If you’re still aggravating to get your arch captivated about how nuclear reactors like the ones in Fukushima operate, and what went amiss afterwards the Tohoku earthquake, Mother Jones beat adolescent Joe Kloc ability be able to help. He’s put calm a chic diagram of the cooling arrangement from a GE Mark 1 nuclear reactor—the affectionate begin in 5 of the 6 reactors at Fukushima Daiichi. By appearance in the pipelines he demonstrates how coolant is declared to breeze through the reactor normally, and how it’s declared to breeze during assorted emergency abeyance situations.
This adaptation of the diagram shows accustomed operation.
Mark I Reactor Running Normally: Recirculation loops (RED) accumulate pressurized baptize circulating through the uranium amount of the reactor. When baptize is acrimonious by the uranium amount it turns to steam. It passes through the beef separator and dryer assemblies positioned aloft the amount (ORANGE) and afresh moves through the beef pipe. The beef is acclimated to about-face a agent affiliated (PURPLE) to an electrical generator. It is afresh angry aback into aqueous by a condenser and cooled by a aqueduct (GREY) of circulating algid water. The baptize is afresh pumped aback into the reactor, area the action begins again.
I accept attempted to actualize a diagram of the reactors based on the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Boiling Baptize Reactor Systems Manual, which contains maps of the assorted Mark I emergency systems. In places area the chiral was unclear, I acclimated Japanese account broadcasts. The cartoon is not to calibration and the blueprint of the pipes absolutely my own (though their area in affiliation to the assorted ascendancy walls is based on the USNRC manual). To my knowledge, the diagram is authentic to the admeasurement that a New York City alms map is accurate. It shows the assorted components, connections, and relationships amid the emergency baptize systems.