10 Years Since Tohoku & Fukushima feat. Paul Blustein

The Tohoku earthquake which led to the Fukushima accident
was the 4th most powerful earthquake in the world since modern
measurement and record keeping began in 1900. This earthquake was
so powerful that it redistributed earth’s mass sufficiently to
shift the earth’s figure axis by 17cm and shorten our days by 1.8
microseconds.


There’s a tendency in the West to forget about the
earthquake in our fascination with the nuclear accident in
Fukushima. Paul Blustein is a former Rhodes scholar, journalist
and writer who has written about economic issues for more than 40
years and lives in Kamakura Japan with his family where he
experienced the earthquake and its aftermath. Paul was an early
voice of reason dispelling some of the worst radiation fear
mongering at the time. He has made a point of supporting the
farmers of Fukushima by eating and promoting produce from the
prefecture where safe radiation limits are set at 1/10 those of
Europe. 


In this episode we discuss the lived experience of the
earthquake and its aftermath as well as the enormous damage
caused by the failure of NRC chairman Gregory Jackzo to correct
the record on a modelling error he publisized. This led to
suspicion that the Japanese government was suprressing the
seriousness of the accident and significantly eroded public trust
and exagerated panic. 


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