4 ms·

air circulation around zirconium clad fuel rods is not a good thing. auto ignition becomes a high probability issue with the generation of hydrogen gas.

sassy_quat 5y ago
If only if this is reddit and I could call upon the remindme bot to see if you'll eventually be right. For now I wonder when this will happen.
- jeofken 5y ago
  Make a calendar entry with a link to the comment you want to remember
rectang 5y ago
- beloch 5y ago
  Predicting Putin is difficult at best. However, Chernobyl may have been captured simply because it's on one of the shortest paths to Kyiv. It may also be that the exclusion zone is a bit safer for troops to travel through than the surrounding areas. Residual radiation is nowhere nearly as deadly as a pissed off Ukrainian with an RPG. Also, Russians camped out in the exclusion zone probably don't have to worry about artillery or drone strikes. Ukrainian forces know better. If you're worried about nuclear catastrophe, the taking of the Zaporizhzhia power plant is far more concerning. Russians hit one of the buildings with rocket fire. It turned out to be a training building and not one of the reactors. We have to ask if that was deliberate or if everyone (the Russians included) just got lucky. Taking this power plant gave Russian forces control over a quarter of Ukraine's power generation, which has obvious strategic value. Ukrainian forces are also unlikely to counter-attack directly, for obvious reasons, so it should be easy for the Russians to hold. Finally, taking this plant hostage dealt a huge psychological blow to a country that remembers the Chernobyl incident.
- KerrAvon 5y ago
  Very unlikely. Where is Moscow geographically, in relation to Ukraine? What is the nature of an incident at a nuclear power plant that makes it concerning for neighbors potentially for thousands of miles around?
- dehrmann 5y ago
  - sterlind 5y ago
    I was actually in Pushkin tunnel 30 minutes before the bomb went off. Our host family was worried sick for us after seeing the news and immediately suggested it was a false flag to drum up support for the Chechen war. a whole nuke for a false flag seems less feasible though, for many reasons.
    - selfhoster11 5y ago
      I'm curious, why would a nuke be less feasible?
      - sterlind 5y ago
        in my view: anyone can build a suicide vest or IED. it's much harder to attribute than a nuke. even if you have the uranium, you need precisely-shaped explosive lenses and lots of machined parts for a regular atomic bomb, not to mention tritium and highly-classified knowledge for hydrogen bombs. you also can't covertly test it. even if you had a nuke that got lost in the 90s, you would need to replace its tritium , and likely other components. even after all that, you might be able to attribute the radioactive material by analyzing isotopes from the fallout. it'd just be a monumental stretch to claim the Ukrainians somehow assembled their own nuke in a matter of weeks. even with Russia's propaganda I can't see anyone inside the country or out buying it. a dirty bomb (the rumor Putin is running) is more feasible, since it's just a conventional bomb with radioactive shrapnel. but that's much less dramatic, and would be feasible to clean up without incurring many casualties, unless it's air-dropped. so I don't think a dirty bomb would be cause for thermonuclear retaliation - it plays more like using a chemical weapon. also, as crazy as Putin is, I have a hard time believing anyone at FSB would follow an order to nuke their own citizens.
        selfhoster11 5y ago
        I see how isotope fingerprinting can be a big issue in the plan. No way that the world at large wouldn't recognise this as a false flag attack if they got a 99% match with known Russian military nukes. That said, I don't see why people domestically wouldn't buy it. They could spin any number of stories, such as that a corrupt/kidnapped military/government official allowed the weapon to escape Russian custody and detonation control. Or they could just lie. Some fraction of people will believe it, either because they are not nuclear experts, or because it's repeated so often they'll start believing it eventually.
opwieurposiu 5y ago
Zirconium starts to make hydrogen from steam at 1000c. Air is not steam and spent fuel will not get to 1000c. https://www.nuclear-power.com/nuclear-power-plant/nuclear-fuel/fuel-assembly/fuel-cladding-cladding-tube/high-temperature-steam-oxidation-of-zirconium-alloys/ https://www.nuclear-power.com/nuclear-power-plant/nuclear-fu...

sassy_quat 5y ago

If only if this is reddit and I could call upon the remindme bot to see if you'll eventually be right. For now I wonder when this will happen.

jeofken 5y ago
Make a calendar entry with a link to the comment you want to remember

rectang 5y ago

beloch 5y ago
Predicting Putin is difficult at best. However, Chernobyl may have been captured simply because it's on one of the shortest paths to Kyiv. It may also be that the exclusion zone is a bit safer for troops to travel through than the surrounding areas. Residual radiation is nowhere nearly as deadly as a pissed off Ukrainian with an RPG. Also, Russians camped out in the exclusion zone probably don't have to worry about artillery or drone strikes. Ukrainian forces know better. If you're worried about nuclear catastrophe, the taking of the Zaporizhzhia power plant is far more concerning. Russians hit one of the buildings with rocket fire. It turned out to be a training building and not one of the reactors. We have to ask if that was deliberate or if everyone (the Russians included) just got lucky. Taking this power plant gave Russian forces control over a quarter of Ukraine's power generation, which has obvious strategic value. Ukrainian forces are also unlikely to counter-attack directly, for obvious reasons, so it should be easy for the Russians to hold. Finally, taking this plant hostage dealt a huge psychological blow to a country that remembers the Chernobyl incident.
KerrAvon 5y ago
Very unlikely. Where is Moscow geographically, in relation to Ukraine? What is the nature of an incident at a nuclear power plant that makes it concerning for neighbors potentially for thousands of miles around?
dehrmann 5y ago
- sterlind 5y ago
  I was actually in Pushkin tunnel 30 minutes before the bomb went off. Our host family was worried sick for us after seeing the news and immediately suggested it was a false flag to drum up support for the Chechen war. a whole nuke for a false flag seems less feasible though, for many reasons.
  - selfhoster11 5y ago
    I'm curious, why would a nuke be less feasible?
    - sterlind 5y ago
      in my view: anyone can build a suicide vest or IED. it's much harder to attribute than a nuke. even if you have the uranium, you need precisely-shaped explosive lenses and lots of machined parts for a regular atomic bomb, not to mention tritium and highly-classified knowledge for hydrogen bombs. you also can't covertly test it. even if you had a nuke that got lost in the 90s, you would need to replace its tritium , and likely other components. even after all that, you might be able to attribute the radioactive material by analyzing isotopes from the fallout. it'd just be a monumental stretch to claim the Ukrainians somehow assembled their own nuke in a matter of weeks. even with Russia's propaganda I can't see anyone inside the country or out buying it. a dirty bomb (the rumor Putin is running) is more feasible, since it's just a conventional bomb with radioactive shrapnel. but that's much less dramatic, and would be feasible to clean up without incurring many casualties, unless it's air-dropped. so I don't think a dirty bomb would be cause for thermonuclear retaliation - it plays more like using a chemical weapon. also, as crazy as Putin is, I have a hard time believing anyone at FSB would follow an order to nuke their own citizens.
      - selfhoster11 5y ago
        I see how isotope fingerprinting can be a big issue in the plan. No way that the world at large wouldn't recognise this as a false flag attack if they got a 99% match with known Russian military nukes. That said, I don't see why people domestically wouldn't buy it. They could spin any number of stories, such as that a corrupt/kidnapped military/government official allowed the weapon to escape Russian custody and detonation control. Or they could just lie. Some fraction of people will believe it, either because they are not nuclear experts, or because it's repeated so often they'll start believing it eventually.

opwieurposiu 5y ago

Zirconium starts to make hydrogen from steam at 1000c. Air is not steam and spent fuel will not get to 1000c. https://www.nuclear-power.com/nuclear-power-plant/nuclear-fuel/fuel-assembly/fuel-cladding-cladding-tube/high-temperature-steam-oxidation-of-zirconium-alloys/ https://www.nuclear-power.com/nuclear-power-plant/nuclear-fu...