Radiation at Japan's Fukushima Reactor Is Now at 'Unimaginable' Levels

[Stormspark]

it indicates the reactor is getting worse and could be an indication of it going critical which would be lethal for anyone in a certain radius.

A nuclear reactor is "critical" if it's on. That means the reaction is sustaining itself. I really hate it when people have no idea what the term means. A nuclear reactor *cannot* explode like a bomb. Period. It's physically impossible. You can have steam or hydrogen explosions that damage the building, but that's already happened. Nothing more can happen. Sure you can get leaks from the containment which would have fairly nasty local consequences, but that would be mostly confined to the site. The only people that have to worry about what's going on at the site right now are, people working at the site. They have to monitor the areas they're working in, and their exposure/etc. The worst case scenario has pretty much already happened though, the only thing they can really do at this point is contain and monitor. At this point the containment buildings are just loaded with a former reactor pile that is now a half melted pile of reactor, surrounded by contaminated water. They just have to make sure that as little of this contamination as possible escapes the containment buildings. The radiation in the containment buildings will be high for hundreds if not thousands of years.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph.../GoingCritical

[Ripster42]

A nuclear reactor is "critical" if it's on. That means the reaction is sustaining itself. I really hate it when people have no idea what the term means. A nuclear reactor *cannot* explode like a bomb. Period. It's physically impossible. You can have steam or hydrogen explosions that damage the building, but that's already happened. Nothing more can happen. Sure you can get leaks from the containment which would have fairly nasty local consequences, but that would be mostly confined to the site. The only people that have to worry about what's going on at the site right now are, people working at the site. They have to monitor the areas they're working in, and their exposure/etc. The worst case scenario has pretty much already happened though, the only thing they can really do at this point is contain and monitor. At this point the containment buildings are just loaded with a former reactor pile that is now a half melted pile of reactor, surrounded by contaminated water. They just have to make sure that as little of this contamination as possible escapes the containment buildings. The radiation in the containment buildings will be high for hundreds if not thousands of years.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph.../GoingCritical

Most of his comments are about as well thought out as hubcaps.

[Osmeric]

it indicates the reactor is getting worse and could be an indication of it going critical which would be lethal for anyone in a certain radius.

No, it just means they're getting sensors closer to the solidified fuel mass.

[Magical Mudcrab]

Who would have thought that putting energy plants which utilize a highly toxic form of fuel (uranium) on a fault line beside the ocean would be a bad idea.

[Uncle]

Security concerns? Security at any reactors would have a hard time failing even if you had lost complete control of your country. If you can, take a tour of some reactors. You'll see things from six inch thick steel doors with gun emplacements that are simple but extremely effective, to much higher tech security systems. Here in the United States all reactors are tested against Green Berets who are given full blueprints ahead of time. The Green Berets have never made it close to even breaching the first line defenses.

And when you want to talk renewable? High enriched reactors are some of the closest things we have to renewable energy on the planet technically speaking. Their waste isn't nearly as harmful as low or medium enriched, you need fewer core changes (or no core changes depending on the size, you can't form it into a bomb like one dumb-ass senator argued here for not allowing it (yay California rep again, thanks for hurting the environment), and is substantially easier to shut down and regulate.

In France, we have even more drastic security protocols: the army is protecting the reactors, it is strictly outlawed to fly over a reactor, and we even have missiles ready to shot down any plane who would want to try anything. However, due to Greepeace nuts, people are actualy thinking everyone can go and reach the reactor core in a matter of minutes without difficulty...

[Venara]

Let's not necro old threads, thanks