Hey all, I'm here to inform you of a very interesting (and scary) hypothesis I've heard during an interview last night.

 

I don't know if you were aware of such, but recently, a lot of the french nuclear powerplants were overflown by small drones ('?do=embed' frameborder='0' data-embedContent>>  if you want more information).

 

The hypothesis was brought by a physician specialized in nuclear security in our country. It's actually pretty simple, and yet fearsomely efficient if someone planned to do this. But first, some explanations.

 

France has one of the world's largest nuclear power. Understand by that that we have an incredibly high ammount of nuclear powerplants, so many that we actually sell a part of the electricity we produce to other european country. In a few words, we could say that France is the ultimate European powerplant. That was for the small info that is going to be a huge factor later.

 

The drones that overflew the powerplants always did it at night or early morning, meaning that the visibility wasn't good enough for regular cameras to take pictures of the sites. We can conclude by that that if the people controlling the drones overflew the plants to map the sites, they had to use infrared cameras. Infrared cameras work by detecting the heat emission. Of course, the biggest heat emission in a nuclear powerplant is the reactor, but everyone can guess where it is considering its size and the huge cooling chimneys visible kilometers away. Also, the reactors themselves are protected by walls of a meter thick made of reinforced concrete, made to resist large explosions and plane crashes. So from there, we can conclude the drones were sent to find something else.

 

And there's actually something else within the plant that release a relatively high ammount of heat, something that seems irrelevant but is all the problem: the transformer. Basically, the electricity coming out of the reactor is low tension, between 200 and 400 volts, and requires to be transformed into high tension current to be sent through the electrical network. For that, they use a transformer.

 

The hypothesis is the following: instead of focusing on the nuclear reactor, someone with bad intentions could target the transformer. If one or two were targeted and destroyed, it wouldn't be a big deal, the company taking care of the powerplants having a few transformers ready in case of an accident. Only a shutdown of a few hours, or in worst cases, days, would be to be expected. However, a total of more than fifteen nuclear powerplants were overflown. If the fiften transformers were targeted and destroyed at once, the whole french electrical network would go down, followed by a good part of the european electrical network. That would mean:

• No more communication
• No more cops
• No more firefighters
• No more hospitals
• No more grocery stores
• And basically all the things working on communications and electrity.

Basically, a real post-apocalyptic scenario. And the building of new transformers would take months, or even years in such cases. The economy would crash, Europe would sink into anarchy and be completely obliterated.

 

This hypothesis is even more worrying that it's actually realistic and plausible. A disaster to expect?

So this is intresting, while it does seem possible, I think the last thing France needs is a country wide power outage, hopefully the drones are captured by French special forces or at least destroyed. Lots of possibilities here.

If I were French I'd start digging a vault and creating some strategic baguettes reserve just to be sure. 

 

Don't forget some wine, the longer you keep it, the better it is. 

Edited December 7, 201411 yr by Hastings

 

If I were French I'd start digging a vault and creating some strategic baguettes reserve just to be sure. 

 

Don't forget some wine, the longer you keep it, the better it is. 

 

My god, that's the best idea I've seen all day.

doesn't France have any backup coal power plants or turbines for energy? I would have thought that in this scenario, a backup electrical source could be used.

If I were French I'd start digging a vault and creating some strategic baguettes reserve just to be sure. 

 

Don't forget some wine, the longer you keep it, the better it is. 

 

You forgot the frog legs!

 

 

doesn't France have any backup coal power plants or turbines for energy? I would have thought that in this scenario, a backup electrical source could be used.

 

The thing is, the transformer is the link between the powerplant and the electrical network, a bit like a funnel. Its destruction shuts down everything. Maybe there's an alternative network, but I've never heard of such, and it's not even mentioned, so I guess it'd concern only the governmental buidings and such. But the whole population would be in a general blackout, and panick would quickly take over any other emotion.

 

To be honest I find it quite stupid that no one thought of this before, considering the transformer is not protected by anything in particular. Something that important should have at least been in a building in reinforced concrete or something.

Edited December 7, 201411 yr by Hystery

well if you want my opinion this is it

 

 

Russia must be on the move again to regain the USSR and more this time.

Jeez......Chernobyl anyone?  

Jeez......Chernobyl anyone?  

The Chernobyl disaster was caused by bad design of the control rods inside the nuclear reactor, causing a massive power surge. This in turn generated massive amounts of pressure and resulted in the incident in question..

 

As stated in the original post, the hypothesis here suggests nationwide power outage. Hardly the same now, is it?

Meh, conspiracy theories.

Every single country in Europe can handle themselves.

Oh a drone, blah blah blah...

Modern NPP (Nuclear Power Plants) are built to withstand major damages. They can theoretically withstand a Boeing-747 crash.

I am aware that I put theoretically. Its not 100%, but its at least 90% that it can producing power after half a year of repairing. 

 

And a lot of other countries, e.g Germany, Spain, the UK, Poland, etc. can also provide power to Europe. Don't worry.

Meh, conspiracy theories.

Every single country in Europe can handle themselves.

Oh a drone, blah blah blah...

Modern NPP (Nuclear Power Plants) are built to withstand major damages. They can theoretically withstand a Boeing-747 crash.

I am aware that I put theoretically. Its not 100%, but its at least 90% that it can producing power after half a year of repairing. 

 

And a lot of other countries, e.g Germany, Spain, the UK, Poland, etc. can also provide power to Europe. Don't worry.

 

Actually, we are not talking about the nuclear plant as in the reactor. I'm aware that powerplants are built to be solid (even though our nuclear plants are -really- old, like thirty years or something for the oldest ones), my father was actually working in a plant as a security technician (doing sonography of the reactor's confinement walls to make sure there was no leak). The transformer is a lot smaller, external, and a lot less protected, if not at all, hence it's an easy target. It's not really a conspiracy theory, the drones did overfly the plants, without anyone knowing who did this and why, and the transformers are indeed a weak point, the Achille's tendon of nuclear powerplants, hence it could be dramatic if the authors of those flights had evil intentions.

Actually, we are not talking about the nuclear plant as in the reactor. I'm aware that powerplants are built to be solid (even though our nuclear plants are -really- old, like thirty years or something for the oldest ones), my father was actually working in a plant as a security technician (doing sonography of the reactor's confinement walls to make sure there was no leak). The transformer is a lot smaller, external, and a lot less protected, if not at all, hence it's an easy target. It's not really a conspiracy theory, the drones did overfly the plants, without anyone knowing who did this and why, and the transformers are indeed a weak point, the Achille's tendon of nuclear powerplants, hence it could be dramatic if the authors of those flights had evil intentions.

Regardless, the country must have backup power supplies in case of the need to turn of the nuclear power stations.

 

Even if the nuclear power stations were attacked, the redundancy systems will kick in.

Regardless, the country must have backup power supplies in case of the need to turn of the nuclear power stations.

Even if the nuclear power stations were attacked, the redundancy systems will kick in.

Won't the U.S. help out if there is ever an attack on one of its closest allies?

Won't the U.S. help out if there is ever an attack on one of its closest allies?

If it's needed, yes, but the rest of Europe and NATO would come forward before that's necessary.

 

Besides, they won't need any help as damaging the transformers won't kill anyone, and won't cause that much of a problem. The outage would last an hour, if that.

If I were French I'd start digging a vault and creating some strategic baguettes reserve just to be sure. 

 

Don't forget some wine, the longer you keep it, the better it is. 

 

Doomsday Preppers!

Hey all, I'm here to inform you of a very interesting (and scary) hypothesis I've heard during an interview last night.

 

I don't know if you were aware of such, but recently, a lot of the french nuclear powerplants were overflown by small drones ('?do=embed' frameborder='0' data-embedContent>>  if you want more information).

 

The hypothesis was brought by a physician specialized in nuclear security in our country. It's actually pretty simple, and yet fearsomely efficient if someone planned to do this. But first, some explanations.

 

France has one of the world's largest nuclear power. Understand by that that we have an incredibly high ammount of nuclear powerplants, so many that we actually sell a part of the electricity we produce to other european country. In a few words, we could say that France is the ultimate European powerplant. That was for the small info that is going to be a huge factor later.

 

The drones that overflew the powerplants always did it at night or early morning, meaning that the visibility wasn't good enough for regular cameras to take pictures of the sites. We can conclude by that that if the people controlling the drones overflew the plants to map the sites, they had to use infrared cameras. Infrared cameras work by detecting the heat emission. Of course, the biggest heat emission in a nuclear powerplant is the reactor, but everyone can guess where it is considering its size and the huge cooling chimneys visible kilometers away. Also, the reactors themselves are protected by walls of a meter thick made of reinforced concrete, made to resist large explosions and plane crashes. So from there, we can conclude the drones were sent to find something else.

 

And there's actually something else within the plant that release a relatively high ammount of heat, something that seems irrelevant but is all the problem: the transformer. Basically, the electricity coming out of the reactor is low tension, between 200 and 400 volts, and requires to be transformed into high tension current to be sent through the electrical network. For that, they use a transformer.

 

The hypothesis is the following: instead of focusing on the nuclear reactor, someone with bad intentions could target the transformer. If one or two were targeted and destroyed, it wouldn't be a big deal, the company taking care of the powerplants having a few transformers ready in case of an accident. Only a shutdown of a few hours, or in worst cases, days, would be to be expected. However, a total of more than fifteen nuclear powerplants were overflown. If the fiften transformers were targeted and destroyed at once, the whole french electrical network would go down, followed by a good part of the european electrical network. That would mean:

• No more communication
• No more cops
• No more firefighters
• No more hospitals
• No more grocery stores
• And basically all the things working on communications and electrity.

Basically, a real post-apocalyptic scenario. And the building of new transformers would take months, or even years in such cases. The economy would crash, Europe would sink into anarchy and be completely obliterated.

 

This hypothesis is even more worrying that it's actually realistic and plausible. A disaster to expect?

There's nothing to worry about, if it happens, there will be more than enough back up power supply to keep the bear minimum of services like the police, hospitals and fire services going. The only thing to worry about making sure the energy generated by the fusion is handled properly, other wise that could cause a fire at the power station which could lead to bigger problems depending on how good the safety measures are. Assuming the safety standards are what they should be, then all a fire would do is slow down the recovery process, which will be however long it takes to replace the transformers (a few days).

For starters, I'm pretty sure French hospitals and the like have heard of backup generators (hospitals presumably have a battery and diesel generator, to prevent even momentary power loss). You're also probably overestimating the time it takes to get plants online; in addition to the spares on hand, transformers are to some degree interchangeable (it's always better to have a custom-designed one on a plant, and it would take time to source a suitable alternative, but it could be done if needed). Also, from what I can tell, continental Europe is on a single combined grid (like the US and Canada) -- stations in Germany or Spain could pick up the slack if French stations lose power. Then it's a matter of prioritizing (there's likely not enough excess capacity to handle 15 nuclear stations), but the idea that this would be total catastrophe is honestly ridiculous.

For starters, I'm pretty sure French hospitals and the like have heard of backup generators (hospitals presumably have a battery and diesel generator, to prevent even momentary power loss). You're also probably overestimating the time it takes to get plants online; in addition to the spares on hand, transformers are to some degree interchangeable (it's always better to have a custom-designed one on a plant, and it would take time to source a suitable alternative, but it could be done if needed). Also, from what I can tell, continental Europe is on a single combined grid (like the US and Canada) -- stations in Germany or Spain could pick up the slack if French stations lose power. Then it's a matter of prioritizing (there's likely not enough excess capacity to handle 15 nuclear stations), but the idea that this would be total catastrophe is honestly ridiculous.

 

Might be ridiculous, but first, it's an hypothesis, and second, even if it does seem ridiculous it's not to be taken lightly. How many people would have said that the 9/11 was a ridiculous hypothesis before it happened? And yet it happened. It being ridiculous doesn't mean it wouldn't be a problem, even though can be dramatized by exaggerating some points.

Might be ridiculous, but first, it's an hypothesis, and second, even if it does seem ridiculous it's not to be taken lightly. How many people would have said that the 9/11 was a ridiculous hypothesis before it happened? And yet it happened. It being ridiculous doesn't mean it wouldn't be a problem, even though can be dramatized by exaggerating some points.

9/11 and the destruction of an entire continent can't be compared.

9/11 and the destruction of an entire continent can't be compared.

 

Still, how many people would have believed someone saying "the World Trade Center will go down with 2 thousand of deaths!" before it happened?. Not many, I think, and yet it happened. My point is that, even if something sounds crazy, that doesn't mean it will never happen. And as I said, even if the guy in the interview lightly exaggerated his words, even a few days of blackout would have an unparalleled impact on the installations and economy.