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 Posted 8/17/2004 10:19 PM |
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Junior Member
Group: Forum Members
Active: 5/12/2005
Posts: 5 |
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well I'm new so I don't want anyone to hate me or anything but I have to say that it isn't true that you can't cause a reactor to blow up like a nuke. the only way to do it is to get some kind of reaction with the fuel rods. since there in a thick concrete and metal structure that would be hard. If a terorist were to atempt it it would cause them to have to go into the reactor complex with some sort of device or something you could put on the fuel rods and since he's only going to blow up anyway he would probably not care about the burns or rad poisoning. anyway it won't happen. another way it could happen is if the reactor melts down and the fuel rods hit grownd water, that would cause I violent reacton that would end in a bang. the only reason this doesn't happen when they cool the rods down is they are prety much in active when they are removed. and the coolant never realy touches the rods. This has also been prevented with a grownd sheild, it's prety much just concrete and metal plates that are layered to prevent the rods from melting into the grownd. wich is what a melt down is.
p.s what is this place? I don't know much about it just that it has a bunch of sites on it.The strongest mind is the open mind. |
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| Posted 11/19/2005 5:52 PM |
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Senior Member
Group: Forum Members
Active: 4/2/2006
Posts: 18 |
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Correct in all respects. In fact if you go back in this topic you'll see I said that before. Nuclear reactors do NOT explode, they meltdown.
Literally a meltdown is when the core ov a reactor overheats to the pont that it melts, or some chemical reacion takes place (like the steam/graphite explosion that created the Chenobyl disaster)
The common term for the meltdown effect is "China syndrome" basically saying the superheated material will burn through the reactor base and eat into the ground till it reaches china. Though of course IRL It'll just go down till it hits the water table, then explode in a steam explosion as the water boils.
The problem is that some reactors can be used to turn relativle harmless uranium 238 into plutonium. So while the reactor is not it's self a nuke for the first terrorist that comes along, if they can smuggle out enough of it's waste they could make one from it."It thinks we're either a threat, food or a mate - it's gonna either kill us, eat us or hump us." |
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| Posted 11/27/2005 2:23 AM |
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Senior Member
Group: Forum Members
Active: 4/2/2006
Posts: 18 |
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I have noticed that we seem to have become sidetracked here, from nuclear weapons to nuclear power reactors. I think we should try and get back to the listed topic of nuclear WEAPONS.
That's;
A Bombs
H Bombs
and Neutron bombs
Oh and starship trooper mini-nuke Bazookoids  "It thinks we're either a threat, food or a mate - it's gonna either kill us, eat us or hump us." |
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| Posted 11/28/2005 6:32 AM |
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Supreme Being
Group: Forum Members
Active: 8/14/2007
Posts: 170 |
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thats not exactly right what you say about Chernobyl:
the disaster was caused byt reactor overheat but it dodn't happen as you said it. So, first of all reactor had design error, which wasn't cause by itself but it added itself to the income. So waht was I saying....ah the reason! So, it was casual security test, which had to be done from time to time, althrought instead of doing it during the day, when the experienced engineers were on duty, it was done at night, with young nightshift engineers, to prevent cutting power to Moscow for few hours. Whats more, reation was controlled from 2 separate rooms, which were on 2 different sides of the building and had no communication. Not gonna go into more details as it would probably exceed one post word limit, so for those interested go and watch discovery channel 8p. Only thing am gonna add, is that firefighters who, arrived at the scene, were not told that that was reactor explosion and except getting radiated, while extinguishing the fire they caused radioactive dust to rise which then expanded itself over whole europe.
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Always knew i didn't belong in this world. I wasn't made for this. But I'll never forget- those who betrayed me, and those who never failed my trust. I'll be carrying nothing but this lesson: never trust anyone and rely on your instincts. Forget the past. I'll never find peace here. So, I'll seek justice for myself. I'll choose the truth I like.
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click this link to help the little vampire argonian http://world6.monstersgame.co.uk/?ac=vid&vid=114028 |
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| Posted 11/28/2005 8:18 AM |
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Senior Member
Group: Forum Members
Active: 4/2/2006
Posts: 18 |
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There's elements of both stories, the test was intended to make sure that the backup coolant system started up fast enough to take over in the event of a main system shut down. Shutting down the main pumps to test the backups was usually done carefully, and it wasn't schedualed for that night's tests.
The supervisor got a rush of inspiration and added an emergency shutdown and switch to backups to see if they could power up fast enough.
The main pumps were cut, the backups wouldn't start! The cheif engineer was at home in bed, and lack of comunication rapidly made things worse. The supervisor ordered the primary pumps started, and they wouldn't becaus the rapid shut down had flooded the engines.
Finaly the control rods were ordered lowered to shut down the reactor, but rods were intended to be slowly moved in and out. By this time the supervisor was starting to panic as the reactor temperature hit redline and repeatedly ordered the controller in charge of the control rods to lower faster. The controller speed up, the rods ceased from being screwed in to fast and the overheating then jammed them solidly against the reactor moderator and reactor 4's fate was sealed.
About 5 minutes later the reactor's coolant water boiled into superheated steam, which reacted explosively with the graphite moderator of the reactor core, and the entire reactor and housing building exploded. "It thinks we're either a threat, food or a mate - it's gonna either kill us, eat us or hump us." |
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| Posted 10/28/2006 8:39 PM |
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Supreme Being
Group: Forum Members
Active: 6/21/2007
Posts: 77 |
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I'm skeptical about how radiation would cause the mutation which 'Godzilla' underwent. meh.. guess it's just Hollywood. So says the man with the duct-taped mouse |
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| Posted 11/24/2006 6:32 PM |
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Supreme Being
Group: Forum Members
Active: 3/2/2007
Posts: 56 |
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Bronzewing, you mention a reaction between Water and Graphite there. What kind of reaction it was?. You said it was an explotion...
What caused the explosion?, The rapid vaporization of superheated water that escaped the reactor because the graphite layer was weakened by the reaction with water, or the rapid production of gases from a Water and Graphite reaction?.
I'd lean more towards the former hypothesis, but I don't know what reaction happened there. Care to point it out please?
H2O (l) + C (s) ---> ? ?? ?? ? ?
S. Pentalis.
Edit: OH SHIT, I just realized I'm going ultra offtopic here... disregard my question.
Edit2: For the curious, I found the reaction. Effectively under high enough temperatures water reacts with graphite to form carbon monoxide and hydrogen (and other things), both products are gases, while the reagents are a solid and a liquid: when large amounts of gases are released too fast as product of a reaction, it's called an explosion, because the gases tend to expand to take up the very large volume they normally do at atmospheric pressure, causing an inmense "push inside-out" of everything around them as they expand... basically: BOOM.
The following text is copied from where I found the reaction:
http://www.webelements.com/webelements/elements/text/C/chem.html
Carbon, either as graphite or diamond does not react with water under normal conditions. Under more forsing conditions, the reaction becomes important. In industry, water is blown through hot coke. The resulting gas is called water gas and is a mixture of hydrogen (H2, 50%), carbon monoxide (CO, 40%), carbon dioxide (CO2, 5%), nitrogen and methane (N2 + CH4, 5%). It is an important feedstock gas for the chemical industry.
C + H2O → CO + H2
This reaction is endothermic (ΔH° = +131.3 kJ mol-1; ΔS° = +133.7 J K-1 mol-1) which means that the coke cools down during the reaction. To counteract this, the steam flow is replaced by air to reheat the coke allowing further reaction.
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PICO, WEA, TETA. |
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| Posted 11/28/2006 1:08 AM |
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Supreme Being
Group: Forum Members
Active: 6/21/2007
Posts: 77 |
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| Quote: Bronzewing, you mention a reaction between Water and Graphite there. What kind of reaction it was?. You said it was an explotion...What caused the explosion?, The rapid vaporization of superheated wat... |
The explosion could also have been the result of superheated water coming in contact with something that broke it's surface tension. The sudden change in pressure plus the thermo softening of the reactor casing would have resulted in an explosion of similar proportion. note that The actual explosion that occured in the reactor did not spread the radio active materials, resulting fires from the excessive heat aerosolised parts of the reactor core. So says the man with the duct-taped mouse |
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