Keep counting them

Further in my series of “famous climate skeptic writers who made bad calls on the seriousness of Fukushima,” you can add the Telegraph’s James Delingpole.

This morning, I see that the Japanese PM has said that the situation remains grave and he cannot be optimistic.  (That’s how the ABC is reporting it.)

What I suspect is going on – but could be wrong of course – is that they have realised they have a very dangerous leak of very radioactive water, probably from the reactor core itself, and no one knows how to get rid of it.

Update:   from Bloomberg:

Radiation levels in sea water inside quake-damaged reactors at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi power plant may be rising, Japan’s nuclear watchdog said.  Levels show signs of climbing, Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman at the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, said in Tokyo today. Readings of between 200-300 millisieverts per hour were found in water at the No. 2 reactor, he said, equivalent to the maximum-permitted exposure for workers during the crisis.

I think (although media reporting on this is often mucking up the figures) the anuual limit for US reactor workers is 50 millisieverts, and Japan has increased it to 250. If I, and Bloomberg, are correct, I assume that a worker can only be near the reactor 2 water for an hour and then not be able to work there again. They are going to run out of workers pretty fast, if they need to be close to the water.

On a lighter note, I was talking to a Japanese friend this morning whose parents live at Chiba in Tokyo.  They have told him that bottled water is sold out, as is toilet paper. 

We both do not know why there would be a run on toilet paper.