BoatBanter.com - View Single Post

[email protected]

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 20:11:30 -0400, wrote:

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 11:04:10 -0700, wrote:

On Wed, 16 Mar 2011 01:46:39 -0400, wrote:

Seems to me that if the water was released in a controlled fashion at
the beginning of the problem, there wouldn't be a requirement for that
vast an amount of water.

These reactors do not stop on a dime and the fuel rods continue to
generate heat long after the reactor is "scrammed"

Yes, I understand how they work. What I'm proposing is that there be a
reservoir that is gravity fed. If there's a backup pump failure, the
water in the reservoir would be deployed over a period of time until
either it ran out or the backup pumps came back online. It wouldn't be
perfect, but it would at least delay the over-heating. It would add
some time to the equation.

That is actually a pretty good idea but it still requires having a
lake. That might not be a bad idea when you are picking a site.

The whole Roman plumbing system was gravity fed and most "citizens"
had running water in their house.
The trick is having your aqueduct survive the earthquake.

I was thinking since many plants are not near the ocean, near a lake
would work.

If it were a closed system... lake water flows into the plant, cools
the reactor, then flows down hill, it could generate enough energy
(with a boost from the heat produced) to create enough power to pump
some of the water back to the lake. The water would be contaminated,
but it would be better than a meltdown.

I would have the plant very close to the lake... just down hill from
it.