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How a Nuclear Meltdown Works · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you Should Know?
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Speaker 1: From House Stuff Works dot com? Hey, and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as always as
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Speaker 1: Charles W. Chuck Bryant, And that makes this Stuff you
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Speaker 1: Should Know kind of a special edition. Really, we don't
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Speaker 1: usually like hop on news stories. Yeah, you can't ignore
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Speaker 1: this up and I guess probably releasing something like a
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Speaker 1: full week after it happens is not hopping on. But
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Speaker 1: still now it's people have concerns and there's a lot
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Speaker 1: of information flying around. Everyone's trying to explain this thing
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Speaker 1: and the simplest terms, and since that's what we do
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Speaker 1: for a living, we figured we should do it. Yes,
0:48
Speaker 1: so that's what we're doing that. They were going to
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Speaker 1: talk about um nuclear meltdowns and how it pertains to
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Speaker 1: the crisis in Japan. Right, Yeah, and it's a lot
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Speaker 1: more basic and simple than I thought. I was intimidated
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Speaker 1: going into this, and then I was like, oh, well
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Speaker 1: that's not too hard to understand. Yeah, it is nuclear science,
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Speaker 1: but it's kind of approachable nuclear science degree. So Chuck, um,
1:10
Speaker 1: let's talk about catastrophe modeling. It's a type of risk
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Speaker 1: modeling that insurance companies love. It's how they figure out
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Speaker 1: why your insurance should be less than say, somebody else
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Speaker 1: of the same age, weight, height, the kind of thing
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Speaker 1: who lives in California. Right, UM, my former self. Yeah.
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Speaker 1: So you can actually, um take a catastrophe model, right
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Speaker 1: and plug in every variable you can think of, and
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Speaker 1: what you'll spit out is UM basically a a curve,
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Speaker 1: a graph of probability of an accident happening, and then say,
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Speaker 1: like the the level of damage that will happen. Okay,
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Speaker 1: So if you do this over like say a ten
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Speaker 1: thousand year catalog, you can figure out how off and say, uh,
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Speaker 1: nine point oh earthquake is going to hit Japan, And
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Speaker 1: you can figure that out by choosing a probability. Let's
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Speaker 1: say there's four percent probability of a nine point oh happening.
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Speaker 1: You can find that that pops up maybe forty times
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Speaker 1: over a ten thousand year scale. And what you have
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Speaker 1: then is that that's a one and two D and
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Speaker 1: fifty year probability. That's where they get the predictor yeah, exactly,
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Speaker 1: and that's why UM power plants are that's how they're
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Speaker 1: built to withstand something like a once in a two
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Speaker 1: fifty year quake, saying it could happen in this area,
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Speaker 1: so we need to account for it. Right. And it's
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Speaker 1: based on the dynamics, the geophysical dynamics of an earthquake
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Speaker 1: of a nine point oh magnitude right. Because you've got
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Speaker 1: all that plugged in the model, you figure out how much,
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Speaker 1: how bad it's going to be, how often it's gonna happen,
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Speaker 1: and then you build accordingly. And these the plants on
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Speaker 1: the north coast of Japan, the TEPCO's Tokyo Electric Power Company, right, uh,
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Speaker 1: their Daichi and Daini plants UM number one and number
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Speaker 1: two plants in Fukushima UM were built to a stand
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Speaker 1: a two fifty year quake, which is exactly what they
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Speaker 1: got on March eleven. Yeah, they were, and they withstood it.
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Speaker 1: They did. Everything went fine, they shut down the reactors,
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Speaker 1: which is what's supposed to happen to its sweet But
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Speaker 1: the problem was it was stood an earthquake, a huge earthquake,
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Speaker 1: possibly the most massive earthquake that's ever hit Japan, but
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Speaker 1: it didn't withstand the tsunami. It's this model, whatever the
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Speaker 1: model it was built for did not predict the tsunami.
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Speaker 1: It didn't take it into account, and that's why we
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Speaker 1: have this this crisis right now. Right so we should
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Speaker 1: probably also mention that the the focus right now is
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Speaker 1: on um, you know, this nuclear potential nuclear meltdown. But um,
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Speaker 1: I mean the tsunami is up to like I think
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Speaker 1: fifteen thousand dead and missing now just from the tsunami alone.
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Speaker 1: Are they calculating the tsunami different from the earthquake as
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Speaker 1: far as that goes, I would not me. Okay, so
4:01
Speaker 1: possibly because I read seven thousand, but that might just
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Speaker 1: be maybe there's different numbers that could know. I think
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Speaker 1: that's just dead. This is like dead and missing. So yeah,
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Speaker 1: but now you've gotten an earthquake that just knocked down
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Speaker 1: a bunch of stuff, you have a tsunami that took
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Speaker 1: out entire towns, and then you have this this nuclear
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Speaker 1: crisis that's unfolding, and um, you know this is going
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Speaker 1: to release in a few days. So we'll have to
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Speaker 1: make do with the information that we have, right Yeah,
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Speaker 1: unless something like really really big happens between today, which
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Speaker 1: is Thursday and Tuesday, we might have to come back
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Speaker 1: in and like doctor it up a bit, right, This
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Speaker 1: is what we're going with for now. Yes, So Chuck,
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Speaker 1: let's talk a little bit about how, uh if you
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Speaker 1: walk around a nuclear power plant, where are you going
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Speaker 1: to find what's going on there? Well, it's pretty easy, actually, Um.
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Speaker 1: And this is something that I didn't know because I
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Speaker 1: didn't know a whole lot about nuclear power at all
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Speaker 1: until this happened. And basically, what a nuclear power plant
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Speaker 1: does is it creates one of the oldest model oles
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Speaker 1: for creating energy, which is steam powered UH turbines. And
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Speaker 1: how they do that they basically use nuclear fuel, which
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Speaker 1: these days is enriched uranium. The uranium atom split creates
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Speaker 1: a lot of heat. UH neutrons flying around also creates
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Speaker 1: is created by that process, and this heat boils water
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Speaker 1: in the case of these UH reactors, these are water
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Speaker 1: boiling reactors. And we'll talk about more the mark one
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Speaker 1: here in a minute, and it produces basically boils's water,
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Speaker 1: produces steam. That steam drives a turbine generates power about
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Speaker 1: a gigawatt of electricity at full power, which is a lot, right,
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Speaker 1: and um, that is a tremendous amount. And that full power, UM,
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Speaker 1: the heat that's being put out um Marshall who wrote
5:46
Speaker 1: a really cool he's the founder of the site. Yes,
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Speaker 1: yes he does. He wrote a very um incredible article
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Speaker 1: in record time called how Japan's Nuclear Crisis works. But um,
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Speaker 1: he said that this puts out the heat. Um, that's
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Speaker 1: akin to about a billion watt bulb. That's that full power.
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Speaker 1: The thing is, obviously you don't always need your nuclear
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Speaker 1: reactors to be running at full power. So UM, what
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Speaker 1: you do is you modulate how much heat is being
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Speaker 1: put out by um using what are called control rods. Yeah,
6:18
Speaker 1: sort of like the throttle on your gas right, but
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Speaker 1: instead of Yeah, but the the control rod is basically
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Speaker 1: something like, UM, maybe a boron enriched length of metal
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Speaker 1: that is inserted into the fuel rod core, right, And
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Speaker 1: if you pull it out a little bit, then it
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Speaker 1: heats up. If you push it in a little bit
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Speaker 1: that it heats down. So and and by heat, I
6:41
Speaker 1: guess I could say it powers up and it powers down, right, Yeah,
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Speaker 1: because it's attracting the neutrons. Then the neutrons are what
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Speaker 1: basically make the splitting of the atom happen. And that's
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Speaker 1: the problem there is it's self sustaining. So if you
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Speaker 1: didn't have these control rods, it becomes you know, it's
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Speaker 1: own living reaction. Well, it'll just it would just keep going, right,
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Speaker 1: it will keep going as long as you can can,
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Speaker 1: as long as you could keep it cool and just
7:07
Speaker 1: be running at max power all the time. Right now,
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Speaker 1: when an earthquake hits, one of the fail safe designed
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Speaker 1: into any nuclear reactor is that the control rods are
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Speaker 1: going to get jammed in all the way, which is
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Speaker 1: called scramming. And when the um, when the reactor is scrammed,
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Speaker 1: all the control roads are shut down, all the sheil
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Speaker 1: roads are shut down because there's these control rods just
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Speaker 1: accepting all the neutrons. And like you said, the neutrons
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Speaker 1: are the active ingredient in nuclear fission because they're just
7:35
Speaker 1: making all the atoms in the surrounding area unstable. Right.
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Speaker 1: But it's important to point out that even when they're
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Speaker 1: fully inserted and it's shut down, it's still creating keat
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Speaker 1: And here's the problem. Small amount of heat, but it's
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Speaker 1: enough heat if left unchecked, to potentially cause what's called
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Speaker 1: the meltdown. Right. So this heat that you're talking about
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Speaker 1: chuck is called decay heat. And I've read places where
7:56
Speaker 1: it lasts a week. I've read that it lasts for
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Speaker 1: a year, and I think it acts really last for
8:00
Speaker 1: a year. It takes a year for a fuel rod
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Speaker 1: to actually shut down, to to go to shut down state,
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Speaker 1: where like it doesn't need to be cooled any longer
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Speaker 1: with water, right, So when you scram something like they
8:13
Speaker 1: did on March eleven, it's not just gonna cool down
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Speaker 1: right away. And that's the problem that we're dealing with
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Speaker 1: right now is this decay heat, which, like you said,
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Speaker 1: is still it's it's a ridiculous amount of heat, and
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Speaker 1: it requires tons of cooling, right, which normally should be
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Speaker 1: fine because the Dachi plant with reactors went through four
8:31
Speaker 1: I have cooling systems and lots of them, right. Yeah,
8:34
Speaker 1: it's a closed loop. So what happens is the water
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Speaker 1: boils and creates a lot of pressure. The pressure is
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Speaker 1: released the esteem uh and the steam actually gets cooled,
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Speaker 1: condensed and reused like a closed loop air conditioning system,
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Speaker 1: not a whole lot different, and the water is recirculated.
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Speaker 1: That water is recirculated back through the system with these
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Speaker 1: electric pumps, and those electric pumps are the key to
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Speaker 1: keep in everything cool and the problem, uh, well, well
9:02
Speaker 1: we'll get to the problem. Um, they have a lot
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Speaker 1: of fail safes in place because you know, they don't
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Speaker 1: just plug the pump into the wall and say all right,
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Speaker 1: we're good to go, because that would be bad if
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Speaker 1: the power went down. Uh, there are backup electric pumps.
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Speaker 1: There are backup Uh if if the power goes down,
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Speaker 1: you can actually um, because I believe it's using its
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Speaker 1: own nuclear power to generate to operate these pumps. This
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Speaker 1: is an electricity generating nuclear power plants. It's running itself.
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Speaker 1: But once the plant shuts down, which is what they did,
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Speaker 1: they say, okay, we can grab electricity from the grid,
9:34
Speaker 1: but the grid shut down. Yes, that just shut the
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Speaker 1: grid down to pretty much right after the control rods
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Speaker 1: were scrammed into the into the reactors. So they have
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Speaker 1: another backup there, Like, all right, we got these diesel generators,
9:45
Speaker 1: which are diesel generators are great, they do a great job. Uh.
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Speaker 1: Tsunami comes in water on top of electrical or I'm sorry,
9:53
Speaker 1: diesel generators makes them to not operate. Yeah, they were submerged.
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Speaker 1: They weren't designed to operate and submerged. Now and then
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Speaker 1: they said, all right, we've got all these backups in place.
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Speaker 1: The final backup we have is a battery system. Battery
10:06
Speaker 1: system kicked in, it worked great, but the problem is
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Speaker 1: it only works for a little bit of you know,
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Speaker 1: like how many hours. I don't know if it's said
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Speaker 1: a few several hours, because the idea is that the
10:16
Speaker 1: battery system is in dire emergency until you get the
10:18
Speaker 1: grid back going, which shouldn't take that long. Um. Now. Also,
10:22
Speaker 1: transport transportation was knocked out. Supply routes are knocked out,
10:27
Speaker 1: there's no power. They try to get more diesel generators there,
10:30
Speaker 1: but they just couldn't get them in time. Right. Um,
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Speaker 1: So we have a nuclear power plant without power to
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Speaker 1: run these cooling systems. And these are boiled water reactors,
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Speaker 1: which means that the water, um you know, like you said,
10:45
Speaker 1: chuck it, it gets its energy or it creates electricity
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Speaker 1: by boiling water. Now, these fuel rods are so hot,
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Speaker 1: even with this decay heat that the moment water hits them,
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Speaker 1: even boiling water, the boiled water is keeping them cool.
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Speaker 1: They're so hot they just have to remain underwater. Let's
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Speaker 1: just keep them underwater. That's the key. The problem is
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Speaker 1: is they create tons of steam, and that steam is
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Speaker 1: what is what runs the turbine, and then after it
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Speaker 1: access the turbine, like you said, it's condensed and then
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Speaker 1: reused as coolant. Right, But if the those pumps aren't working,
11:17
Speaker 1: all it's doing is producing steam, boiling off water and
11:21
Speaker 1: basically getting rid of the only coolant source they have. Yeah,
11:25
Speaker 1: and if water gets hot enough, it actually something called
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Speaker 1: thermalisis takes place, and that's when it breaks down into
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Speaker 1: constituent hydrogen and oxygen atoms or in this case um
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Speaker 1: hydrogen gas, which is really really explosive. And that's that's
11:41
Speaker 1: actually a pretty normal byproduct of even like the proper
11:44
Speaker 1: functioning of a boil water reactor plan. So they have
11:48
Speaker 1: procedures in place to vent steam normally, but they burn
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Speaker 1: the hydrogen, often a slow control burn when they're venting
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Speaker 1: it to reduce radioactivity and to you know, keep explosions
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Speaker 1: from happening. Then you may be wondering why would they
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Speaker 1: design a system with that uses water to cool and
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Speaker 1: and nothing else. The point, the whole reason that somebody
12:15
Speaker 1: ever designed the Mark one or boil water reactor is
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Speaker 1: that it's actually has a failsafe built in the fact
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Speaker 1: that it uses water as a coolant and what's called
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Speaker 1: a neutron modulator which keeps that thing from going like
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Speaker 1: out of control past, you know, just to sustain max power.
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Speaker 1: Nuclear fission is whatever you're using as a new neutron
12:37
Speaker 1: modulator or moderator. I'm sorry. So as long as the
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Speaker 1: neutron moderator there, you can have fission nuclear fission. But
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Speaker 1: if the if you can't get the control rods in
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Speaker 1: in time and the coolant goes away, the the fuel
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Speaker 1: actually won't be able to continue in a fission state
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Speaker 1: because the neutron mod moderator is not there. So you
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Speaker 1: don't have the cooling, but at least you don't have
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Speaker 1: a meltdown um from nuclear fission, which is really horrible. Right,
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Speaker 1: So that's why they have this boiled water reactor. But
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Speaker 1: the problem is this water served as a fail safe
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Speaker 1: and it's achilles heel and in this case, shosh the
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Speaker 1: hydrogen gas we were talking about, the normal reaction got
13:18
Speaker 1: worse because the water boil away. These fuel tubes were
13:22
Speaker 1: now exposed to air. They got really really hot and
13:26
Speaker 1: started cracking. And the little uranium fuel pellets I think
13:30
Speaker 1: they're the size of a Tootsie roll, right, Uh, they
13:33
Speaker 1: overheated and and cracked and allowed water to get in there,
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Speaker 1: and water is not supposed to be in there. And
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Speaker 1: that's where you had this massive hydrogen gas explosion. And
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Speaker 1: I think was it one of them, two of them,
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Speaker 1: I think it was several different reactors had this explosion
13:49
Speaker 1: within the reactor building itself. It wasn't like the whole
13:52
Speaker 1: thing exploded, it was it was contained within the building,
13:55
Speaker 1: they hope, they think, really exactly. So we're still getting
14:00
Speaker 1: news at this point because they there's a small number
14:03
Speaker 1: of people, you know, on the ground, and they're not
14:06
Speaker 1: all like on the phone with Anderson Cooper, right so
14:09
Speaker 1: the information on the inside isn't that readily available right now.
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Speaker 1: So there were there were several explosions, Chuck, I think
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Speaker 1: it was like reactors one and three had explosions from
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Speaker 1: this hydrogen gas. They were venting it, they didn't burn
14:22
Speaker 1: it off properly, and the hydrogen built up and up
14:26
Speaker 1: and up and um. You remember, you know, you need
14:29
Speaker 1: to keep these things wet. You have to keep them
14:31
Speaker 1: underwater under any circumstances whatsoever. They have to be cool constantly.
14:35
Speaker 1: They have to remain underwater. So without these backup generators,
14:40
Speaker 1: without the battery power, generators without their normal electricity, without anything.
14:45
Speaker 1: They finally decide we need to flood these things with seawater,
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Speaker 1: boron and enriched seawater. And it was a chemical reaction
14:53
Speaker 1: between the sea water and the hydrogen that caused these explosions. Yeah,
14:59
Speaker 1: which we should say this is very very very very important.
15:03
Speaker 1: That was a conventional chemical explosion, right. It was not
15:07
Speaker 1: a nuclear bomb, right, it's not. It's not possible for
15:11
Speaker 1: a nuclear reactor to blow up like in a nuclear explosion.
15:15
Speaker 1: It's not possible. The danger, like with chernobyl and anything
15:19
Speaker 1: is is leaking radiation. It's not like a Hiroshima type
15:23
Speaker 1: of event, right, So that happens. Um To to create
15:27
Speaker 1: a nuclear bomb, what you have to do is take
15:30
Speaker 1: um radioactive material in a subcritical state, which is like
15:35
Speaker 1: what you might have in your front pocket right now. Shucks, right,
15:39
Speaker 1: it's just plain old lump of uranium. Who cares, right,
15:42
Speaker 1: and you have to explode it so fast to create
15:46
Speaker 1: a chain reaction that uses up all of that subcritical
15:50
Speaker 1: material that it skips over the critical stage and goes
15:53
Speaker 1: right into supercritical. The precision that that requires makes it
15:57
Speaker 1: that there's probably like five people on the planet right now,
16:00
Speaker 1: they know how to build a nuclear bomb like that.
16:03
Speaker 1: You can't just do that with fuel. The big threat
16:05
Speaker 1: is the melting of the fuel, right, right, And so
16:09
Speaker 1: they flooded it with seawater, to which ruins the reactors forever,
16:13
Speaker 1: by the way, we should mention, but that's a better scenario.
16:16
Speaker 1: And apparently these are forty year old reactors that were
16:19
Speaker 1: not on its last legs as far as they're about
16:22
Speaker 1: to break, but they were near the end of their
16:24
Speaker 1: operating lifespans. Do you want to hear something horrible? Reaction
16:28
Speaker 1: Number one went online on March, so it should have gone.
16:35
Speaker 1: It should have been decommissioned on March eleven. Really there
16:39
Speaker 1: was actually a date there should have been. But apparently
16:41
Speaker 1: TEPCO applied for and received a tenure extension on its
16:44
Speaker 1: operating licenses for those interesting Yeah, so what what what
16:50
Speaker 1: we have some information here? What does this all mean
16:53
Speaker 1: to the world at large? Well, here's the big problem.
16:56
Speaker 1: Like we said that the fuel isn't going to explode,
16:58
Speaker 1: but it's going to melt, right, And said Chuck that
17:00
Speaker 1: these little fuel pellets in the fuel rods are like
17:04
Speaker 1: the size of a tutsie roll in about the shape, right,
17:08
Speaker 1: if it melts. If this when this stuff hits air,
17:10
Speaker 1: it begins to melt, and if it melts, it will
17:14
Speaker 1: no longer be able to be cooled because it's going
17:16
Speaker 1: to be a big, flat, dense glob of nuclear fuel
17:21
Speaker 1: that's melting and collecting inside of this containment vessel. Right,
17:25
Speaker 1: So the operative word is containment vessel. This extremely hot
17:30
Speaker 1: nuclear fuel that's forming a pool can conceivably melt through
17:35
Speaker 1: the containment vessel. And once that happens, if it when
17:40
Speaker 1: it encounters the concrete barrier, this which is like the
17:42
Speaker 1: fail safe of fail safe. This it's it should not
17:45
Speaker 1: be able to melt through that, it's possible it could,
17:49
Speaker 1: and if it does, then you have you have nuclear
17:54
Speaker 1: fuel in the environment, and that's when it's it's beyond
17:59
Speaker 1: catastrophe level. Yeah, And that's a containment vessel that's completely
18:03
Speaker 1: functional and intact. And we don't know what kind of
18:07
Speaker 1: damage these explosions of cause they might be compromised from
18:09
Speaker 1: the inside to make containment even more difficult. Who knows
18:13
Speaker 1: at this point. So the the explosions were kind of
18:16
Speaker 1: um jarring, you could say, right, the explosions that reactors
18:20
Speaker 1: one in three. Yes, there is a fire at UM
18:23
Speaker 1: reactor four UM. But apparently one of the big problems
18:28
Speaker 1: is a bunch of spent fuel that's no longer being
18:30
Speaker 1: cooled at reactor too. And while when this fuel melts,
18:37
Speaker 1: it can catch on fire. So vapor is bad enough,
18:42
Speaker 1: but if it catches fire, smoke is what's really going
18:45
Speaker 1: to get you. It will create and carry further UM
18:50
Speaker 1: radioactive particles that UM has a much longer half life
18:55
Speaker 1: than the stuff that's going to come out in the vapor. Right,
18:58
Speaker 1: that's the threat. That's a big threat threat. Uh. So
19:02
Speaker 1: we mentioned that it was the Mark one boiling water
19:05
Speaker 1: reactor that that was over there. Um G E made
19:09
Speaker 1: these General Electric in the nineteen sixties. They went online
19:12
Speaker 1: and I think seventy one you said yes, which is
19:15
Speaker 1: a long time ago. Uh. The United States has twenty
19:18
Speaker 1: three of these reactors right now at sixteen locations, including
19:23
Speaker 1: UH Oyster Creek in New Jersey, Dresden near Chicago, Monicello
19:28
Speaker 1: near Minneapolis. No reason to freak out right now, UH,
19:33
Speaker 1: because well, here's the deal. These these Mark one boilers
19:37
Speaker 1: are UH are under scrutiny right now. The New York
19:40
Speaker 1: Times ran a piece about these. Apparently in nineteen seventy two,
19:44
Speaker 1: right after they built these things, that identified weaknesses and said, hey,
19:48
Speaker 1: we should discontinue this because, uh, there's some safety risks.
19:52
Speaker 1: One of the safety risks was a smaller containment design,
19:57
Speaker 1: which they said in nineteen seventy two might be more
20:00
Speaker 1: susceptible to explosion and rupture from a build up of hydrogen.
20:04
Speaker 1: So that it seems to be what happened here in Japan. Uh.
20:09
Speaker 1: Obviously g is not on the hook or anything they
20:11
Speaker 1: you know, once you take control of your nuclear power
20:15
Speaker 1: plant as a nation, it's yours, and it's not like
20:18
Speaker 1: you can call up GE and say, hey, Jerk's you
20:20
Speaker 1: know what about all this? So Japan was responsible for,
20:24
Speaker 1: you know, caring upkeep of their own thing. Uh. And
20:28
Speaker 1: apparently the mark ones in the United States have undergone
20:31
Speaker 1: a lot of modifications over the years, one of which
20:35
Speaker 1: is a change to the Tourists, which is a water
20:38
Speaker 1: filled vessel that encircles the primary containment vessels. So there's
20:42
Speaker 1: all these things in place, uh in the seventies and
20:45
Speaker 1: eighties that the US put in place at our mark
20:47
Speaker 1: ones that they say will prevent something like this. I
20:50
Speaker 1: don't know what was going on in Japan. If they
20:53
Speaker 1: were modified at all over the years, I'm sure that'll
20:57
Speaker 1: all come out. Well. Apparently at some point starting to
21:00
Speaker 1: apparently some UM, at least one G engineer for the
21:03
Speaker 1: Mark one resigned UM because he thought the Mark one
21:06
Speaker 1: was so flawed and apparently G wasn't doing anything about it.
21:09
Speaker 1: This was in the early seventies. But UM, some G
21:12
Speaker 1: whistle blowers UM blue Well blew the whistle on the
21:16
Speaker 1: Fukushima plant UM because apparently they falsified records before UM
21:22
Speaker 1: they they used dishonest practices in UM monitoring their own
21:27
Speaker 1: radioactive output, and there was a lack of safety culture
21:31
Speaker 1: basically by by the company's own admission. This is interesting
21:35
Speaker 1: to see what Ramifications is going to have a nuclear
21:37
Speaker 1: power because there was a pretty good track record for
21:40
Speaker 1: a couple of decades and a lot of people it's
21:43
Speaker 1: starting to come around again. Well yeah, and saying this
21:46
Speaker 1: is actually a green uh fuel producing technology because it
21:49
Speaker 1: doesn't produce carbon and we got a good track record
21:54
Speaker 1: and it's pretty safe now and these things are like
21:56
Speaker 1: super safe. They can withstand all these different things. What
22:00
Speaker 1: they couldn't withstand was a combination in Japan's case of
22:03
Speaker 1: these things like earthquakes and tsunamis Well, Chuck, it had
22:07
Speaker 1: a good twenty year run where it was starting to
22:10
Speaker 1: like gain tracks again. Nuclear power was um because it
22:15
Speaker 1: was trying to emerge from the shadow of Three Mile Island. Right,
22:18
Speaker 1: the the partial fuel melt which is the correct term
22:22
Speaker 1: meltdown is not actually used in the industry, we should say, yeah,
22:25
Speaker 1: but partial fuel melt in in Pennsylvania, that's right. And
22:30
Speaker 1: that was, like you said, Three Mile Island, which is
22:32
Speaker 1: categorized as a level five disaster, which had had local consequences.
22:37
Speaker 1: It was like the fuel melted and pulled, but it
22:39
Speaker 1: didn't um, It didn't escape the containment vessel, but some
22:43
Speaker 1: radio active material was released into the surrounding area. But
22:46
Speaker 1: it scared the tar out of everybody. Well, China syndrome
22:51
Speaker 1: didn't help much. Yeah, that that's true too. Um. And
22:53
Speaker 1: so this uh disaster in Japan right now is categorized.
22:57
Speaker 1: I've seen it as a six, I've seen it as
22:59
Speaker 1: a five, ending on who you ask, but either way
23:01
Speaker 1: it's it's not a good situation obviously. So um, what
23:05
Speaker 1: we do know is that as it stands right now,
23:07
Speaker 1: at least, it's not a Chernobyl and Chernobyl was a
23:11
Speaker 1: level seven, which is as bad as it can get.
23:13
Speaker 1: The in Chernobyl was a different scenario as well, definitely,
23:16
Speaker 1: so um, there were a lot of differences. Remember we
23:19
Speaker 1: talked about water being a neutron modulator. Well, Chernobyl's design
23:23
Speaker 1: used water as a coolant but had graphics graphite as
23:26
Speaker 1: a neutron modulator um. When their system failed, the graphite
23:30
Speaker 1: caught fire and spewed radioactive smoke, which you'll remember is
23:34
Speaker 1: the worst stuff to have into the atmosphere for ten
23:37
Speaker 1: days before they got ahold of it. Yeah, and they
23:40
Speaker 1: also tried to keep it quiet, which isn't a wise
23:43
Speaker 1: move when you're talking nuclear meltdown. And by all indications,
23:46
Speaker 1: Japan has been very forthcoming. Uh here, they're trying to
23:50
Speaker 1: get good information out. Really, they kept this They kept
23:52
Speaker 1: the fire at Um reactor for Um quiet for for
23:58
Speaker 1: enough hours that it ruined credibility. Basically, Yeah, so no
24:02
Speaker 1: one's quite sure. Plus Japan's like, we just need a
24:05
Speaker 1: twelve mile radius between twelve twelve miles, get out of
24:08
Speaker 1: their twelve and nineteen miles, steal up your home. And
24:11
Speaker 1: the US is like, we say fifty miles and any
24:14
Speaker 1: American that shows up at Narita Airport gets a free
24:16
Speaker 1: flight out of here. Yeah, so the Japanese are probably saying,
24:19
Speaker 1: I've listened to the guys in America. No they're not
24:22
Speaker 1: broadcasting it. Well, no, Americans is getting broadcast over there. Well,
24:26
Speaker 1: the citizens if they knew this, right, what about Facebook?
24:28
Speaker 1: And so I'm sure it's getting out like that. But apparently,
24:31
Speaker 1: like the Japanese media is they they're known to not
24:34
Speaker 1: really criticize the government. It's just not their culture. Yeah.
24:37
Speaker 1: I got a really good friend in Tokyo and he's
24:39
Speaker 1: uh gone to Osaka right now with his family, two
24:43
Speaker 1: small kids. He's not trying to be panicky, but he's
24:46
Speaker 1: also got two small kids and he's just kind of
24:48
Speaker 1: playing at safe right now. So we should talk about radiation.
24:51
Speaker 1: I guess it's actually small kids that are at the
24:53
Speaker 1: biggest risk about this um with radio How do you
24:58
Speaker 1: measure radiation, Chuck? You measure Josh with a unit called
25:01
Speaker 1: a millisievert, and it measures the absorption into the human
25:06
Speaker 1: body specifically, not like how much is in the air,
25:09
Speaker 1: This is how much you're absorbing. How much is dangerous
25:11
Speaker 1: to you? So you can measure it in millisievert or
25:15
Speaker 1: mic receiver. But the one that's like when you get
25:17
Speaker 1: to one severt, which would be a thousand millisieverts or
25:22
Speaker 1: a million microceiverts. Um, that's when you are in big trouble.
25:28
Speaker 1: One thousand mic receiverts and a millisievert and then how
25:31
Speaker 1: many millisieverts and a sivert a thousand thousand? Yeah, okay,
25:34
Speaker 1: so one sivert I think gives you a ten percent
25:38
Speaker 1: chance of dying in thirty days. And it's that's just bad.
25:42
Speaker 1: That's ridiculous exposure. I don't think anybody's recorded any levels
25:46
Speaker 1: like that, right, Yeah, but let's put this into perspective. Um.
25:50
Speaker 1: Right now, they're saying in you're you're probably hearing on
25:53
Speaker 1: the news, like a hundred and sixty seven times the
25:55
Speaker 1: average annual dose that human gets because we get radiation.
26:00
Speaker 1: I think Americans get six point two millissy verts a
26:03
Speaker 1: year through uh, medical diagnostic procedures, dental X rays, flights, flying, smoking,
26:11
Speaker 1: going through those full body scanners, smoking one and a
26:14
Speaker 1: half packs of cigarettes today, thirteen millisy verts per year.
26:19
Speaker 1: I am radioactive. Yeah, well you're you're getting it out
26:23
Speaker 1: of your system. But yes, I am, But I still
26:25
Speaker 1: probably AM because radioactivity is cumulative, which is why they
26:31
Speaker 1: break it up into um millisy verts per hour or
26:35
Speaker 1: melissy roots per year because after a little bit of time,
26:38
Speaker 1: your body can process this stuff, or the half life
26:41
Speaker 1: of it is spent and it's not deadly any longer. Right.
26:44
Speaker 1: But the big problem is when it is still um
26:47
Speaker 1: in full bore, a radioactive material, and it's absorbed through
26:51
Speaker 1: your skin. You can breathe it in, you can get
26:54
Speaker 1: it in through your tongue, your ears, your eyes, your hair,
26:57
Speaker 1: everywhere you can you can absorb this radioact the material UM.
27:01
Speaker 1: And apparently one of the biggest threats or the biggest
27:05
Speaker 1: known threat, is UM. Like I said earlier, I died
27:09
Speaker 1: one right, io dine right, iodine one thirty one. So
27:14
Speaker 1: that's important because iodied it's actually counteracts the effects of radiation.
27:18
Speaker 1: And people are snapping this up. Apparently drug store dot
27:21
Speaker 1: com is sold out of iodide right now, right, so
27:23
Speaker 1: fake iodide is even being sold. There's warnings now about
27:26
Speaker 1: buying fake iodie, I know. And people are eating iodide
27:29
Speaker 1: salt and the some I think, like the Salt Council
27:32
Speaker 1: came out and said that's not going to do anything
27:34
Speaker 1: for you. The reason, um, people are eating iodied and
27:38
Speaker 1: buying iodide salt tablets, which they should frankly be selling
27:44
Speaker 1: or sending them, not selling them, sending them to Japan.
27:46
Speaker 1: You don't need them here in the US. They actually
27:48
Speaker 1: do need them in Japan. UM, with iodine one one,
27:53
Speaker 1: it's a it's a radioactive byproduct of nuclear fission, right,
27:58
Speaker 1: or uranium specifically, And when you absorb that, your thyroid
28:02
Speaker 1: gets this big fat, heavy dose of it. And the
28:06
Speaker 1: thyroid is responsible for some very fast dividing cells. So
28:10
Speaker 1: once a cell is compromised in your thyroid, that radioactivity
28:14
Speaker 1: is going to spread like gangbusters through your body, especially
28:17
Speaker 1: if you're a kid, because you have faster than normal
28:20
Speaker 1: dividing cells anyway. Right, So that's why thyroid cancer tends
28:24
Speaker 1: to go up in cases of radioactive exposure. UM, if
28:29
Speaker 1: you take iodide, your thyroid actually is going to get
28:33
Speaker 1: as much iodide as it can, but it has a
28:36
Speaker 1: saturation level. So if you if you expose it to
28:40
Speaker 1: iodide before you're exposed radioactive iodine, your thyroid is gonna
28:46
Speaker 1: be full up and be like sorry, no more room
28:48
Speaker 1: for iodine here radioactive or otherwise, and even better, iodine
28:53
Speaker 1: one one has a half life of eight days, So
28:57
Speaker 1: all you have to do is basically make sure your
28:59
Speaker 1: thyroids full of io died for eight days in your set.
29:03
Speaker 1: And uh, if you're worried here in the US. UM,
29:06
Speaker 1: there's been stuff on the news about the radioactive plume
29:10
Speaker 1: crossing the ocean. Apparently the nuclear submarine the Ronald Reagan
29:15
Speaker 1: cruise right on through it the other day and the
29:18
Speaker 1: material was removed with soap and water and it's contamination free.
29:22
Speaker 1: And they said, basically, the steam that's coming across the
29:26
Speaker 1: ocean is less dangerous than living in Denver, Colorado for
29:29
Speaker 1: a year, because when you live at high altitudes, you
29:32
Speaker 1: have less atmosphere to block radiation. And just living in Denver,
29:37
Speaker 1: Colorado means you have more radiation than the average American, right,
29:41
Speaker 1: plus still a very small amount. So I'm not saying
29:43
Speaker 1: people in Denver should be like, oh, I need to move, Yeah,
29:46
Speaker 1: right exactly. They're also, um, it's not factoring in crime.
29:50
Speaker 1: Even you get hit by a bus, you can get
29:52
Speaker 1: shot in Denver. Or if you're a smoker, if you
29:54
Speaker 1: go to the Dennists and get your head X rate,
29:56
Speaker 1: it's like you get radioactive uh, radioactive as a human being,
30:01
Speaker 1: and a little more so as an American. I think that, Yeah,
30:03
Speaker 1: I think we're I think the media is fanning the
30:07
Speaker 1: flames of us losing our perspective as far as radiation
30:10
Speaker 1: hysteria goes absolutely, Um, what else is there? Chuckers, Well,
30:15
Speaker 1: this was just off the news wire about twenty minutes ago.
30:19
Speaker 1: They said that they have picked up some small amounts
30:22
Speaker 1: of radioactive material in Sacramento. But it was minuscule, is
30:28
Speaker 1: what they're saying, not harmful to human health, and so
30:32
Speaker 1: people on the West Coast don't need to be freaking
30:34
Speaker 1: out at this point from what we can tell. So
30:37
Speaker 1: people in Japan should be worried, but they're even saying
30:40
Speaker 1: in Japan, like, you know, let's see what we can
30:42
Speaker 1: do here. You don't need to be leaving leaving the country.
30:44
Speaker 1: On maths, if you UM hear a report that there
30:50
Speaker 1: is radiation coming our way, ask what's the level. If
30:54
Speaker 1: it's in micro siverts, I would advise you not to worry.
30:57
Speaker 1: If it's in millisy verts, start to wonder exactly how
31:00
Speaker 1: many mility words. If it's um a hundred or less,
31:05
Speaker 1: then you are within e p A standards. For radiation exposure,
31:10
Speaker 1: but you should probably consider maybe getting out of town
31:12
Speaker 1: for a little while. Um. But I think maybe keeping
31:15
Speaker 1: a calm head and not buying up all the iodide
31:18
Speaker 1: tablets in the world is probably a good idea at
31:20
Speaker 1: this point. Yeah. I got one more little factoid. This
31:22
Speaker 1: interesting for all the news agencies that are fanning the flames.
31:27
Speaker 1: Apparently Grand Central Station, New York City, the granite there
31:32
Speaker 1: and the uranium lay stone used at the US Capitol
31:35
Speaker 1: Building supposedly give off enough radiation that they would not
31:39
Speaker 1: pass a nuclear power plants licensing test, So they're pretty
31:45
Speaker 1: strict with the licensing. People walking around Grand Central Station
31:48
Speaker 1: aren't in danger of dying from nuclear radiations, so that
31:52
Speaker 1: just kind of puts it into perspective, or are they.
31:57
Speaker 1: I wish we had the law and order do doom
31:59
Speaker 1: the play that was appropriate. Well, I guess it's about it.
32:01
Speaker 1: Do you have anything else, Chuck? No? No, Okay, Hopefully
32:05
Speaker 1: you guys have a better understanding of what's going on there.
32:07
Speaker 1: I know I do. Um Our hearts and minds are
32:10
Speaker 1: with everybody in Japan. Uh, keep keep thinking of them.
32:15
Speaker 1: Maybe send some money, you send some I dye, send
32:18
Speaker 1: some lifestraws. Apparently lifestraws are being sent over there, uh
32:21
Speaker 1: in some of these rescue boxes. Yes, kind of cool.
32:24
Speaker 1: I saw it too. And there's always red cross, right yes, um,
32:29
Speaker 1: And I guess since that's about it. Oh, if you
32:31
Speaker 1: want to learn more, type in Japan's nuclear crisis in
32:35
Speaker 1: the handy search bar at how stuff works dot com.
32:37
Speaker 1: It will bring up um A just a really great
32:41
Speaker 1: overview of what's going on over there. Um. And since
32:44
Speaker 1: I said handy search bar, it's time for a listener mail. Yeah, Josh,
32:50
Speaker 1: I thought it'd be appropriate today. You asked UM a
32:52
Speaker 1: few weeks ago about if you're involved in a program
32:54
Speaker 1: it's helping the world out send it in. We got
32:56
Speaker 1: a few of these and we're reading them periodically, and
32:59
Speaker 1: this like an appropriate podcast to do. So. So this
33:02
Speaker 1: is from Paul C in Canada and he's involved in
33:06
Speaker 1: a program in Northern Canada helping to start up a
33:09
Speaker 1: project with a group of First Nation folks who are
33:11
Speaker 1: being super proactive about reclaiming and protecting their culture and language.
33:17
Speaker 1: The and it's spelled t l I C h Oh.
33:19
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna go with licho or licho thank that
33:24
Speaker 1: skin probably wrong are concerned that their traditional knowledge and
33:27
Speaker 1: ways of life are not being passed onto their young
33:29
Speaker 1: people who are leaving to find jobs and go to college.
33:32
Speaker 1: In response, they're creating a program to hire some of
33:35
Speaker 1: their dedicated young people for the summer to learn their
33:37
Speaker 1: traditional ways of life. We are looking for some funding
33:41
Speaker 1: to get the program off the ground. We have applied
33:43
Speaker 1: to an organization called Small Change Fund. Uh struck me
33:47
Speaker 1: that you folks have a sizeable Canadian brigade in your stuff.
33:51
Speaker 1: You should know army and I'm hoping that you can
33:53
Speaker 1: help me spread the word about the Small Change Fund.
33:56
Speaker 1: I'm of course biased towards my program, which is the
33:59
Speaker 1: Litchko Summer Culture Education Program. It sounds like a good program,
34:04
Speaker 1: but the small Change Fund website as a whole is
34:06
Speaker 1: really full of great worthwhile social and environmental programs, all
34:10
Speaker 1: looking for small amounts of startup funding less than five grand.
34:14
Speaker 1: If you could mention the small Change Fund website, that
34:17
Speaker 1: is small Change fund dot org to your Canadian fans
34:22
Speaker 1: and everyone. Actually, I will gladly take you guys fishing
34:25
Speaker 1: and give you all big high fives when you come
34:27
Speaker 1: up to yellow Knife in w T Do I think
34:30
Speaker 1: is Northwest Territory. I think it is. It's my guess,
34:35
Speaker 1: and UH do a podcast on the northern lights or
34:37
Speaker 1: work how Caribou migration works, or how to survive in
34:41
Speaker 1: negative forty degrees or some other such a northern thing.
34:45
Speaker 1: So that is from policy and that is the Small
34:47
Speaker 1: Change Fund dot org. And his program is the t
34:50
Speaker 1: l I c h O Summer Culture Education Program. So
34:55
Speaker 1: stop buying ms it. It sounds like a good program.
34:58
Speaker 1: Thank you, it's Paul. See thanks Paul. Good idea. UM,
35:03
Speaker 1: if you have a good idea or you have a
35:06
Speaker 1: good idea on how to help Japan, how about that? Yeah? Specifically,
35:10
Speaker 1: go on our Facebook, stuff Facebook dot com, slash stuff
35:13
Speaker 1: you should Know, tweet it to us um s y
35:16
Speaker 1: s K podcast, or send its plain old email to
35:20
Speaker 1: stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com. For more
35:28
Speaker 1: on this and thousands of other topics. Is it how
35:30
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Want more how stuff works, check
35:34
Speaker 1: out our blogs on the house stuff works dot com
35:36
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