At the same time, the reactor system would have no need for fuel handling, all of which helps to alleviate proliferation concerns.
FORBES: After Fukushima, U.S. Seeks to Advance Small Nuclear Reactors
However, since the UK will most likely adopt a single reactor system for all its new nuclear power plants, there will only be one type of waste stream.
Hours earlier, the plant operator switched off a reactor cooling system after discovering rats near critical equipment.
When the Chernobyl reactor in the Ukraine melted down, an entire reactor with virtually no containment system exploded, spewing huge amounts of radioactive material into the air, where they were blown by the wind into habitable areas.
An alarm at reactor number three earlier revealed the system had stopped at one of the pools containing spent, but highly radioactive, fuel rods.
Some of the suggestions include using molten lead as the coolant for the system, but the reactor would run at a temperature above 700 degrees C. when the material becomes corrosive.
Officials discovered the system failure after an alarm sounded at reactor number three.
Even before the reported explosion, officials were becoming increasingly worried about No. 2 reactor, due to a problem in the cooling system that hasn't occurred in the others.
Tepco is developing a few measures, including a system that would pump groundwater away from the reactor buildings so there would be less contaminated liquid to deal with, and another that would remove all radioactive elements from the water so it could be released safely into the environment.
While it's almost impossible to determine exactly where the next reactor will crop up, we've developed our own handicapping system to boil down the choices somewhat.
On site, the workers in its number one reactor appear not to have been familiar with an emergency-cooling system called an isolation condenser, which they wrongly thought was still working after the tsunami.
Thursday marked the second time in a month that the reactor has been shut down, following an August 22 leak in a heating system used to pressurize water.
CNN: Pump triggers Three Mile Island reactor shutdown, NRC says
In early April, the cooling system at one of the pools containing spent - but highly radioactive - fuel rods in reactor number three broke down for about three hours.
If the pumps are knocked out in a Generation II reactor as they were at Fukushima Daiichi by the tsunami the water in the cooling system can overheat and evaporate.
应用推荐