Word: reactors
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What makes the failure all the more disturbing is that it was unnecessary. Engineers have the know-how to build reactors that are demonstrably safer than those now in operation. Moreover, that basic technology has been available for more than 20 years. It was largely ignored in favor of a technology -- the water-cooled reactor -- that had already been proved in nuclear submarines. But water-cooled reactors are particularly susceptible to the rapid loss of coolant, which led to the accidents at both Chernobyl and Three Mile Island...
...problem with defense in depth is that no matter how many layers of safety are built into a conventional reactor, it can never be 100% safe against a meltdown. At its Idaho plant, the Energy Department wants to try a different strategy. Rather than construct a giant atomic pile that requires the cooling of large quantities of concentrated fuel, designers propose to build a series of four small-scale, modular reactors that use fuel in such small quantities that their cores could not achieve meltdown temperatures under any circumstances. The fuel would be packed inside tiny heat-resistant ceramic spheres...
...Savannah River layout, where discharges of reactor coolant emerge hot enough to boil a frog, a DOE official admits, "It's not too good for the fish around here either." The agency also concedes that a network of shallow aquifers under the vast acreage is contaminated with radioactive compounds. A deeper aquifer contains toxic, nonradioactive materials. The only argument: whether this supply is the source of drinking water for the surrounding area...
...most disturbing blunders have been exposed. Congressional investigators have turned up internal memos from the facility's manager, E.I. du Pont de Nemours, citing numerous incidents over three decades. On May 10, 1965, operators ignored a loud alarm for 15 minutes. Then they saw water spilling across the reactor- room floor. Fully 2,100 gal. of fluid had leaked out of the reactor, leaving the level of coolant too low. The reactor shut itself down automatically...
...inflated the Savannah River troubles so that Westinghouse Electric, which is scheduled to take over the plant's operation from Du Pont on April 1, will look better. Heckert also contends that DOE is promoting the furor to gain public support and congressional funding for a new tritium-producing reactor at the huge installation. It would cost at least $6 billion and take more than six years to build. "Despite all the hullabaloo," Heckert says of his company's operation of the plant, "nobody was ever injured or killed...