Talk:Nuclear reactor accidents in the United States/Archive 1

Archive 1

Definition of "Accident" and "Nuclear Power Plant"

The table currently includes a hodgepodge of actual nuclear power plant accidents and events that occured at places like research reactors but not "nuclear power plants" and some that were mere conditions that involved no actual consequences. Would anyone object to my editing the table to limit the discussion to "accidents" as defined by the IAEA nuclear event scale? Or the acticle and table could be expanded to include "incidents" as defined by the INES scale and the article could be renamed accordingly. There should be a common understanding of what this article is trying to be. Is it supposed to be about events involving "nuclear reactors" as opposed to "nuclear power plants"? Should we agree to limit the events to accidents of "4" or higher significance on the INES or include "1" or higher "incidents" and rename the article accordingly? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Blubbaloo (talk • contribs) 14:34, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, the article is about events involving "nuclear reactors" rather than "nuclear power plants", and I've renamed the page to reflect that. As the article says, it is covering nuclear reactor accidents which are "defined as incidents that either resulted in the loss of human life or more than US$50,000 of property damage, the amount the US federal government uses to define major energy accidents that must be reported". I'm happy for INES material to be brought in, and we have a column in the Table for that, but the INES is just one way of defining the accidents and incidents which have occurred. Johnfos (talk) 15:36, 28 August 2010 (UTC

Is there a basis for defining accidents as "incidents that either resulted in the loss of human life or more than US$50,000 of property damage, the amount the US federal government uses to define major energy accidents that must be reported" other than Benjamin Sovacool's definition? The INES scale would seem to be more "definitive" and commonly accepted. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Blubbaloo (talk • contribs) 22:39, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Let's try to give readers a few different angles on these accidents. Let's give them info about loss of life, property damage and the INES level. I'm more than happy for the INES material to be brought in, and we already have a column in the Table for that. Johnfos (talk) 23:35, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

This article is still incredible bias, example: when did 56/99 become 66.6/100 at least it ques in the reader —Preceding unsigned comment added by Daniel lightforge (talk • contribs) 00:10, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

A lot of these aren't even accidents. There are transients and unusual events, but things which did not involve offsite property damage. Should day to day equipment failure be treated as property damage? Greater than 50k of equipment fails regularly at nuclear power plants but has no impact outside of the plant. The definition should likely be changed to events with loss of life, INES scale events, and events which were seen as significant by the regulator (such as davis besse reactor head). Additionally, there are at least two events on here that I see which did not even result in a shutdown, and another one which is just incorrect and also doesn't even mention the real problem. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.134.240.13 (talk) 21:35, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

I have added some more clarification and the article is now very clear on what counts as an accident. It says:

Globally, there have been at least 99 (civilian and military) recorded nuclear reactor accidents from 1952 to 2009 (defined as incidents that either resulted in the loss of human life or more than US$50,000 of property damage, the amount the US federal government uses to define major energy accidents that must be reported), totaling US$20.5 billion in property damages. The accidents involved meltdowns, explosions, fires, and loss of coolant, and occurred during both normal operation and extreme emergency conditions (such as droughts and earthquakes). Property damage costs include destruction of property, emergency response, environmental remediation, evacuation, lost product, fines, and court claims.

-- Johnfos (talk) 07:51, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

Although the stated threshold for inclusion here is US$50,000, I notice in the table that there are no incidents listed with a cost less that $1,000,000. For the time being, therefore, discussion as to whether the nuclear industry is so rich that it writes of $50k of equipment regularly, or as part of business as usual, is academic. The table seems to be sourced to Sovacool-2009 and Sovacool-2010. The latter I cannot access as there is no URL, and the former has a table of accidents, but they seem to be in the oil, hydroelectric and LPG industries. I think the basis and purpose of the article is perfectly sound, but would be happier if there was at least one clear reference for each incident in the table. This would allow a reader to verify the cause and details of the incident, the estimated cost and loss of life, even the INES rating if these get added. We're never going to find a reliable source that says what a Wikipedia article should be about, so we can choose any criteria provided we have Wikipedia:Notability and Wikipedia:Verifiability. I'm sure we have WP:N, but maybe we all need to work together to put a bit more effort into WP:V here. --Nigelj (talk) 15:31, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

Personal accidents

At this point I see 4 events which while they are definitely accidents at nuclear reactors don't strike me as relevant. A worker electrocuting themselves or falling down a hole then electrocuting themselves doesn't have much to do with the safety of nuclear rectors but more just poor industrial safety practice in general. Maybe they should be in a separate table and counted separately Bostwickenator (talk) 05:11, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

The source used sees them as relevant and counts them in with other accidents, so we have just followed that approach. Johnfos (talk) 14:31, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Though the source is clearly biased. Daniel lightforge (talk) 18:15, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Accident use

The use of the term accident in the context of operation of nuclear reactors in this article strains credulity. The use of the word accident to mean incidents which resulted in greater than 50,000 USD property damage is arbitrary and specious in this context. I think that this article needs to be cut down to the events which are internationally recognized as nuclear accidents, and not simply any incident which occurred in a nuclear power plant and resulted in financial loss greater than the un-referenced limit used previously here.216.96.229.48 (talk) 17:46, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

That's simply not true. The definition here is close to the one the U.S. EPA uses for accidents in other energy sectors, like the oil and gas industry, as well as the Paul Scherr Institute. Why apply it to nuclear energy? Because the original source, a study I did in the journal Energy Policy, wanted to look at trends in energy accidents across many different technologies, including oil, coal, natural gas, nuclear power, and hydroelectricity. So I had to pick a common definition of what constituted an "accident." I had to pick a broader definition so that accidents (and incidents) could be compared across different fuel systems and technologies. Bksovacool (talk) 15:43, 4 August 2013 (UTC)

Then you would be conducting an analysis of "industrial accidents" across different segments of the energy sector. A nuclear accident is clearly defined by respected international organizations and widely accepted to be something categorically different from your definition. Again, you are only damaging your own credibility by attempting to characterize personal accidents unrelated to reactor safety or radiation exposure and property damage unrelated to reactor safety or radiation exposure as nuclear accidents. Nuclear implies that it concerns some radiological process or nuclear transformation. If a man falling down a hole had no effect on safe operation of the plant, exposure to himself, or release of activity to the public, it's not a nuclear accident. You are extending a term which carries the implication of catastrophe and poisoning to everyday dangers independent of any radiological risk.216.96.229.107 (talk) 20:42, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Pluming Leaks

Many of these are plumbing related. If you have pipes they will leak need to be replaced occasionally.

It's NOT a nuclear incident if a pipe fails or a valve sticks. Many of the "incidents" listed aren't really incidents at all. Just a plumber call. It's an incident if the plant is dependant and the operators do not know it (it causes un-planned damage).

If there's a surprise it's where they allowed leaks and moreso how long the leaks caused shutdown (or cost).

Why is what a factory floor manager does: plans what needs to be redundant to avoid down time (ie, 24/7). What to maintain or allow to fail. Which parts to keep on hand for hot swapping.

The records look pretty good if we take the "so what, a leaky pipe" point of view. But one has to wonder how these plants have so many pipes and still not enough pipes to do the pluming! One has to wonder at the posted cost of some of these events: some go above a $1B USD. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.209.222.174 (talk) 22:27, 26 July 2013 (UTC)

This is completely ignorant of the definition of nuclear accident. Nuclear grade pipes do not commonly leak, nor do they need to be commonly replaced. Plumbing fails in residential and commercial facilities because of cheap materials, lack of maintenance, corrosive contents, less-than-professional repairs, and a complete lack of site-specific engineering. These conditions do not exist at NPP's. If a leak in a pipe or a stuck valve degrades reactor safety, then it is a nuclear incident or accident. In regards to the costs posted, I have a significant issue with the lack of citations, but given the incredible daily loss of revenue for an unplanned shutdown, it's not inconceivable that costs associated with repairs which first require significant engineering and regulatory burden can approach $1B.216.96.229.107 (talk) 20:48, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Context Section? You mean, "Bias Injection Section", Should be removed in its entirety

Context Section? Really? Its an obvious violation of neutrality. All the context section does is say, there are a bunch of accidents, which if true would be evident from reading the list included IN the article. CONTEXT would be including a comparison of the US Nuclear Industry's saftey record to that of the European and Russian Nuclear Industry. Or to compare the human fatalities and property damage caused by US Nuclear Accidents to other energy sources such as hydroelectric, coal, or natural gas. Not to mention at least some of the sources used deceptively included dead hyperlinks so their so their statements appeared to be well supported, when the opposite is true. To summarize, CONTEXT section needs heavily revised or deleted entirely. yeaggermiester (talk) 16:30, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Missing

• Salem near ATWS events in 1983
• Surry Feedwater Pipe Break (18 inches) in 1986
• Loss of all DC power in Nine Mile Point 2 in 1991 -> emergency shutdown with nearly no control functions for the operators
• Recent permanent shutdown of the units in San Onofre, caused economically by generic flaws in the newly installed Steam Generators

--2A02:120B:2C08:F3E0:6062:60:6CFF:C2C2 (talk) 04:46, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

• Louis Slotin, Los Alamos, May 21, 1946 (died May 30, 1946) There was an earlier radiation related fatality at Los Alamos, Harry Daghlian include that one, too. [1] Rklawton (talk) 16:49, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

The Slotin incident is important to accident history, however, it was not a nuclear reactor accident. Netherzone (talk) 01:36, 8 September 2017 (UTC)