This is a very big accusation,
but I feel obliged to state it.
Le document d'Areva sur Fukushima
Look At the above Document, Read Page 11. See Where it says Battery Power Required?
Now look at this...
It's a bit hard to read, but, the NRC says "The RCIC system consists of a turbine-driven pump, piping, and valves necessary to deliver water to the reactor vessel at operating conditions." Note What they Left out. Nothing says "Battery Power to the Recirc Pump is critical to this system"
I diaried on Fukushima here http://www.dailykos.com/... and I couldn't understand why the RCIC died.
They died because GE and the NRC lied. They never said the RCIC must have power to the recirc pump as well. That means every other GE BWR is vulnerable to a station blackout just like this. Any loss of Station power and Backup Gennies, and that's it. Meltdown.
We saw that at Unit 1,3 and later at 2,
When we have a large event like a Katrina or like a Richter 8 quake, we will see it here.
If you want to see some video of Meg Shilling she glosses over this
at http://www.engineering.iastate.edu/...
She mentions it en passant.
So does the NRC
http://www.nrc.gov/....
http://www.nrc.gov/...
Loss of onsite and offsite ac power results in the unavailability of the high-pressure injection system, the containment spray system, the inside and outside containment spray recirculation systems, and the motor-driven auxiliary feedwater pumps. While the loss of all ac power does not affect instrumentation at the start of the station blackout, a long duration station blackout leads to battery depletion
and subsequent loss of vital instrumentation. Battery depletion was concluded
to occur after approximately 4 hours. The ability to subsequently provide decay heat removal with the turbine-driven AFW pump is lost because of the loss of all instrumentation and control power. Using information from Reference 3.5, approximately 3 hours beyond the time of battery depletion was allowed for restoration of ac power before core,,,,,
Loss of offsite power (LOSP) due to seismically induced failure of ceramic insulators in the switchyard, with simultaneous (seismic) failure of both high-pressure injection (HPI) and component cooling water (CCW) systems (the redundant sources of seal cooling).
Failures of HPI result from seismic failures of the refueling water storage tank or emergency diesel generator load panels, while seismic failures of the diesels or the CCW
heat exchanger supports result in loss of the CCW system.
,,,,,
Loss of offsite power occurs followed by asubsequent failure of all onsite ac power. The
diesel generators fail to start because of failure of all the vital batteries. Without ac and dc power, all core cooling systems (including
HPCI and RCIC) and all containment heat removal systems fail. Core damage begins in
approximately 1 hour as a result of coolant boiloff.
* Loss of offsite power occurs followed by a subsequent failure of a safety relief valve to
reclose. All onsite ac power fails because the diesel generators fail to start and run from a variety of faults. The loss of all ac power fails most of the core cooling systems and all the containment heat removal systems. HPCI and RCIC (which are ac independent) are
available and either or both initially function but ultimately fail at approximately 10 hours
because of battery depletion or other late failure modes (e.g., loss of room cooling effects). Core damage results in 10 to 13 hours as a result of coolant boiloff.
The NRC knew and GE had to know that the Batteries become critical during a
station blackout and Station blackout is where all heck breaks loose.
All those cooling systems die, you are down to one pump and the batteries must
start the DG's.
The conclusion of the NRC’s initial study released in 1987 was that in the case of a severe ac- cident, there was a low degree of confidence that the re- actor would not release radiation. The GE containment was designed to vent radiation in order to avoid a cata- clysmic breach. “Station blackout accidents contribute a high percentage of the core damage frequency for the [GE] boiling water reactors,” says the study.
The Batteries are Critical for Station Survival, that means a large event that trips Grid power and SCRAMs the reactors means the Batteries must be able to start the Generators.
Generator Failure or Battery Failure and Boom, the Rac starts melting down in an hour.