N.Y. has a nuke plant event

[ensho]

http://hisz.rsoe.hu/alertmap/index.php?smp=&lang=eng


A nuclear power reactor at Indian Point shut down automatically Monday after its main electrical generator malfunctioned. According to engineers, the generator went off-line "safely" at about 4 p.m. A second reactor at the site was not affected. The plant's owner says there was no threat to workers or to the public. Monday's incident comes just two months after a report linked sky rocketing cancer rates to people living in the area. The Indian Point Nuclear plants are located on the Hudson River about 35-miles north of the city.
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"sky rocketing cancer rates to people living in the area" !!

bad news

[stray cat]

1. Do you actually have facts for the cancer rates?

[ensho]

3. I personally do not have any stats. since I just read the report this a.m.

and haven't looked for further articles. have you?

[Paper Roses]

2. Wasn't there another nuke shutdown event a month or 2 ago?

These old plants are tired. I wonder how many need real updating. There are not many near my area but there seem to be problems poking up their ugly heads now and then. Are we leaving the important maintenance on these plants until something really bad happens.

Sorta like a major highway bridge falling down but on a huge scale.


Oh, I forgot. There is no money. It is all tied up in wars and Wall Street.

[ensho]

4. yes NY plants seem to have frequent problems

nt

[Tikki]

6. I would say....cancer increases in the vicinity are a problem....

Tikki

[Statistical]

5. The shutdown had nothing to do w/ nuclear power.

Nuclear reactors need electrical power to run cooling pumps in a shutdown scenario.

Now when reactor is operating normally it is producing power however in a shutdown, failure, or other issue they are not.
A reactor can scram in a matter of seconds (end fission reaction) and fission comes to a standstill in minutes however decay heat will eventually melt the reactor unless it is cooled. It takes 24-48 hours to cool the reactor after a shutdown.

So a cornerstone of nuclear safety is for there to be multiple redundant sources of power to run cooling pumps
a) power from reactor turbines
b) power from high priority grid
c) power from on site generators
d) power from off site generators

In this instance an on-site generator failed. The reactor was in no danger of meltdown, the reactor could operate 100% fine for decades without the generator. However hypothetically if the offsite generators failed, and the high priority grid failed, and the turbines (which produce power for reactor even when spinning down) were destroyed AND the reactor had a core event which percipitated a shutdown at that exact same instance (before even a single source of power could be restored) THEN and ONLY THEN there would be the POTENTIAL for a meltdown.

So the plant as designed shutdown the reactor routinely as a precaution.

[ensho]

7. the report doesn't link the two - the cancer report seems to be an

addition to the info about the plant. to me it infers that the plant can't be safe if there is a cancer uptick in the area.

[Statistical]

9. I see a lot of rec cars on the road and road deaths have increase...

therefore red cars kill people. If we just banned red cars then nobody would die on the road.

[ensho]

14. this thread isn't about car accidents. its about nuke plant radiation

leaks

[Recursion]

10. Pet peeve: the report implies, you infer

And, not having any data to examine, there's no way to know if you're inferring correctly. Nuclear power plants emit less radiation than a brick wall, so there would have to be some pretty convincing evidence.

[ensho]

8. the report doesn't link the two - the cancer report seems to be an

addition to the info about the plant. to me it infers that the plant can't be safe if there is a cancer uptick in the area.

[Paper Roses]

12. Thank you for the overview. For many of us, just the thought of

anything going wrong at a Nuclear plant is cause for the jitters. I did not know there were so many redundant features.

I do remember the incident at Three Mile Island. My kids lived in the area and it made me nervous.
Taking your time to explain is appreciated.

[Statistical]

16. No prob.

Redundancy is the key. That is why the plant shuts down. Although the plant could operate without the generator the loss of the generator reduces redundancy if anything were to happen to other sources of power. That is why the plant shuts down.

While you may not be aware that the plants electrical grid is 4x redundant and that shutting it down is a routine procedure just done as a precaution the OP most certainly does.

Your reaction is exactly what the OP was hoping for with the "nuke event" scare. If only people like me would shut up then the disinformation could continue uninterrupted.

The industry learned a lot from 3 Mile island. While the reactor was @ 3 Mile island was redundant it had poor sensors (operators need to rely on sensors because they can't just look inside the core). The poor and limited sensors combined with human error is what lead to wrong procedures being followed. Since 3-Mile plants have more sensors/instrumentation. Also events can trigger plant shutdown automatically. If everyone in the NY plant was dead the reactor would have shutdown exactly the same without any human action.

[SidDithers]

11. Unrec. For the usual reasons...nt

Sid

[Paper Roses]

15. And those reasons would be? I think posts like this bring information.

Maybe some of us have less than perfect knowledge of things like this report. DUers who take the time to inform us do a great service.

I think this rec/unrec stuff has created more problems than it solved. Now you and I are doing a back and forth on the merits of "the usual reasons". Not helpful to anyone.

[leftynyc]

13. I live 20 miles south of this

I haven't heard about those cancer rates but will do some digging.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

17. Wow.

An electric generator shutdown and gave people cancer two months ago.

Fascinating.