Following the terrible earthquakes and tsunami in northeastern Japan on March 11, schoolchildren as far away as Tokyo have been going to school wearing pointy silver hats to protect them from potential fires and debris during ensuing aftershocks. For some, too, the shiny hoods function as ineffectual radiation shields, a poignant sign of Japan’s deepening unease over the ongoing meltdown at the Fukushima nuclear power plant.
Japan is at present menaced by several concurrent, concatenating crises. But with smart and responsible energy policies and politics, it could pioneer approaches that help lead us all out of our increasing dire, energy-centred dilemmas.
Energy concerns may underlie U.S. involvement in the intervention in Libya, to the exclusion of Bahrain and Yemen.
We shouldn’t let the much greater danger of nuclear weapons obscure the risks of nuclear energy.
The Chinese know why the U.S. is bombing Libya but not challenging Bahrain and Yemen: Bahrain hosts the U.S. Fifth Fleet, and Yemen’s port of Aden provides access to the Red Sea.
Since Nevada has balked at storing nuclear waste in Yucca Mountain, spent fuel rods are piling up in U.S. nuclear plants.
As Japan’s nuclear crisis deepened, Gaddafi revealed that he would cancel oil contracts with Europe and sign up instead the BRIC countries.
Would the United States have handled Fukushima better?
The Fukushima reactors survival of both an earthquake and tsunami with minimal radiation release can be a powerful selling point for nuclear power plants.
The U.S. response to the financial crisis showed scant evidence that we learned from our mistakes.