WO2016074687A1 - Method for radiation protection of biosphere - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention relates to means for protecting the biosphere against the spread of ionizing and toxic substances. A method for radiation protection of the biosphere includes blocking airborne forms of particles and aerosols contained in emergency discharges by means of stimulating coagulation and sedimentation processes for particles and aerosols in flows of air masses. Flows of air masses are directed, by means of wind energy installations, toward a flame front of an emergency discharge flare stack. The wind energy installations are disposed on tall towers surrounding an industrial site. The distance between neighboring wind energy installations is determined on the basis of the mutual overlap of flanking airflow fields. A flare stack is kept from circumventing an oncoming flow, from above, by pumping descending airflows from tethered high-position wind energy installations operating in a ventilation mode. A gas/aerosol flare stack flow, which is blocked from three sides, is sucked into receiving windows of a pneumatic storage unit and is pumped into gas holding tanks. Gas/aerosol ventilation mixtures are released from the gas holding tanks onto a turbine. An additional source of electric energy is produced. The invention allows for retaining and rendering harmless a maximum volume of active gases of ionizing toxicants.

Description

 The method of radiation protection of the biosphere

The invention relates to technologies for the active protection of the earth's surface from the spontaneous dispersion of radioactive and chemical toxicants entering the planetary atmosphere with flows of emergency gas-aerosol emissions of powerful industrial facilities.

The method is intended for use at nuclear power plants and other enterprises of the nuclear fuel cycle, where the possibility of beyond design basis accidents complicated by the uncontrolled release of radioactive gas-aerosol emissions into the free atmosphere is not completely ruled out. Low-grade coal-fired thermal power plants, petrochemical, metallurgical, and construction industries that supply thousands of tons of abiogenic substances (including ionizing ones) to the atmosphere using the proposed method will be able to prevent cross-border transport and dispersion of toxicants on the earth's surface.

The uniqueness and perfection of nuclear power plants creates the prerequisites for the theoretical justification of the infinitely small likelihood of severe accidents during normal operation. In practice, under the protective shells of nuclear power units are concentrated: giant potential energy of heat content, energy of compression of the coolant, potential chemical energy of reagents, tens of tons of nuclear materials, including hundreds of different isotopes with accumulated radioactivity, measured in hundreds of millions of curies. With some coincidence of unfavorable initiating events, the release of this energy can lead to various consequences, the danger of which for personnel, the public and the environment The habitat is divided by a special International Nuclear Event Scale (IN ES-liiternational Nuclear Event Scale) into seven levels of limit states. The destruction of the reactor vessel, the melting of the active zone and the release of radioactivity beyond the last barrier of reactor protection correspond to the most dangerous - the seventh level. Accidents at the Chernobyl station and at the Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear power plant are assigned to the seventh - highest level of danger. The results of studies in the field of reliability of nuclear technologies and methods from related fields of technology [1] do not allow us to determine when and on which of the many nuclear power plants operating around the world a minor incident or catastrophic accident occurs. Along with busy technological regimes, additional problems in the field of nuclear safety and radiation protection cause threats of natural hazards, nuclear terrorism, social and military conflicts, as well as uncertainty about factors and events that may arise in the future.

The rules for the industrial operation of nuclear power plants require that all types of emissions with increased activity against established norms should not be carried by the winds towards the nearest cities and towns. The conditions for observing this rule begin to be created at the stage of pre-design surveys by searching for the territories necessary for the placement of nuclear power plants. One of the most important areas of this search is an in-depth meteorological study of the aerological characteristics of the desired territories and the features of long-term atmospheric circulation above them [2]. Data on the altitude distribution of wind speed and the characteristics of the course of wind flows over long periods of observation significantly affect the final decision on the suitability of the territories for the placement of nuclear power plants. As a result of geophysical and meteorological Surveys, the choice is most often stopped on the coasts, hills or extended open spaces. Natural winds over such territories do not encounter obstacles. At altitudes of 100 meters, the influence of the friction force of the air masses on the underlying surface is insignificant, and natural atmospheric flows are mobile for the maximum number of days and hours in a year. In normal operation modes of nuclear power plants, wind energy works to achieve radiation safety of plant personnel twice. Initially, the constant flow of fresh air masses to the ventilation center provides multiple air renewal in all rooms of the power unit, which is vital for the prompt removal of even the smallest volumes of active gases from the premises, which are formed as a result of various leaks, blowing from equipment surfaces and repair work. The ventilation center of the power unit processes and pumps used air through the ventilation pipes, the purity of which can change situationally. The ventilation pipes of nuclear power plants discharge more than 100,000 m ³ / hour of exhaust air to a height of 100 - 130 meters into the atmospheric wind flows. Open atmosphere winds randomly carry ventilation air with residual toxicants to uncontrolled distances from the mouth of the pipes, providing radiation protection for the industrial site and personnel for the second time. This method of handling hazardous gas-aerosol flows monotonously transforms the free atmosphere - and the entire environment - into an endless reservoir of man-made toxic waste, but remains the main radiation protection method for most hazardous enterprises. The observed consequences of using the method characterize the well-known conclusion: "The total value of only licensed (permitted and planned) emissions from all existing nuclear power plants in the world, over the entire life of their operation, exceeds the total emissions from the Chernobyl accident" [3]. Planned emissions of numerous enterprises of other industries, for example, medium-sized thermal power plants, cause much greater damage to the biosphere than planned emissions of powerful nuclear power plants [4]. The consequences of extremely rare accidental releases of powerful nuclear facilities represent the highest of industrial hazards. The habitat - and the biosphere as a whole - are defenseless against simultaneous release into the atmosphere of radioactive products in industrial volumes and with an activity of millions of curies. An effective method for automatically holding the flow of accidental emissions within the territory of the sanitary protection zone (SPZ) of a hazardous enterprise is unknown.

In the event of design conditions, emergency gas-aerosol flares break through cracks in aggregates and faults in building structures, bypassing all filter systems and holding gas holders, and go directly into the open atmosphere. Uncontrolled atmospheric currents capture flares of emergency gas-aerosol emissions carrying mixtures of irradiated materials and numerous radionuclins. Extremely high radioactivity is spontaneously scattered by the wind over the earth's surface. Winds over carefully selected territories for nuclear power plants, during normal operation of the station working for radiation protection, during the accident randomly scatter ionizing substances around the planet, and work to multiply the catastrophic extent of damage. Effective during normal operation ventilation centers in a beyond-design situation are useless. Electric drives of the equipment of ventilation centers, as practice has shown, can be de-energized along with other consumers due to the loss of sources of own and emergency energy supply. During the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the angle of wind movements over the industrial site in ten days amounted to more than 270 °, and the plume of ionizing materials was carried by wind flows far beyond the borders of the continent. With the cost of the destroyed power unit about $ 1 billion, the external damage from the accident according to the IAEA [5] exceeded $ 300 billion, but the final elimination of the consequences of the accident still requires considerable effort, time and money. During the accident at the Fukushima-Daiichi NPP, wind movements, along with initiating tectonic and hydraulic influences, led to the dispersal of nuclides in transboundary spaces. According to preliminary estimates, the damage, the scale of which remains to be studied, coincides in order of magnitude with the losses from the accident at the Chernobyl station [6].

The practical need to justify the size of capital investments in the development and real resolution of radiation and nuclear safety problems has led to the emergence of various concepts and systemic approaches in assessing the ratios of radiation risks, damage, threats and appropriate costs. According to one of them, known as the ALAPA principle - as low as practicable achievable, any costs are acceptable if human health is behind them, because it is priceless. Another principle: as low as reasonably achievable - ALARA, is to strive to ensure that the lowest levels of danger are reasonably achievable. Another approach, known as the un threshold dose conception, argues for a linear relationship between the dose and the biological effect. Adherents of this approach argue that there are no such doses of radiation to which the human body is indifferent [7], and further, without taking into account real circumstances, they conclude that it is necessary to immediately close all objects nuclear power. The practical implementation of this approach would require shutting down all existing reactors, unloading fuel assemblies, dismantling, disassembling, cutting large units and parts, their subsequent decontamination and destruction. Such processes are associated with high levels of radiation risks and require huge material costs, but are subject to consistent implementation in the coming periods. The reality is that, after the planned or extended deadlines, hundreds of power plants must go through decommissioning processes already in this century. This circumstance many times increases the urgent need for guaranteed protection of the biosphere from the influx of ionizing and chemical toxicants, from their going beyond the sanitation and protection zones of hazardous objects, passing through complex and dangerous decommissioning processes. In a number of approaches focused on a rational combination of economic methods and constructive solutions, there is no data on such a method of radiation protection of the biosphere, by which achieving the necessary level of protection would be supplemented by economic profitability at the level of self-sufficiency. Currently, the costs of creating nuclear and radiation safety systems make up more than half of all the costs of creating a power unit. Among the methods known from information sources and practice aimed at radiation protection of the biosphere, for example, [8, 9, 10], it was not possible to identify a method that, performing its target function, would be economically viable and create a backup source of energy supply for its own needs. Another disadvantage of the known methods of sedimentation, localization, blocking, removal of gas-aerosol toxicants can be considered the absence in the arsenal of their capabilities of such an important function as automatic response to exit to the air pool of the radionuclide object as a result of minor incidents or limit states of the third to fifth levels. The closest in direction can be taken patent ITTO201 10763 (A 1) - 2013-02-12 System for abatement of noxious emissions in the atmosphere from industrial or nuclear power plant. Published as WO2013021308 and TW201308351. The main disadvantage of this expensive system is its dependence on air temperature. Another difficulty in the application of the system lies in its dependence on external power supply, the losses of which are characteristic of most emergency situations.

The objective of the proposed invention is to create a method of radiation protection of the biosphere from the influx of industrial masses of ionizing and chemical toxicants. The technology of the method, according to the subject of the invention, should automatically block gas-aerosol emissions in the air basin above the sanitary protection zone of a particularly dangerous facility, maintain this function at all stages of the facility’s life cycle, serve as a source of commercial power supply, ensuring profitability and self-sufficiency during operation, situationally provide backup or emergency power supply of the facility’s own needs.

The technical result of the invention is aimed at holding and neutralizing the maximum volume of active gases and the mass of volatile ionizing toxicants entering the air pool above a particularly dangerous object with gas-aerosol emissions, preventing the possible occurrence and development of nuclear accidents initiated by complete or partial blackout of the power unit. Another part of the technical result consists in the possibility of using basic equipment that implements the technology of the method for commercial generating electricity and making a profit offsetting capital costs.

The feasibility of the proposed method is based on the rules for planning territories of especially hazardous facilities that have sanitary protection zones, the areas of which allow (in most applications) to rationally place and effectively use the technological equipment necessary for radiation protection of the rest of the Earth. The kinetic energy of the winds, fed by the forces of atmospheric circulation, in the proposed method paradoxically does not scatter toxicants on the earth's surface, but limits their dispersion and blocks them in a limited area, designed and adapted to handle hazardous substances. In the implementation of the method also use the features of compression and turbulence of the air when flowing around obstacles, stimulate coagulation and sedimentation of particles of the most volatile forms and, therefore, the most dangerous for habitats. The fundamental property of reversibility of electric machines (EM), used as part of wind power units (WEA) of the megawatt class, is used for situational switching of EM from the generator mode to the motor one. The VEA number required at each moment of time is transferred from the vane to the fan mode. By controlling the air flows coming from the fans, they control all movements of gas-aerosol emissions in the air basin above the station. The universality of the proposed method leads to the need for binding in place, taking into account the uniqueness of each object. A further description of the proposed method is given in relation to a conventional nuclear power plant. In the description, illustrations of FIG. 1, figure 2, fig.Z. The method of radiation protection of the biosphere includes, as shown in figure 1, the industrial site A nuclear power plant limited by circuit 6, with power units 2 housings located within the industrial site, ventilation pipes 5. Contour line 1 denotes a calculated line along which a wind turbine is installed 4. An existing district railroad is specially laid on the territory of the station’s sanitary protection zone, 7 for the use of mobile platforms 9 carrying auxiliary equipment of high-altitude tethered VEAs 8. Airborne VEAs are connected to platforms by holding cables with live cables 10. On mobile cables On the molds, control units for movement drives 11, VEA control units for air accommodation 12, a rechargeable energy supply source for mobility 13 are installed. In figure 2, dashed lines 19, 20 indicate incoming atmospheric circulation flows, lines 22 indicate wind flows flowing around the industrial site after the power loss on the blades VEA 4. Lines 21 indicate the flow that has lost power after the VEA drive. Lines 15 indicate the flows of ventilating gas-aerosol mixtures of nuclear power plants, lines 16 indicate a mixture of ventilation flows with a stream 21, lines 18 indicate a stream from an airborne wind turbine, lines 14 indicate a flow from a wind turbine located on the leeward side when it is in the motor-fan mode . The figure 3 shows a pneumatic storage unit connected to the receiving window 3 through the actuator 22 and a supercharger 23, loading gas holders 24 with control valves 25, 27 and a communication line 26, with a turbine 28, a generator 29 and an autonomous control unit 30. Also in figure 3 weather station 31 is presented, ionizing radiation sensors 32, the placement of which must be specially agreed, because they are not part of any equipment related to the actual systems of nuclear power plants. To implement the method, in the territory of the sanitary protection zone of the nuclear power plant, a closed circumferential strip with a width of 200 meters is allocated. The district strip is divided into 16 meteorological points. For installation VEA outside the industrial site of a hazardous facility, for example, nuclear power plants, in the territory of the sanitary protection zone, a closed district strip with a width of 200 meters or more is allocated. The circumferential strip under the VEA installation is marked, for example, on 16 meteorological points, VEA is installed in the obtained ring sectors and additional equipment is placed to collect and remove toxicants. VEA nacelles are mounted on load-bearing towers, setting the centers of rotation of the blades above the upper mark of the mouth of the ventilation pipes. A district wind farm formed from at least one VEA belt of ground and / or air deployment, is used normally during normal operation of a nuclear power plant — to generate and deliver electric power to planned loads. Any irregularities in the normal operation of nuclear power plants, complicated by emissions of gas streams with increased radioactivity, automatically put the wind farm in the mode of the last radiation protection barrier (RHL). In this mode, before streams of atmospheric winds, which, moving above the NPP industrial site, mix with the streams of gas-aerosol emissions and carry them into the free atmosphere, a vibrating aerodynamic barrier is created in the air basin above the circumferential strip, as shown in Figure 2. In the case of collision of streams 16 and 14 normal displacements, flow past and braking of oncoming flows occur. To exclude the exit of stream 16, with the highest concentration of toxicants, above the upper edge of stream 14, a high-altitude mobile tethered windmill 17, known as a Dyson fan, is included. The incident pressure stream 18 presses the stream 33 with a high concentration of toxicants to the receiving window of the pneumatic storage unit. In the considered example, according to the capabilities of the method, the toxicants entering through the ventilation pipe are removed, which is one of the most common conditions. However, with the unexpected and extremely rare condition associated with the release of activity in a not so fixed place as a ventilation pipe, the automatic algorithm for removing toxicants and the entire flow of gas aerosols will be preserved. In situations that do not require instant reactivity, control of the process of eliminating emissions is permissible in an automated operator mode. In difficult meteorological conditions, if it is necessary to take into account changes in the direction of the wind over the industrial site, where gas aerosol emissions diffuse into the air flows, additional control of the angles of attack and the rotational speed of the wind turbine blades operating in the fan mode is introduced, and an air flow is created whose pressure blocks the flow of emergency gas and aerosol emissions limits of receiving windows, stimulates the coagulation of hazardous aerosols and their deposition. In a wide range of industrial situations, from minor incidents to high-level extreme conditions, the technology of the method automatically blocks the flows of gas-aerosol emissions, limits their dispersion by a narrow strip inside the sanitary protection zone of the enterprise, preventing the chaotic spread of ionizing, radiomimetic, and other toxic materials the surface of the earth. Another possibility, which is not difficult to implement as part of the proposed method, is associated with loading gas tanks with 24 high-pressure ventilation gas streams. In unfavorable situations caused by the loss of power supply for own needs, the chain: gas tank 24 - valves 27 - turbine 28, directs gases into the atmosphere through a vent, a pipe, and electricity from a generator 29 to emergency power circuits. Moreover, as the gas holders are unloaded, they are situationally filled with the most toxic gases for aging and liquidation. List of references

[1] Ed. h-box RAS N.A. Makhutova. Risk analysis and improving the safety of water-cooled power reactors // Moscow, Nauka, 2009

[2] D.J. Derenzo. Wind power recent developments // N.J., U.S.A., 1979,

[3] I.N. Beckman. Nuclear industry Lecture course,

www.profbeckman.narod.ru/NIL 17

[4] Ed. prof. V.V.Busheva. World energy state of the problem of perspective // Moscow, 2007

[5] Ed. Academician V.E. Foritova. Russian Energy: Problems and Prospects // Transactions of a Scientific Session of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 2006

[6] The consequences of Fukushima will be much more serious than Chernobyl,

www. dw. de / expert

[7] A.V. Apples. The myth of the safety of small doses of radiation // Moscow, 2002 [8] Method for the localization of gas-aerosol emissions, RU 2081466 [9] Method for the deposition of harmful aerosols, RU 2082234 [10] Method of heat treating a radioactive surface, US 5425072

Claims

Claim 1. The method of radiation protection of the biosphere, namely, that the most toxic volatile forms of particles and aerosols from the composition of accidental emissions of a particularly dangerous enterprise are blocked within its air basin by stimulating the processes of coagulation and sedimentation of particles and aerosols in the flow of air masses that are pumped towards the front accident emission flare by means of wind energy units (WEA) of the megawatt class, which are placed around the industrial site of a particularly dangerous facility at high altitude shnni and establish the axis of rotation of the blades above the level of the mouth of the chimneys and ventilation pipes, the distance between adjacent wind turbines is determined by calculating the mutual overlap of the flank fields of air flows, injected by adjacent wind turbines in a fan mode, which excludes frontal breakthrough of emergency torch flows, and block the flow of the oncoming torch from above by pumping downward air flows from the high-altitude tethered wind turbines operating in the fan mode of high-altitude placement, gas-aerosol flow of the ava torch blocked from three sides iynyh emission is sucked into the receiving window pnevmoakkumuliruyuschego node extracts injected into gas tanks, gas tanks pre vented from the turbine are in their gas-aerosol mixture of air, the turbine rotates the generator to give GCO d l n ite flax source of electrical power required in an emergency situation.  2. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that in the normal operation mode of a particularly hazardous facility, wind turbines located around the facility are used in the generator mode of a regular veterinary park that provides power for commercial loads.  3. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that the wind turbines operating in the generation mode, in case of loss of especially dangerous power supply object using their own needs, use the wind turbine power, not located along the front of emergency emissions, as a source of emergency power supply, thereby reducing the risk of and the possible development of a nuclear accident.