Taishan nuclear plant: China admits damage to fuel rods

[SouthBayDem]

Source: BBC

The Chinese government has acknowledged damage to fuel rods at a nuclear power plant in the south of the country, but said no radioactivity had leaked.

China's Ministry of Ecology and Environment said the problem was "common" with no need for concern.

The admission comes after CNN reported that the US government was assessing a reported leak at the facility.

The French energy firm which helps operate the plant in Guangdong province earlier reported a "performance issue".

Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-57496831

[pdxflyboy]

1. The Chinese government said

“No radioactivity leaked”……Yeah, I believe that.

[AZLD4Candidate]

9. The chinese government said. . .

from my experience living there, those are four words that should instantly trigger a BS detector.

[inwiththenew]

2. Only 3.6 Roentgen

[NutmegYankee]

5. Clearly a control tank explosion and leaking feed water...

[Baitball Blogger]

3. They were so forthcoming with Covid, so...

[dalton99a]

8. +1. It's rather obvious that the local party chief is in charge, not the plant engineers

[BootinUp]

4. Nothing to see here. (It's invisible) nt

[PoliticAverse]

6. "performance issue" - euphemism of the day. n/t

[Javaman]

7. what they really mean....

"The Chinese government has acknowledged damage to fuel rods at a nuclear power plant in the south of the country, but said no radioactivity had leaked."

meltdown

"China's Ministry of Ecology and Environment said the problem was "common" with no need for concern."

meltdown.



I would put the sarcasm thing but I'm not really sure if I want to use that.

[getagrip_already]

10. From the BBC article....

"An increase in radiation levels was detected in Taishan's Unit 1 reactor, but this was within the parameters for safe operations, the ministry said."

"In its report, CNN said the company had warned the US government that China's nuclear regulator had raised limits on permissible levels of radiation outside the plant to avoid shutting it down."

=Radiation leak

"The ministry said the increase was caused by damage to the cladding of a small number of fuel rods. Fuel rods are sealed metal tubes which hold nuclear materials used to fuel the nuclear reactor."

=Melted Rods... aka meltdown

"Of the 60,000 fuel rods in the reactor, the damaged ones accounted for "less than 0.01 percent", the ministry said."

There are usually 200 rods in a bundle. 6 Damaged rods is a significant problem. But it was probably many more.

=lying liars who are lying.

[FBaggins]

12. Damage to cladding is not a meltdown

It isn't even all that rare.

If the reactor is still operating at full power (which appears to be the case), then they're measuring the amount of noble gases in the primary coolant flow and estimating how many rods must have cladding damage. They haven't shut down and inspected the bundles themselves.

[BootinUp]

13. And chocolate rations have been increased too! Nt

[thesquanderer]

11. I understand it's because bats flew into the cooling towers. (n/t)

[paleotn]

14. Meaning we know about as much about what happened as we did yesterday..

which is equal to nothing. A performance issue....well, that could run the gamut from minor blip to Chernobyl I suppose.

[roamer65]

15. Being of French design, I assume it's a BWR.

I much prefer CANDU reactors to BWR.

No need for uranium enrichment on a CANDU reactor.

[FBaggins]

16. It's a 3rd generation PWR

The first completed EPR (European Pressurised Reactor) in the world (late 2018).