| > I thought this is what contaminated Europe's farmland more than the meltdown itself. Am I wrong? What contaminated the surrounding farmland was the release of gaseous fission products from the reactor due to a hydrogen gas explosion caused by the completely insane and clueless way that the plant operators were running an experimental procedure, which went out of control. That happened even before the reactor itself melted down. As just noted, the explosion was not a nuclear explosion and did not involve a nuclear reaction running out of control; it was an explosion of hydrogen gas released inside the reactor. However, because the plant was built without a secondary containment structure (which is one key design flaw that no other country has ever built into a nuclear reactor), the explosion, since it disrupted the structure of the reactor core, released various gaseous fission products that were dangerously radioactive, over a wide area. If there had been secondary containment, the explosion and the radioactive materials would have been contained inside it and would not have contaminated the surrounding environment. In short, there are at least two key factors that were necessary to create the Chernobyl situation that do not apply to any commercial reactor that any other country has ever built: running clueless experimental procedures on a reactor, and not having any secondary containment. As for potential dangers from reactors in Ukraine, that's because Ukraine is a war zone. I don't think we should restrict commercial reactor construction in the US because Ukraine is a war zone. Certainly no other country in the world has restricted the building of nuclear reactors based on that kind of logic. France was invaded in WW II, but still makes the majority of its electricity using nuclear reactors today. |