Japan’s Nuclear Reactor Cutaway

Click on the image above to see a full-scale [6MB], poster-size scan of a Japanese advanced boiling water nuclear reactor [ABWR]. Though the image above is NOT the Fukushima Dai-ichi reactor, it closely resembles the design of that plant. You can also download the PDF here.

A few quick notes (though the major point of this post was to show off this amazing cutaway). Japan is a world leader in utilization of clean, nuclear energy, and produces about 34% of its energy with its 50 nuclear reactors. To hop up on my soapbox for  a brief moment, allow me to say something about the tragic events in Japan, in order for us all to maintain a clear head, in spite of the destruction and pandemonium being played up in the media:

• The amount of radiation currently leaking into the atmosphere from Fukushima Dai-ichi is about as much as you’d get from eating 1-2 bananas a day for a year [source]. Granted, this could quickly change, but for now it looks relatively benign.
• Radioactive isotopes that are released do not last millions of years, as is commonly thought. The half life of the two most common isotopes from fallout (caesium and iodine) is 30 years and 8 days, respectively. This means that most radiation from a nuclear disaster will naturally decay quickly. [source and source]
• Burning coal for power is 100 times more radioactive than the radiation from nuclear waste [source]
• Litigation and regulation are stalling 351 U.S. energy projects that could create as many as 1.9 million jobs and increase the nation’s gross domestic product by $1.1 trillion. [source]
• The U.S. and Russia has a stockpile of outdated, dangerous plutonium from Cold War weapons. What would normally be stored as nuclear waste could be re-processed into fuel (MOX) to provide a low-carbon source of energy. Highly-enriched uranium in US and Russian weapons and other military stockpiles is equal to about 12 times the annual world mine production. [source]