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The nuclear reactor accident at Three Mile Island

Article  in  Radiographics · February 1994

DOI: 10.1148/radiographics.14.1.8128063 · Source: PubMed

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 Radiologic
History Exhibit
The Nuclear Reactor Accident at
Three Mile Island1
Kenneth L. Miller, MS, CHP, CMP

. INTRODUCTION
“The reaction is self-sustaining, the curve is exponential” (1,2). With these words,
Enrico Fermi ushered in the nuclear age at 3:53 PM on December 2, 1942, beneath
the west stands of Stagg Field at the University of Chicago.
In September 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, father of the “Atoms for
Peace’ plan, initiated
‘ the ground breaking for the first U.S. commercial nuclear
power plant at Shippingport, Pennsylvania, from a television station in Denver,
Colorado (3). Three years later, on December 2, 1957, exactly 15 years after the
Stagg Field experiment, the Shippingport Atomic Power Station went critical.
By 1979, there were approximately 80 commercial nuclear reactors in operation
in the United States with an 60 either planned
additional or under construction.
The prediction was that by the year 2000 the United States would have over 500
nuclear plants on-line (4) Nuclear power,
. the long-awaited promise of a clean, inex-
pensive source of electricity, was making substantial inroads toward breaking the
United States away from a dependency on foreign oil. And then, it happened! The
accident that was beyond expectation, beyond the comprehension of many, and, for
many, beyond their worst nightmare. The cause was nothing more than a valve stick-
ing open, but the result was the worst accident to date in the history of commercial
nuclear power. As a consequence, 36 units that had received construction permits
were canceled (5), and several others that were under construction were converted
or abandoned. Since the accident, there have been no new reactors ordered in the
United States. By 1992, the total number of nuclear power plants operating in the
United States reached 108, with the world total at 412 (6).

Abbreviations: EPA = Environmental Protection Agency, NRC = Nuclear Regulatory Commission. NCRP = National
Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements. TLD thermoluminescent dosimeter, TMI.2 = Three Mile Island
Unit 2

Index terms: Radiations, injurious effects ‘ Radiology and radiologists. history

RadloGraphics 1994; 14:215-224

I From the Department of Radiology, The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center. Pennsylvania State University, 500 Univer.
sity Dr. Hershey. PA 17033. Received and accepted May 24, 1993. Address reprint requests to the author.
. R.SNA, 1994

215
 Figure 1. Three . I generating station.
building indicated by the arrow. (Reprinted from reference 8.)

LANCASTER

Figure 2. Map of the Three Mile Island (TMI) area in south central Pennsylvania. (Re-
printed from reference 8.)

216 U Special Exhibit Volume 14 Number 1

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Figure 3. Schematic plan of the nuclear generating station at Three Mile Island. ADMIN = administration,
CTMT = containment, DOE/EPA = Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Agency, FHB = fuel
handling building, NRC = Nuclear Regulatory Commission, RAD = radioactive, TLD = thermoluminescent
dosimeter. (Reprinted from reference 8.)

. THE ACCIDENT and had not been reopened (4,9). Without

Three Mile Island Unit 2 (TMI-2), a pressur- this inflow of vital cooling water, the reactor
ized-water nuclear reactor capable of operat- core temperature and pressure began to rise.
ing at a rated power of 2,772 MW thermal, Within 8 seconds, the reactor underwent a
first achieved criticality on March 28, 1978 scram and its control rods dropped into the
(7) . Exactly 1 year later, at 4 si of March 28, core, shutting the reactor down. The residual
1979, this reactor, located only 10 miles heat within the reactor core caused the tem-
downstream from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, perature of the surrounding water to rise and
the state capital (Figs 1-3), was operating at the water to expand. The sudden increase of
97% full power with the integrated control pressure within the core forced open a pres-
systems on full automatic. sure-reliefvalve on the pressurizer. The escape
At precisely 36 seconds after the hour, the of steam into the reactor building lowered the
plant experienced a total loss of feed water, reactor pressure to its normal pressure of
accompanied by a tripping (shutting down) of 2,155 pounds per square inch within 13 sec-
the main turbine. When the main pump shut onds. Unfortunately, and unknown to the op-
down, automatic controls activated emergency erators at that time, this same pressure-relief
feed-water pumps and the reactor continued valve failed to close, as it should have once
to operate at full power. Unfortunately, unbe- the pressure was lowered. As a result, the re-
knownst to the reactor operators, the valves
on these backup pumps had been closed 42
hours earlier during maintenance operations

January 1994 Miller U RadioGraphics U 217

 actor core began losing its cooling water. The pected, readings varied with releases and lo-
result was a reactor core that was allowed to cations within or without the plume of radio-
boil dry when it contained enough residual active gases from the containment building. At
heat to melt the reactor core. The core melted 1548 hours on March 28, 50 mR/hour (3.6 X
and released fission products that were con- 10 C/kg/s) was measured on Route 441
tamed within the fuel into the reactor vessel. about 1,500 feet south of the North Gate en-
To compound the situation, superheated trance to the island. At 0600 hours on March
water and steam in contact with the zirconium 29, 30 mR/hour (2.2 X 10 C/kg/s) was mea-
alloy cladding surrounding the fuel caused sured in Goldsboro, located 1 .2 miles to the
the release of hydrogen. Enough hydrogen west of the plant. The highest level measured
was released into the reactor building to on site (outside the plant) was 365 mR/hour
cause an explosion by 1 : 50 PM that same day. (2.7 x 108 C/kg/s) on March 28 at 2325
In addition to the hydrogen, large quantities hours at a location 1,000 feet northwest of the
of fission products, especially the radioactive TMI-2 station vent. Measurements made by
noble gases xenon-133, xenon-135, and kryp- helicopter teams indicated 3,000 mR/hour
ton-85, were also released (10). Under nor- (2.2 X 10-v C/kg/s) at 15 feet above the
mal circumstances, when radionuclides are station vent at 1410 hours on March 29.
released into a reactor containment building, Gamma-ray spectroscopy of collected samples
the building is isolated from the outside. indicated that radioactive noble gases were
However, at TMI-2, when the water from the essentially the only radionuclides being re-
reactor core reached the basement of the re- leased. The highest dose recorded off site was
actor building, a sump pump began pumping 83 mrem (830 p.Sv) (TLD reading) (1 1),
it into a storage tank located next door in the whereas the highest dose estimated for an
auxiliary building. A total of 8,000 gallons of individual was 37 mrem (370 tSv) (10).
water were pumped into the 3,200-gallon At subsequent environmental sampling,
sump tank of the auxiliary building, which iodine-131 was detected in occasional milk
was already three-quarters full when the samples. However, the maximum concentra-
pumping began. Within a short period, the tion detected was 41 pCi [1.52 Bq/L in goat’s
storage tank began to overflow onto the floor. milk and 36 pCi [ 1 .33 Bq]/L in cow’s milk
The radioactive gases dissolved in the reactor (12), 300 times lower than the level at which
coolant water quickly escaped into the air of the Food and Drug Administration would rec-
the auxiliary building and were vented to the ommend removing cows from contaminated
outside by the building’s exhaust system. For- pastures. Cesium-137 detected in milk follow-
tunately, these exhaust systems contained ing the accident was at the concentrations
iodine and particulate filters that prevented expected from residual fallout from previous
all but the noble gases from escaping. nuclear weapons testing.
Some 15 hours and 50 minutes into the
accident, the operators managed to bring the . DOSE TO THE SURROUNDING
situation with the reactor core under control POPULATION
as they reestablished circulation through the Following the accident, an Ad Hoc Population
core and pressurization of the reactor vessel. Dose Assessment Group (12) consisting of
Unfortunately, by then, the damage had been staff members from the U.S. Nuclear Regula-
done. tory Commission (NRC), the Department of
Health, Education and Welfare, and the Envi-
. ESCAPE OF RADIOACTWITY ronmental Protection Agency (EPA) per-
The operators of TMI-2, at the time of the ac- formed a health impact assessment on the
cident, maintained 20 thermoluminescent nearly 2 million residents living within 50
dosimeter (TLD) off-site monitoring stations. miles ofThree Mile Island. This group evalu-
Fifteen of these stations were within 3 miles ated all data from the time of the accident up
of the plant, and the remaining five were at to and including April 7, 1979. They found
locations out to 15 miles. During the accident, that there was an estimated collective dose of
numerous in-field measurements were per- 3,300 person-rem (33 person-Sv), or an aver-
formed to track the plume and to obtain age dose of 1.5 mrem (15 pSv) to an mdi-
samples for gamma-ray spectroscopy. As ex- vidual, in this population. This led to the pro-
jection of one excess death from cancer over
the remaining lifetime of the population
within 50 miles of the island. The normal

218 #{149}
SpecialExhibit Volume 14 Number 1
 Figure 4. Workers training
for decontamination opera-
tion. (Courtesy of General

ii:iL’:. . \ Public Utilities,

Pennsylvania.)
Middletown,

expectation, had the accident not occurred, in that the damaged fuel and low-level radioac-
a population of this size is approximately tive wastes could not remain on the island.
325,000 cancer deaths. They were determined that Three Mile Island
would not become a radioactive waste dis-
. ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT posal site (8).
ANALYSIS
In March 1981, the NRC released its Final Pro- . CLEANUP OF TMI-2
grammatic Environmental Impact Statement Shortly after the accident at Three Mile Island,
related to decontamination and disposal of it was recognized that the cleanup operation
the radioactive wastes resulting from the acci- would be monumental and that unprec-
dent (8). Their estimate was that complete edented decisions would have to be made
cleanup would require 5-9 years from the along the way. Over the ensuing years, the
date of the accident. cleanup operation evolved into four separate
The estimated total body dose to the maxi- operational phases (14): (a) stabilizing the
mum exposed individual off site was 0.8-2.3 plant, from 1979 to 1980; (b) waste manage-
mrem (8-23 iiSv) (an estimated increased risk ment, from 1980 to 1983; (C) decontamina-
of dying of cancer of between one in 2 million tion, from 1981 to 1985; and (d) defueling,
and one in 600,000 or an increased risk of a from 1984 to 1990.
genetic effect to offspring over the next five Stabilization of the plant and initial pro-
generations ofbetween one in 100,000 and gress in the cleanup operation took longer
one in 300,000). The total cumulative dose to than expected. The initial cleanup was started
the entire population within 50 miles was es- in April 1979 when Metropolitan Edison, a
timated to be between 10-30 person-rem subsidiary of General Public Utilities, began
(0. 1-0.3 person-Sv) for the entire cleanup. decontamination of the auxiliary and fuel-
This was considered small compared with the handling buildings (Figs 4, 5). Over the
255,000 person-rem (2,550 person-Sv) that summer, a water treatment system called
would be accumulated by this population EPICOR-Il was installed to decontaminate the
from natural background during the same radioactive water in the TMI-2 auxiliary build-
period (these estimates were made before it ing tanks. Little could be done with the reac-
was realized that individuals also receive 200 tor containment building until it was purged
mrem (2,000 iiSv) per year to the lung from of the Kr-85 gas that it contained. The idea of
exposure to radon [13]).
The final disposal method for the accident-
generated radioactive water was deferred un-
til a later date, but it was decided by the NRC

January 1994 Mffler U RadioGrapbics #{149}

219
 purging additional radioactivity in an already
traumatized population was received with
great skepticism and concern. The ensuing
debates stalled the process for many months.
The frustration of delay can be seen in the
Rogovin Report (15): “The nine months since
the accident have passed with surprisingly
little change. Cleanup plans and efforts are
mired in prolonged debate. The auxiliary
building is slowly being cleaned up; the
waste-water outside containment is finally
being purified. A camera has been introduced
to the inside of the reactor containment build-
ing. This long unseen place, where fiercely
radioactive gas billowed and hydrogen
burned during the course of the accident, ap-
pears on the video screen, still, shiny, drip-
ping with humidity like a robot rain forest.
TMI-2 seems suspended in time, still waiting
to be opened, to be cleaned, or repaired, or
torn down.”
On May 16, 1980, in response to a request
from Governor Thornburg, the National
Council on Radiation Protection and Measure-
ments (NCRP) released its assessment of the
public health significance ofventing the Kr-85
from the reactor containment building (16). Figure 5. Workers decontaminating the auxiliary
They estimated a per capita skin dose of 0.054 building. (Courtesy of General Public Utilities,
mrem (0.54 iSv) and a whole body dose of Middletown, Pennsylvania.)
0.0004 mrem (0.004 pSv).
Onjune 12, 1980, the NRC approved de-
contamination of the reactor building atmo- for damage and to obtain radiation data. A
sphere through controlled purging. The chronology of significant or interesting events
purging began on June 28, 1980, and was is given in the Table.
completed onjuly 11, 1980. The environmen-
tal monitoring conducted during the venting U WORKER DOSE FROM DECON-
was unprecedented (14). Independent mea- TAMINATION OPERATIONS
surements were made by the EPA, General The decontamination effort at Three Mile Is-
Public Utilities, and the Pennsylvania Depart- land required thousands ofworkers, many of
ment of Environmental Resources. The EPA whom had to be sent into areas where they
and NRC held daily news conferences to re- could exceed exposure limits in a matter of
port the findings. Fifty residents from the sur- minutes. Every aspect of the cleanup opera-
rounding area volunteered to wear TLDs for tion was closely monitored by General Public
the 14-day venting period. The results were Utilities, the regulators, and the public. With
all within normal background levels. the exception of a short period during 1979
The first entry into the reactor building af- when it was necessary for workers to enter
ter the accident occurred onjuly 23, 1980. By certain areas to stabilize the plant and to as-
mid-December of that year, five entries into sess damage, the program was overwhelm-
the reactor building had been made to survey ingly successful. After that initial period, no
worker received whole-body radiation expo-
sure in excess of the limit.

220 U SpecialExhibit Volume 14 Number 1

 Chronology of Events Related to the Accident at Three Mile Island

February8, 1978 TMI-2 granted an operating license

March 28, 1978 TMI-2 achieves initial criticality
December 30, 1978 TMI-2 added to the electricity rate base
February 17, 1979 TMI-1 shut down for routine maintenance and refueling
March 28, 1979 TMI-2 accident begins at 4:01 i.M
March 30, 1979 Limited evacuation advised by Governor Thornburg
April 1, 1979 President and Mrs Carter arrive to tour the Three Mile Island nuclear generating
station
April 2, 1979 Hydrogen recombiner begins removing hydrogen from the containment building
April 9, 1979 Governor Thornburg lifts the evacuation advisory
April 19, 1979 First cold shutdown achieved
May 5, 1979 Court orders NRC to perform environmental assessment
August 7, 1979 First low-level radioactive waste shipped to Richland, Washington
August 28, 1979 Five workers receive excess exposure to extremities
October 22, 1979 EPICOR-Il water treatment system begins operation
October 31, 1979 Radioactive waste disposal site at Barnwell, South Carolina, closed to TMI-2 waste
November 10, 1979 Initial radiation measurements made in the containment building
February 27, 1980 Lancaster Agreement passed against river discharge of accident-generated waste
water
March 24, 1980 General Public Utilities stock hits all-time low at 33/s
June 28, 1980 Purge of the containment building begins
July 23, 1980 First entry into the containment building
August 8, 1980 General Public Utilities estimates a 5-year, $500-million cleanup
November7, 1980 Cleanup estimate revised to $ 1 billion
March 12, 1982 Processing ofwater in the containment building basement completed through the
Submerged Demineralizer System and EPICOR-Il
July21, 1982 First look at damaged core
October 1, 1982 100th entry into the containment building
December 1982 TLD reading beneath the reactor vessel head measures 500 R/h (3.6 x 10
C/kg/s)
March 25, 1983 200th entry into the containment building
July 24, 1984 Reactor vessel head removed
January 14, 1985 Three workers receive skin exposures over the limit
MayS, 1985 NRC votes in favor ofrestarting TMI-1
July 24, 1985 NRC finds no significant off-site health effects from the accident
September 5, 1985 Pennsylvania Department of Health finds no evidence of increased cancer among
Three Mile Island area residents
October 3, 1985 TMI-1 restarted
October 30, 1985 TMI-2 defueling begun
January 14, 1986 Algae growth noted in the reactor vessel
August 11, 1986 Breakup of resolidified mass in the reactor core begun
December 2, 1986 Monitored storage after defueling proposed for TMI-2
April 2, 1987 General Public Utilities declares first dividend since February 1980
April 15, 1987 EG&G Idaho reports 35% of the core melted during the accident
March 28, 1988 Mini-Rover submarine first used to defuel the pressurizer
May23, 1988 Defueling operator falls part way into the reactor vessel, with no overexposure
October 28, 1988 General Public Utilities announces cleanup cost at $973 million
November 1988 General Public Utilities named Electric Utility of the Year by Electric Light and
Power
May 1989 Resolidified material in the bottom of the reactor vessel breaks apart easily
August 26, 1989 Video shows cracks in the lower reactor vessel head
September 9, 1989 Two workers handle core debris and exceed exposure limits for extremities
January30, 1990 Defueling completed
February 1990 Metallurgists at Argonne National Laboratories conclude that cracks in the reactor
vessel are limited to the thin stainless steel lining and do not extend into the car-
bon steel of the vessel
February 1991 TMI-2 cleanup program named one of the top engineering achievements in the
United States in 1990 by the National Society of Professional Engineers

Source-References 14 and 17.

January 1994 Miller #{149}

Ra4ioGrapbic.s #{149}
221
 The initial estimate by the NRC was that the U CONSEQUENCES AND BENEFITS
total cumulative worker dose for the cleanup FROM THE ACCIDENT
would be 2,000-8,000 person-rem (20-80 The major consequence from this accident
person-Sv). As ofthe end ofAugust 1988, the has been the end of expansion of nuclear
total cumulative worker dose was 5,300 per- power in the United States and the continuing
son-rem (53 person-Sv) (18), an amount corn- consumption of a limited supply of fossil fu-
parable to the average collective dose for els. Clearly, the public’s trust of nuclear en-
commercial nuclear power plants in the ergy was shaken by this accident, and, al-
United States over the same period of time. though it has returned, it has not reached the
The total accumulated dose through January level that existed before the accident at Three
1990, when defueling was completed, was Mile Island.
6,217 person-rem (62.17 person-Sv) (General Another consequence of the accident has
Public Utilities, oral communication, April 2, been this country’s inability to develop addi-
1993) . The remainder of preparations neces- tional disposal capabilities for low-level radio-
sary for placing the facility in monitored stor- active waste (2 1). Since the Low-Level Radio-
age after defueling is not expected to add ap- active Waste Policy Act of 1980 and the Low-
preciably to this number. Level Radioactive Waste Policy Amendments
Act of 1985, the three operating disposal sites
. EVAPORATION OF THE ACCIDENT- in the United States have closed or will soon
GENERATED WATER close to wastes from outside their regions.
The accident at Three Mile Island generated Unless a remedy is found soon, this will have
approximately 2.3 million gallons of radioac- a profound impact on medical uses of radio-
tive water. This water contained activation nuclides, biomedical research, university re-
and fission products and approximately 1,000 search, pharmaceutical research, industrial
Ci (37 TBq) of tritium. It also contained boron applications, and future nuclear power.
and sodium as nonradioactive contaminants. The benefits include a safer nuclear indus-
Ten alternatives for disposal were considered, try that has lost the arrogance that existed be-
including deep-well injection, off-site evapo- fore the accident. This accident dramatically
ration at the Department of Energy’s Nevada impressed upon the users of nuclear technol-
Test Site, long-term discharge to the Susque- ogy an awareness of the immense responsibil-
hanna River, and evaporation on site. Several ity that they hold and the consequences of
environmental impact assessments were per- faltering in this responsibility. Several funda-
formed by General Public Utilities and groups mental lessons were learned from this accident
such as the NRC (19) and the NCRP (20). The (22). First, containment worked. Although mil-
results agreed: The maximum dose that lions of curies ofradioactivity were released into
would be received by any member of the pub- the containment building, very few escaped
lic would be substantially less than 1 mrem and the dose to the surrounding population
(10 p.Sv). In fact, of the 10 alternatives consid- was minimal. Second, the fission product in-
ered, there was no clearly preferable alterna- ventory was less threatening than anticipated.
tive. Each could be carried out with minimal The predictions regarding release of cesium
exposure to the public. The most significant and iodine at the time of the accident were
potential impact associated with any disposal not fulfilled (although 52% of the reactor core
alternative was the risk of physical injury asso- inventory of radiocesium and 40% of the ra-
ciated with transportation accidents (19) if dioiodine were released from the core [23],
the decision were made to transport the wa- no radiocesium and only 2.3 x 10 of the
ter off site. radioiodine were released to the environ-
Following additional processing of the wa- ment). Third, where there was water, the fuel
ter to remove the remaining radionuclides was not damaged. In the lower part of the
(other than tritium), the water evaporation TMI-2 core, the fuel still covered by water was
process was begun in 1990 and was corn- not damaged. Finally, the reactor vessel did
pleted in 1993. not fail. Although tons of molten fuel dropped
into the lower part of the reactor vessel within
minutes, it did not fail. By the end of defuel-
ing, it was realized that over 50% of the fuel
had melted during the accident (24) (Fig 6).

222 #{149}SpecialExhibit Volume 14 Number 1

 Plenum Assembly
Control Rod
V Guide Tube

Inlet Nozilo

: : Outlet Nozzle
Upper Grid

11 Core Support
Assembly
Void Area

Loose Debris

Resolidified Mass
: Core Baskel
Suspected F?os P.t
Agglomerated
; Transition Zone
id..
in this Region
Fuel Assemblies

Lower Grid A L

Guide Lugs
:

Figure 6. Cutaway view of

Once Molten Debris
the TMI-2 reactor vessel
vv.
and Rubble shows the status of the core in
October 1984. (Courtesy of
Tv l(1( or o lristr tirient General Public Utilities,
Floss Distributor
L’: GLj,dO Tubes Middletown, Pennsylvania.)

The lessons learned during this cleanup restored to the reactor core on March 28,
will aid immeasurably in future decommis- 1979? Did it end on April 2, 1979, when the
sioning operations. The robotics and other hydrogen recombiners began removing the
decontamination tools, as well as improved hydrogen from the containment building?
dosimetry and radiation detection instrumen- Perhaps it ended onJanuary 30, 1990, when
tation, developed for and during this opera- defueling was completed. Or perhaps the offi-
tion will help keep radiation exposure as low cial end of the accident remains somewhere
as possible during future handling and decon- in the future.
tamination procedures. The medical radiation At this time, evaporation of the accident-
emergency guidelines developed after the generated water has been completed, along
accident (25,26) will aid emergency physi- with preparations for placing TMI-2 into a
cians in providing appropriate response and monitored storage mode to await its decom-
care for future victims of radiation accidents missioning along with Unit 1 The NRC Advi- .

from any source. Most important, this acci- sory Panel (28), chartered in 1980 for the pur-
dent has pointed out the need for redesign pose of obtaining input and views from the
(27) and standardization of future reactors residents of the Three Mile Island area and
that will provide for uniformity of training of Pennsylvania government officials, met for the
operating personnel and will eliminate their last time on September 23, 1993. Class action
susceptibility to human error. suits against General Public Utilities are still
pending.
U CONCLUSION
When did the accident at Three Mile Island
officially end? Did it end when circulation was

January 1994 Miller #{149}

RadioGrapbics #{149}
223
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