Building the Fukushima Power Plant

Once a design was selected, several separate nuclear power plants were constructed in Fukushima. The two most important plants in the prefecture were the Fukushima Daiichi (daiichi means first ) and Fukushima Daiini ( second ) nuclear power plant complexes. In 1966, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCo) applied 

Filburn, S. BuUard, Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima, 

In the spring of 1967, before any constraction activity had started, a steep cliff face was present at the site of the future Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station. This cliff was a significant geographical feature of the site, and rose to an elevation of about 35 m O.P. (0. P. is Japanese for Onahama Peil, above the average sea level (Rhodes, 1986)). After a detailed cost-benefits analysis, TEPCO, the plants future operators, decided that the cliff should be removed before the plant was constructed. Thus, they hired the Ebasco Architect/Engineering firm to remove many thousands of cubic yards of soil from the cliff extending over 100 yards inland (Dawson, 2011). 

Removal of the cliff face was very costiy, and it would not initially seem to be the most economical way to anchor the reactor building. However, the cost of digging was a single, one-time expense, and a variety of other important, longer term financial and engineering considerations contributed to the decision to remove the cliff face. 

At Fukushima Daiichi Unit 1, an anticipated 920 MW of energy would be transferred to the sea every hour while the plant was operating at full-power (given fliat it would produce 460 MW of electric power, at a level of one third efficiency (Van Wylen and Sonntag, 1973), twice the energy would be rejected versus the electricity produced). If we assume that a 90 °F sea water temperature is the maximum that can be allowed for marines life safety, it is easy to calculate the minimum pumping power required for this process. It turns out that at full power operation, the Fukushima Daiichi sea water pumps would need to move about 220,000 gal/min to sufficiently cool the turbine exhaust steam. 

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