waste systems. we know that the gaseous waste system was destroyed in the explosions. if they don t deal with this, we are out of the apocalyptic scenarios of core melting and things like that. that s clearly no longer the issue. the prospect of potentially spilling massive quantities of highly contaminated water really, really worries me. what would you normally do with contaminated water? normally, anderson, we have systems where you process it through a sort of demineralizers and charcoal filters. you take the gaseous waste that s gone off and you process it as well to allow it to decay. we take the solids, they get packaged up and sent off to rad waste facilities around the globe. but all of those systems have been damaged over the last two weeks. again, it shouldn t be any big surprise to them and they should have been putting in place steps
trees, i worry that the accident management that s going on, that they re not being able to stay one or two steps ahead of the evolution. we should have known that there was going to be millions of gallons of contaminated water that needed to be addressed at some point in time. and the ability to handle that should have been something that got put in motion days ago, if not weeks ago. i mean, the fact of the matter is, these tanks are filling up, we continue to inject water. normal operations would have had them using their gaseous rad waste systems. we know that the gaseous waste system was destroyed in the explosions. if they don t deal with this, we are out of the apocalyptic scenarios of core melting and things like that. that s clearly no longer the issue. the prospect of potentially spilling massive quantities of highly contaminated water really, really worries me.
was the one they were most worried about the core melting and that s why they decided to go for that reactor rather than the others. but as i say, that s just my best guess. in terms of what might happen and how they re sort of triaging the different reactors and the different areas of this plant that require attention, how concerned are you about the fission, nuclear fission process starting again, about there being a recriticality in one of these reactors or in one of the spent fuel pools? well, the truth is, rachel, it s actually very hard to know. these reactors and these spent fuel pools are in a regime that they were never designed to operate in. and there s actually a lot of disagreement within the technical and scientific communities about exactly what the risks are here. let me give you one example. on this issue of whether the fuel rods in the spent fuel pools can start burning if the water level drops, you know, the national academy of science wrote a report in 2006 sayi
made the decision to go for unit 2 first. but if you remember, a couple of days ago there was an explosion. and unlike the explosions we saw at 1 and 3 that led to all that mangled mess on the outside of the plant, the explosion at 2 was on the inside of the plant, and it has potentially damaged that key giant concrete and reinforced reinforced concrete and steel tomb-like internal containment structure. so my guess, and this is only just a guess, is that when they made the decision about where they were going to lay this line to they decided that reactor 2 was the one they were most worried about the core melting and that s why they decided to go for that reactor rather than the others. but as i say, that s just my best guess. in terms of what might happen and how they re sort of triaging the different reactors and the different areas of this plant that require attention, how concerned are you about the fission, nuclear fission process starting again, about there being a recritica
was the one they were most worried about the core melting and that s why they decided to go for that reactor rather than the others. but as i say, that s just my best guess. in terms of what might happen and how they re sort of triaging the different reactors and the different areas of this plant that require attention, how concerned are you about the fission, nuclear fission process starting again, about there being a recriticality in one of these reactors or in one of the spent fuel pools? well, the truth is, rachel, it s actually very hard to know. these reactors and these spent fuel pools are in a regime that they were never designed to operate in. and there s actually a lot of disagreement within the technical and scientific communities about exactly what the risks are here. let me give you one example. on this issue of whether the fuel rods in the spent fuel pools can start burning if the water level drops, you know, the national academy of science wrote a report in 2006 sayi