Thermoacoustic Thermometry for Nuclear Reactor Monitoring
On Friday, March 11, 2011, at 2:46pm (Japan Standard Trme), the Tohoku region on the east coast of northern Japan experienced what would become known as the largest earthquake in the country's history at magnitude 9.0 on the Richter scale. The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant suffered extensive and irreversible damage. Six operating units were at the site, each with a boiling water reactor. When the earthquake struck, three of the six reactors were operating and the others were in a periodic inspection outage phase. In one reactor, all of the fuel had been relocated to a spent fuel pool in the reactor building. The seismic acceleration caused by the earthquake brought the three operating units to an automatic shutdown. Since there was damage to the power transmission lines, the emergency diesel generators (EDG) were automatically started to ensure continued cooling of the reactors and spent fuel pools. The situation was under control until the tsunami hit about forty-five minutes later with a maximum wave height of approximately 15 meters, which was three times taller than the sea wall of 5m. The influx of water submerged the EDGs, the electrical switchgear, and dc batteries, resulting in the total loss of power to five of the six reactors. The flooding also resulted in the loss of instrumentation that would have other wise been used to monitor and control the emergency. The ugly aftermath included high radiation exposure to operators at the nuclear power plants and early contamination of food supplies and water within several restricted areas in Japan, where high radiation levels have rendered them unsafe for human habitation. While the rest of the story will remain a tragic history, it is this part of the series of unfortunate events that has inspired our research. It has indubitably highlighted the need for a novel sensor and instrumentation system that can withstand similar or worse conditions to avoid future catastrophe and assume damage prevention as quickly as possible. This is the question which we are attempting to answer: Is it possible to implement a self-powered sensor that could transmit data independently of electronic networks while taking advantage of the harsh operating environment of the nuclear reactor?
- Research Organization:
- Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- DOE - NE
- DOE Contract Number:
- DE-AC07-05ID14517
- OSTI ID:
- 1132589
- Report Number(s):
- INL/JOU-13-28094
- Journal Information:
- IEEE Instrumentation and Measurement Magazine, Vol. 16, Issue 3
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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