I recently read an Op-ed at the New York Times entitled Al Qaeda’s Nulcear Plant written by Charles Faddis, a former officer at the Central Intelligence Agency and author of the book Willful Neglect: The Dangerous Illusion of Homeland Security. Let me start by thanking my Faddis for his service to our country as an intelligence officer. While I don’t know much about his field, it’s obvious that intelligence is the front line in the War on Terror and the job done by our intelligence services is vital to protecting Americans at home and abroad. However, my lack of knowledge in Mr Faddis’ line of work is paralleled by his lack of knowledge of nuclear energy. Suffice it to say I was disappointed with the technical merit of the piece and I would expect a publication as established as the Times to do a better job of fact checking submissions.
Not Just Anyone Can Cause a Meltdown
While refering to Sharif Mobely, a terrorist caught in Yemen who had previously worked as a temporary contractor at nuclear plants, Faddis claimed:
“…it doesn’t take top-level clearance to know how to set off a nuclear meltdown. All it takes is information on perimeter security — information Mr. Mobley possesses about every plant where he worked.”
This statement is wrong. While regulators and utilities are deeply concerned by this news, causing a core meltdown is increasingly difficult. Each plant contains multiple independent and redundant cooling systems with redundant sources of coolant. To cause a core meltdown, every one of these systems must be disabled and maintained disabled by preventing any operating or maintenance personnel near those many different systems. Given the strength of security forces plus that of rapid responders such as state and local police along with the military this is nearly impossible. Nuclear personnel are in constant contact with these agencies and would immediately notify them of an attack.
Even most full time employees with decades of experience don’t have enough knowledge of security systems to breach the perimeter. There is little chance Mobely could have learned enough about cooling systems or security measures by working as a temporary contractor at nuclear plants. Furthermore, countless upgrades have been put in place since the last time he went near a nuclear plant.
China Syndrome Debunked
“If the cooling system malfunctions, even if the rest of the plant is operating safely, the heat will literally melt the reactor and its concrete containment shell, releasing radioactive gas into the atmosphere — in other words, a partial nuclear meltdown like that at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania in 1979.”
The meltdown at Three Mile Island did not melt through the 7 inch thick reactor vessel, let alone many feet of reinforced concrete and steel containment. What Mr Faddis is describing is the movie The China Syndrome, which premiered just days before the TMI event in 1979. The TMI event proved that the China Syndrome isn’t true because that big steel reactor just happens to be the perfect heat sink that carried away the decay heat of the melted fuel and transferred it to the surrounding area inside containment preventing the steel reactor from reaching its melting point. As many of you may know, Hollywood often portrays matters of science in a manner that lends itself to drama rather than fact.
Redundant Cooling Systems
“And it turns out that damaging a reactor’s cooling system is a lot easier than getting to the core…Most of the critical components of the cooling system, including pumps and water intake pipes, sit unprotected outside.”
Wrong again. Core cooling systems are intentionally spread all over a nuclear plant in different areas so as to ensure a fire or any kind of transient condition would not affect all of the systems. Many of these are inside of hardened bunkers that could withstand missile attacks and most are spread out in so many different areas that it would take an army to hit them all (assuming they get past the army that’s there protecting them).
Nuclear power plants contain multiple independent and redundant cooling systems to ensure that the ability to cool the reactor remains intact. Most of these are automated systems that require no human actions to activate. Some are passive that require no pumps or power to operate. There are more than a dozen systems in multiple locations inside and out to make sure water reaches the reactor at any given time in a nuclear power plant.
Hard Target
“Even low-level employees at a nuclear plant would have the information necessary to pull off such an attack, like the number of guards, their weapons and procedures at entry gates — even someone as low-level as Sharif Mobley.”
No they couldn’t, not even close. Information like that is not made available to most or all of the normal personnel at a nuclear plant. Believe it or not, someone already thought of that, Mr Faddis. Knowledge of procedures is simply not enough to accomplish an attack. On top of procedures, there are armed guards, sensor equipment, and fortifications in place. Anyone who actually knows the procedures at entry gates knows how futile an attack would be. Nuclear is referred to as a “hard target” because of this. There are soft targets like water supplies and crowds in the open (like Times Square) that are easier to hit and would cause more destruction if they were hit.
Safe from 9/11 Style Attack
“…we do know that the organization [Al Qaeda] has been interested in attacking American nuclear plants for years; it even considered including a plant on its Sept. 11 target list.”
The terrorists didn’t hit a nuclear plant on September 11 because it wouldn’t have had nearly the effect that the actual attack did. The reactor at most plants is far more difficult to hit with a jet at high speed because it’s much smaller target than the 9/11 targets. Even if the pilot did manage to hit the plant, the plane could not have breached the containment structure protecting the reactor. An attack would have done damage, and possibly caused the facility to shutdown permanently, but the public would be safe throughout the event and the only casualties would be on the plane and plant workers, far less than the 9/11 casualties. Just look at this video of a fighter jet at high speed crashing into a similar wall and vaporizing on impact without any damage to the concrete:
Safe From Car Bombs
“…more barriers must be put in place against car bombs.”
It’s hard to do much better than this Mr. Faddis. Even if a truck somehow learned how to jump and did somehow get past such a barrier, a truck bomb would not be enough to penetrate the containment structure to damage the reactor or it’s cooling abilities. Again, there would be no danger to the public.
I don’t doubt Mr Faddis’ sincerity. I honestly believe his article was written out of concern for the health and safety of the public. Nuclear power operators share this concern and have take measures that are as good as or superior to any other facilities on the planet. To a nuclear professional, it is obvious that this article is the product of the inevitable cynicism developed over a long career protecting citizens from dangerous fanatics and not knowledge of a nuclear power plant design. We believe his heart is in the right place, but he obviously knows very little about nuclear power. I am ethically and professionally obliged to clarify the inaccuracies in his Op-ed before they start a panic.
Image Credit
CIA courtesy of Wikimedia Commons published under the CC license.
17 Comments
İ think you may have been generous in thanking Mr. Faddis for his service to the country.
He apparently wrote this op-ed with sensationalism in mind and if a few facts got mixed in by accident – no big problem. Sensation draws attention whereas the truth is usually a lot more boring.
İf he served the country like he wrote the op-ed then certainly no thanks are due.
I am shocked to discover that a newspaper with the reputation of The New York Times would print something so factually wrong as this Op Ed. Yes, it’s an opinion piece, but I didn’t think the paper printed fantasies. If this was printed because of Faddis’s credentials, then the paper deserves additional criticism because of its failure to question his scientific background. If this is the caliber of people dealing with WMD and other nuclear matters at the CIA, then it’s due for a major investigation and overhaul–but for different reasons than those Faddis discusses in his book (or perhaps it’s a novel?).
I speak from experience. I led four major projects regarding nuclear matters and security at Sandia National Laboratories. Nothing in Faddis’s Op Ed is close to the laws of physics or the facts of materials science, reactor engineering, plant security, or just plain common sense. Faddis needs a simple course in nuclear technology.
Thanks for your kind words, Dr Anderson. I’ve only just started reading it, but from what I’ve read so far in Power to Save the World, perhaps you could turn Mr Faddis back from the dark side.
Mr. Faddis has been trying to paint nuclear power plants among the many things he considers to be still unprotected since 9/11. This isn’t his first op-ed on the topic. I won’t read his book but I assume it has this same kind of misinformed reasoning. His other points in the book may be more valid, but I suspect they’re probably skewed towards fear mongering as well.
Thanks for this write-up. I read this Op Ed when it was published, recognized who was writing it, and I knew right away what I was in for. I haven’t worked at a nuclear plant, but I have visited one during an outage and the level of security I saw (which as with any high-security facility is only a fraction of the level of security actually present) impressed me.
Well said. The scenarios that could cause core damage are much more complicated than Mr. Faddis is imagining.
(Quick spellcheck note – the two instance you wrote “passed”, you probably meant “past”)
Thanks Garrett, the two grammar instances have been fixed.
Now if I could just figure out I before E.
I just started work as a nuclear engineer and I am afraid I might be permanently banned from nuclear work if I even divulge too much specific information. I still need to pass additional security checks before I can be “badged” to enter an operating facility.
My current position is modeling the likelihood of enough equipment failures to cause “core damage”. There is no action possible by an operator to cause core damage. There are big buttons all over the control room to initiate a “trip”, which shuts down the reactor in a few seconds. To lose enough cooling to cause core damage after a trip, you would have to take out three main cooling water pumps, four service water pumps, a diesel operated fire pump, a refueling water storage tank, and an emergency condensate storage tank. Even then, there are emergency tanks inside that 3 foot thick containment dome that will flood the core and keep the core covered for over 6 hours without any cooling at all.
A missile silo may be a slightly harder target.
I’m in the same boat as you. I’ve been badged for a couple weeks now, and what I’ve learned about the security and safety measures of my plant has amazed me. The primary job of a large portion of plant employees is to run “simulations” and make risk assessments of every imaginable accident that could happen in the plant to ensure the proper systems and precautions are in place. In terms of security, drills are often run in which teams of security officer “ninjas” are assembled to attempt breaching the plant. Often they never get past outer fencing, and these are people that work on site and know the plant better than almost anyone else. After seeing how a nuclear plant is secured firsthand, I feel more than safe living near the plant and working on site.
On another note about purposefully causing a meltdown, I bet the only people that might have a chance at it are plant operators actively going around safety systems to melt down the reactor. The funny thing is, this is essentially what happened at Chernobyl, but without harmful intentions. If the operators had gotten up and walked out leading up to the excursion, and left safety systems on, the reactor would have taken care of itself and the crisis would have likely been avoided.
Thanks, Jack, for a well-reasoned and tempered response. For those of us who don’t read the NYT (nor have subscribed to a daily rag for 25 years), having the video inserts are particularly “impacting” – sorry.
BTW, perhaps his book was ghost-written by Helen Caldicott? Similar appeals to emotion and sensationalism.
As a Senior Non Commissioned Officer in the USAF who is also an “intelligence professional” I’m fairly disgusted with the sales pitch- at any cost- placed in broad public view byCharles Faddis. Unfortunately, many intel types fail to recall the important lessons of both fact checking and understanding your subject area from all angles. I submit to Mr. Faddis, on a peer review basis, a finding of FAIL for his work on nuclear plants. His book is probably being sold on the shelves because it couldn’t sell to his bosses.
The good news is that nuclear knowledge (particularly of weapons) is undergoing a renaissance of its own within the USAF thanks to a recent history of failed respect for the power of fission. This knowledge push is segueing into a number of discussions about intel implications to proliferation, energy policies, and reactor uses. I truly hope that this can lead to a competent understanding of a subject that should be second nature to my peers. Not to mention the decades long campaign against nuclear power makes for an outstanding case study in information operations. Propaganda, misinformation, disinformation etc.- man this field has it all; it’s incredibly instructive.
Dr. Anderson, you and Ms. Cravens created a masterful work in “Power to Save the World”- thank you. I use that book as a base reference for people in need of an “education” within my sphere of influence, which is admittedly small. Just know it’s making the rounds in places you probably never expected.
Thanks Travis. If you have any tips on how to combat a well organized, well funded smear campaign such as the one the antis are running against nuclear then please feel free to share your expertise.
Sandia Labs indicated in the New York Times that the nuclear industry has misused their study in an effort to claim reactors were invulnerable to terrorist attack. When asked whether the study the industry was citing showed that a plane could not penetrate a containment dome the Sandia spokesperson stated that, “We have been trying like heck to shoot down this rumor… (t)hat test was designed to measure the impact force of a fighter jet. But the wall was not being tested. No structure was being tested.” (Wald, Matthew, Reactor Vulnerability: Experts Say Nuclear Plants Can Survive Jet Liner Crash, New York Times, September 20, 2002.)
Repeating false claims of nuclear plant invulnerability does not make it so!
Oh my! An employee of Greenpeace lecturing someone about “repeating false claims” — how ironic!
Mr. Riccio’s job is to spread FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt), and this is yet another example of this work. The video of the F4 Phantom hitting the concrete target is simply a useful illustration, which vividly shows what happens to a plane when it hits a hard target. As can be seen, almost all of the plane disintegrates immediately upon impact.
Does this one test conclusively prove that a plane could not penetrate a containment dome? No. Nevertheless, it and tests like it have provided extremely useful test data for engineering analysis to assess and understand what the consequences of an aircraft impact would be. Sandia performed other tests as well, including impacting a TF-30 engine into a two foot thick concrete wall, and impacting a TF-30 engine into an earth-concrete structure (which of course was not allowed to move).
The results of these tests are used to assess the validity of models that have been developed to analyze the consequences of a jet impact into heavily reinforced concrete walls. These calculations are what give us confidence in the protection provided by the thick walls of a containment structure, not just this one test, however fascinating the video might be.
Mr Riccio, I find it suspect that you and Greenpeace are suddenly interested in the war on terrorism. I find it far more likely that you are among those who complain and harass TSA officers at the airport because you’re inconvenienced by removing your shoes or forgot to take your watch off. I also doubt you were a fan of the Patriot Act. I don’t think you fly a yellow ribbon at your home. I believe that you are adamantly opposed to military actions ongoing in the Middle East and southern Asia. So why then are you all of sudden so interested in guarding against terrorism?
Is it your policy to combat terrorist by removing targets? Do you want to let Islamic extremists dictate your life?
What about things like sporting events, concerts, parades, water supplies, and food supplies? Surely you are opposed to all of these things. Each of these would kill FAR more people than a nuclear power plant if attacked by a terrorist.
I think terrorism is a lousy reason to not do something and I also know that you think this way as well. I know the reason you use terrorism as a tool in your ill-advised crusade against nuclear power is because it’s politically convenient and has nothing to do with some fictional interest in national security.
I still fly. I still go to games. One day I hope to have kids and take them to a parade. All the while I will not let a terrorist change my mind. All the while I will live with my family within a few miles of the nuclear reactor where I work knowing they are perfectly safe regardless of your well financed PR campaign.
Well said Jack. If we chose to live our lives fearing what might happen, we’d live no lives at all. Now, I don’t mean to say we should live recklessly, I just mean to say that some risks are worth taking.
So, how long dose it take a melted reactor core to melt threw 8 imches of steel and 10 feet of concreat?
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