Raygun99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Raygun99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raygun99)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/814 "2011-03-22T05:35:10Z")
> [@FXMastermind](#): > > The worst case scenario for the Japanese site is so much worse than Chernobyl, almost nobody even wants to really describe it. Why don’t you describe what you think it is - then for bonus points, how likely it is your scenario would come to pass. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/815 "2011-03-22T05:36:03Z")
The factor that is ignored, is that this site has 6 reactors. They are all screwed up in varying degrees. TMI was one reactor. Chernobly was one. This is 6. Six is more than one. One reactor has a plutonium mixture. That is bad news. It represents a problem not encountered in other nuclear plant explosions. It remains to be seen how bad this will get. The potential is enormous. The explosion may not match Chernobyl. But the radiation can wind up being worse. Then again they mat get lucky. That is the hope. ---
**Author:** ![FXMastermind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fxmastermind/32/7289_2.png) [@FXMastermind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FXMastermind)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/816 "2011-03-22T05:48:47Z")
I’m seriously hoping and praying that they somehow get it under control with no more release of radioactive particles. And I’m not even religious, and I’m praying. An explosion that releases plutonium would be the worst case scenario, even with out the other 5 reactors and shitload of fuel stored there. If it all goes up, or burns, and they can’t even get a helicopter near it to even try and dump boron and sand, that is actually so horrific nobody wants to consider it. It actually is that bad. Because if it gets so bad you can’t get near it (and this has already happened multiple times) then you can’t stop it, and if you can’t stop it, that is as bad as it gets. So far, each time the radiation has ‘gone down’, and they managed to get a lot of water on things, which washes the fine dust into the ocean, and moderates and reduces the gamma radiation. But just the last figures they published on radiation, it means it is already a lot worse than Chernobyl, as far as threat levels go. Because while people rag on the stupid commies for letting that disaster happen, they never had a fire and explosion in a reactor that uses plutonium. Much less stored the plutonium fuel rods on top of the reactor. Even a small amount of plutonium released into the area, or worse, into the atmosphere, makes Chernobyl seem mild. Small being several tons, a fraction of the amount there. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/817 "2011-03-22T06:15:11Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > The factor that is ignored, is that this site has 6 reactors. They are all screwed up in varying degrees. TMI was one reactor. Chernobly was one. This is 6. Six is more than one. > One reactor has a plutonium mixture. That is bad news. It represents a problem not encountered in other nuclear plant explosions. > It remains to be seen how bad this will get. The potential is enormous. The explosion may not match Chernobyl. But the radiation can wind up being worse. Then again they mat get lucky. That is the hope. The problem with one going (and I think that’s where the 20 km figure comes from) is that it stops all the work on the other 3 which could then become critical again. #2 has officially lost it’s pumps so that requires constant care. And nobody talks about 7 & 8 which were suppose to be online in 2014. That time line is surely going to be pushed back. ---
**Author:** ![matt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@matt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/818 "2011-03-22T07:30:09Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > The factor that is ignored, is that this site has 6 reactors. They are all screwed up in varying degrees. TMI was one reactor. Chernobly was one. This is 6. Six is more than one. > One reactor has a plutonium mixture. That is bad news. It represents a problem not encountered in other nuclear plant explosions. > It remains to be seen how bad this will get. The potential is enormous. The explosion may not match Chernobyl. But the radiation can wind up being worse. Then again they mat get lucky. That is the hope. Reactors 5 and 6 are in cold shutdown. That doesn’t mean they’ve stopped producing decay heat, but they are at 1 atmosphere and the circulating water is at less than 100 deg. C, which means there’s no pressure driving any leakage. They have power and the water is circulating and dumping the heat. The refueling halls at the top of the building have had holes cut in them to prevent hydrogen building up and causing explosions as it did in reactors 1-4. I think they’re good. Reactor 4 has been shut down for weeks and has no fuel in it. The issue is with the spent fuel pool in the reactor 4 building. I don’t think anything can explode there now but the fuel pool is definitely a worry. Reactor 3 is the big concern, partly because of its plutonium fuel and partly because the building is such a mess. The containment is holding pressure (in fact yesterday they were planning to vent, but the pressure stopped climbing and stabilised.) This means that some layer of the reactor’s containment must remain intact. The spent fuel pool on reactor 3 contains MOX fuel and must have a whole lot of debris on top of it and possibly in it. Don’t think the pool can explode but the reactor still can have a steam explosion or hydrogen explosion in theory. I’ll be a lot happier with power hooked up to it and water circulating. Ditto for 2 and 1. Fingers crossed. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/819 "2011-03-22T15:24:42Z")
> [@matt](#): > > Reactors 5 and 6 are in cold shutdown. That doesn’t mean they’ve stopped producing decay heat, but they are at 1 atmosphere and the circulating water is at less than 100 deg. C, which means there’s no pressure driving any leakage. They have power and the water is circulating and dumping the heat. The refueling halls at the top of the building have had holes cut in them to prevent hydrogen building up and causing explosions as it did in reactors 1-4. I think they’re good. > > Reactor 4 has been shut down for weeks and has no fuel in it. The issue is with the spent fuel pool in the reactor 4 building. I don’t think anything can explode there now but the fuel pool is definitely a worry. > > Reactor 3 is the big concern, partly because of its plutonium fuel and partly because the building is such a mess. The containment is holding pressure (in fact yesterday they were planning to vent, but the pressure stopped climbing and stabilised.) This means that some layer of the reactor’s containment must remain intact. The spent fuel pool on reactor 3 contains MOX fuel and must have a whole lot of debris on top of it and possibly in it. Don’t think the pool can explode but the reactor still can have a steam explosion or hydrogen explosion in theory. I’ll be a lot happier with power hooked up to it and water circulating. Ditto for 2 and 1. Fingers crossed. You are assuming the pumps and the electrical controls will work if power is restored. They have been subjected to explosions and seawater. It would be a huge break for the pumps to work, but all the controls and monitoring equipment would have to work too. I see this mess lingering for quite a while. I wonder if it requires a suicide mission to go and hook the pumps up? ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2011, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647/820 "2011-03-22T15:30:16Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > You are assuming the pumps and the electrical controls will work if power is restored. They have been subjected to explosions and seawater. It would be a huge break for the pumps to work, but all the controls and monitoring equipment would have to work too. > I see this mess lingering for quite a while. > I wonder if it requires a suicide mission to go and hook the pumps up? [#2 pumps are damaged beyond repair.](http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2011/03/21/2011-03-21_smoke_from_japanese_nuclear_plants_reactor_forces_evacuation_of_fukushima_daiich.html) They will have to be replaced. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647.md?page=40) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/still-support-nuke-power-plants/574647.md?page=42)