today i'm talking to walt patterson who's an associate fellow at chatham house and author of the or fell of a book on the power industry called keeping the lights on and thank you very much for talking to watts and now the situation in japan is we've seen several explosions at the question about nuclear power plants what do you think the chances are that we may see more and this situation carrying on sure that the people working on the site hope that they've got it under control but they seem to be releasing an awful lot of hydrogen from at least three reactors and now from a fuel point as well and hydrogen is an explosive gas if it's confined to mixed with air it produces can produce very dramatic explosions as we've seen so that's clearly a. major concern for them but i think the explosion problem is almost the least of their problems at the moment because what it has done to the reactors we don't know we don't know who hasn't apparently damaged the containment or the reactor pressure vessels themselves although i gather there may be a hole in one of the containments in unit two but wh

our next hour we sit down with walt patterson a nuclear physicist and associate fellow at chatham house as he shares his expert opinion on the situation in japan the problem is that they may have water levels rising and falling they may have few works but we know that they have had a few were exposed which just produce the the reaction the reaction between the morton. metal cladding and the water but produces the hydrogen so we have certainly had some fuel damage they may well have fuel ceramic fuel pellets that are now also circulating through the core and that will be clogging up channels and generally generally changing the configuration of your material in the core and unless the reaction unless the reactor engineers know what is going on they're liable to do something wrong. but turning our attention to libya where colonel gadhafi forces have gained more ground retaking many rebel held cities major world powers have so far dismissed imposing a no fly zone over the conflict stricken country and the issues that are still said to be discussed by the u.n. i don't see support asli repor

coming our next hour we sit down with walt patterson a nuclear physicist and associate fellow a chap and house as he says his expert opinion of the situation in japan. probably is that they may have water levels rising and falling they may have few works but we know that they have had a few were exposed which has produced the the reaction the reaction between the more. metal quieting and the water that produces the hydrogen so very very certainly had some feel very much they may well have fueled ceramic fuel pellets that are now also circulating through the core and that will be calling up channels and generally generally changing the configuration with geometry of the core and unless the reactor number three reactor engineers know what is going on there are liable to do something wrong. well if you are in the affected areas you can always share your experiences by logging onto our facebook account and r.t. news as well on a word our page also features the latest videos analysis and news on the situation in japan as well as all our other top stories if you know something you think th

meantime at walt patterson a nuclear physicist and associate fellow at chatham house he believes that the crisis at the fukushima power plant will have long lasting effects for the global nuclear industry this interview is coming up next hour but for now here's a preview. there's been quite a substantial body of opinion in japan including among sees mol adjusts but building nuclear plants anywhere in japan is not a good idea my personal feeling is that building nuclear plants anywhere is not a good idea for basically economic reasons they are very expensive they tend to be unreliable they are a kind of electricity which is very inflexible and difficult for an electricity system to use because you could lose a thousand megawatts in two minutes and in recent years of course that has been the major controversy about nuclear power investment all over the world private investors do not want to spend money on nuclear plants for quite understandable reasons they don't think you could get their money back but now the safety issue has come back again and that will complicate things even furthe