>> i would focus is to set up and enforce the no-fly zone and that is what we are doing. we will be looking at the costs at another time. >> how many aircraft in total will it take to enforce the no- fly zone? >> we will >> have any coalition partners agreed to putting people on the ground? >> a no-fly zone. it a deterrent. -- a deterrent. we have many nations that are waiting to announce. we have the united kingdom, france, italy, canada, qatar. >> the broadcast messages? >> we are putting up all of our

specialized aircraft of that nature, and i am not ready -- i am not willing to talk about that. >> sir, do you have over-flight allowances from other countries? our neighboring countries allowing you to base maintenance, and if so, which once or how many of them? -- would korea to which ones? >> we will let them make that announcement -- which ones? >> we will let them make an announcement. >> to target gaddafi? >> at this particular point, i can guarantee that he is not on the target list.

what is that? the rest of this is is that if he is expecting a surface-to-air missiles, no, we are not targeting his residence at this time. looking to enforce united nations security council resolution. >> have you engaged with turkey during the situation we are not going to mention any nation that we are using. we will let those countries make those announcements. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] [captioning performed by national captioning institute]

>> president obama continues his trip in latin america. tomorrow, he is in santiago, chilly. you can see his speech live tomorrow about 3:30 p.m. eastern. >> joining us on "newsmakers," the chair of the nuclear regulatory commission appointed by president obama. thank you so much for being with us. "the new york times", and steve powers, energy reporters. you will get a status report on japan tomorrow. what you think you learn? guest: we will have a meeting with the full commission on the nrc. we will have a brief discussion on what kind of impact radiation could have for the public, and then we will take a look at some things, kind of a plan for a

plant for how we intend to go forward and what kinds of things we may need to look at for u.s. nuclear reactors. host: with the fukushima plant in particular, at two of the six reactors are under control. japanese officials have indicated that this facility will have to be shut down. guest: we are continuing to monitor the situation. we have a team of nrc experts and tokyo and are working with their counterparts to get information. our focus is to ensure cooling for three of the reactors that were operating and to continue to work with the japanese to ensure that they can deal with the situation two of the spent fulel areas. host: do you have faith in the information you are getting from the japanese government? guest: right now we have a team

of folks imbedded and tokyo. they are working very closely with counterparts from the nuclear industry in japan. as well as officials from the japanese government. host: are you getting the information you need? guest: right now we are getting good information, but it is a very difficult situation. it is important to remember that there has been a tremendous disaster in japan up with the earthquake and a tsunami. things like the restoration of emergency power will be very important because that will help with the instrumentation and other sources of information. as the work goes on, we will get better and better information. guest: in the u.s. after three mile island, at your agency. in requirement for a 10 mile zone for evacuation's and a 50- mile zone for checking on food and water. here we are a week into this and we have gone to 50 miles for evacuation and they are

detecting to contaminated food 90 miles out. does this suggest that our own emergency planning zone to need to be adjusted? guest: first of all, we want to take a systematic and methodical look at all the information we're getting from japan. but i think there are some differences in of the united states versus what we are seeing and japan. first and foremost, we do not have sites that have some reactors in one location. the emergency planning regulations and requirements we have are really focused on the early phase of an event. so what we want to do is build a system that we know at about 10 miles we can activate that system quickly and we can mobilize it quickly. but we always appreciate that there may be circumstances in which we have to expand that if necessary. again, i do not want to go too far into analyzing what is going on in japan, but we intended to

do that and this is a medical and methodical way. and n a systematic methodical way. probably a much longer look based on the reactor information we get from japan about what really happened and what is most important going forward. guest: the commission staff has issued a license renewal for the yankee plant which is a near twin of fukushima i. do you expect any pressure from outside to take a more careful look at forrester creeks, -- at oyster creek? guest: that decision has already been made. we will move forward to process -- were and the process of going to some of the last paper work with that. i would remind everyone that that license renewal owould

not start for another year altogether. i anticipate we will have our longer-term review done earlier than that. if there are lessons, we do not intend to wait for a renewed license period. we will take those lessons and implement them right away if we need to. that would apply to all of the plants and the country, not just those similar to the plants in japan. it is important for us to view this and a methodical way, because we want to get this right. we do not want to take early information and use that and go off and a completely wrong direction. so we really want to get good information about what exactly happened in japan, and what exactly with the most important factors for the situation we have now. host: steve park, "the wall street journal". guest: there have been reports the water has been disappearing at a faster than can be explained by evaporation. does the u.s. believe there is a

leak? how confident are you in your statement from last week that the pool is dry? guest: i made that statement based on what i have as the best available information at that time. right now, our effort is looking forward to continue to assist the japanese in to their efforts to deal with this. right now, they are taking steps to provide water into the pool, and we will continue to give them some recommendations about how to do that effectively. so i think when this is all done and the crisis is over, i am sure there will be an opportunity to go back and try and understand all the different information that was being presented and what it all means. right now our focus is on moving forward and getting the situation better under control. guest: are you certain that the pool is dry? guest: right now i was very comfortable at the time with the statement i made. i continue to be comfortable with that statement.

that was over three days ago, i believe. since then, efforts have been made to put water into that pool. we are dealing with a different situation than we did then. guest: do you believe there is a leak? guest: it is possible. i do not want to speculate on the conditions. the relevant information is that there are very high rate credit -- radiation field. although we are seeing those radiation levels come down. that is possibly our results of some amount of spent fuel rods be exposed as well as possibly some material that has been deposited on the ground. in many ways, , what is important right now -- is that. that could impact of the workers need to do the work they need to do. it requires extra measure to monitor their time it near the site and their activities because of high radiation levels guest: the american perception

of how serious an accident at this is a seems to be more severe than the japanese perception. can you explain why? guest: matt, i think the japanese people are dealing with a tremendous crisis. as i have had interactions with our team in tokyo, i get a strong sense that they understand the importance of the situation and are working to resolve it, but there is tremendous of damage throughout areas of japan. and i certainly want to express my tremendous stability to the japanese people. this is a very difficult time, and i am focused on one part of what is a very tragic situation. but the japanese government is dealing with many different elements of this. we will continue to do what we can it to provide recommendations and support in their efforts to address the reactors. host: there was a story and the

"the new york times" and which it indicated that they may have lost a valuable time. uest: i think we'll have an opportunity when the crisis is resolved to go back and see how decisions were made and what if anything could be done better. if there were decisions like that that were made, i think that will be valuable information for as as we look at our process and our system to see if there are some things we need to think about ahead of time so that we do not lose a valuable, valuable time. host: when will you get these answers? guest: several months after the crisis is fully resolved. as i said, we intend to do a short-term look. i think that that will be done and a much shorter time frame, just to take the available information that we have and

really look at our plan and make sure there are not any immediate actions we need to take. host: how does this learning process affect the pace and which agency can make decisions on licenses, issuing new ones? guest: i would anticipate the reviews we are going to do would be a in line with the time frames we have for possibly making decisions on reactor licenses. right now we have several new reactor license is in the design approval phase. they are and the last stage of that review. and we anticipate that we could make a decision sometime and the late summer, early fall. i would like to see as a very far along if not resolved and a lot of lessons learned by this time. guest: are you saying this will not have any effect on the pace of decisions, this will not slow anything down? guest: we certainly want to get good information. if that could information tells us that we need to make changes

to our licensing process, then we will do that pared by the way, the focus of our re- licensing effort or reviews is really on systems to deal with the aging of the equipment. that immediate safety issue, for instance from seismic event or severe accident, that is something we do on a daily basis. that is not something we wait to review for a new license or a license extension. if we get information that tells us there is an action that needs to be taken, we will take that immediately or in whatever timeframe is a proper it. guest: would you like to send some of your love the people in tokyo up to the site? -- like to send some of your people in tokyo to the site? guest: they are there and a role to provide technical advice and recommendations to what is a japanese response.

i think tokyo is the best place for them and i think that is where they will stay. guest: at one point -- at what point would you like to send someone up there? guest: i do not think it is the appropriate role for the nrc. we need to ensure that we can provide help to the japanese government. guest: , markey has called under agency to make public the daily situation or other documents that reflected and your staff's data de assessment or situation at the reactors. will you do that? what is the worst case scenario? how bad could it get? guest: i will look of their request. i have not seen it yet. there is not too much -- it is not too different and what i have been talking about. in terms of worst case, i do not

want to go into speculating about those kinds of things because, right now the focus is on trying to resolve the situation. but we are basically working to provide recommendations to the japanese government to fundamentally deal with continued cooling of the three actors that were operating at the time of the earth quaked - - the three reactors that were operating at the time of the earthquake. four of the six reactors at th e site. that is really the focus, and everyone is working to make sure that we can prevent this event from deteriorating. host: for those workers inside the fukushima, what is the long- term prognosis, as an expert on radiation? guest: we do not have information about what kind of

doses workers have been exposed to. there are high radiation levels that if people were exposed to those radiation levels over long a period of time, could be harmful, possibly fatal. but we do not have the specific information about what kinds of those is the workers have actually received, and that is something that the japanese government is working to monitor. host: at what point does it become deadly? guest: the effects of radiation is a combination of many things. it is a combination of the actual amount of radiation, and then the exposure time. so we like to think in the radiation protection world of three factors -- time, distance, and shielding. that way you ensure that the proper levels of radiation are received by workers or by emergency personnel. i would add that and the united states, as in many other countries, we have higher levels of radiation that emergency

workers are allowed to receive in the event of a very serious situation like we have in to japan. that's 25 rim. in the u.s. we do not expect the kind of lethal doses, and we get much higher up into the higher rem levels. guest: do we have independent levels of radiation rates there are related to what they are telling us? guest: there is a u.s. government effort to provide additional radiation measurement lovell's to access at the department of energy and other government agencies. we are collecting some of that information, sharing that with the japanese government. guest: and this is through overflights? guest: we are getting any attrition from a variety of sources -- informationi from a

variety of sources, department of energy sources. is this and the category of, i could tell you, but then it would have to kill you? we have a variety of different sources. it depends on him as the most reliable information. because of a loss of power to a part of the reactor site, instrumentation is not always available. so it is difficult to obtain accurate information. but we believe there right now the radiation levels at the site are high, but we have some indications they may be coming down. guest: how high are they? guest: again, the information is a little bit uncertain, right now, we have seen indications of radiation levels that are approximately and the tens of rem range per hour. but that is very, very near the site and that would not be

unanticipated, given what we believe is the situation there appeare. guest: do you believe that the contamination has been limited to a certain geographic area? how many miles of? guest: we have some information about where the radiation levels are. the japanese government is also looking at that and monitoring it to provide good information about the locales of the radiation. i would stress, we will detect radiation from this event at a much wider area than really present a health hazard. so they will likely be -- there will likely be some very low levels of radiation detected and the united states, but they do not pose any risk to human health. guest: the focus in of the united states has been on the risk from operating reactors,

but as we look at japan, a fair chunk of the risk does not come from the operating reactors but from the spent fuel pools. do we need to redirect our attention to the safety of spent fuel? guest: that is something we have looked at over many years. we believe that fuel pools are designed to withstand the types of natural phenomena we have seen in japan. and addition -- in addition, after 9/11, we have taken a look at ways we can better reduce the likelihood of any type fof spent fuel fire. so there are some strategies we have put a dent and place. it has been an issue that we have always been aware of, and we have taken a lot of steps to ensure that we can prevent or mitigate any type of spent fuel -- guest: what we have done in this country which the deputies have

not done -- the japanese have there are-- racks in place to prevent the moving of water. is it time to rethink of o?el of doenseness guest: we will take a look at lot of the information out of the japanese of said. if there are changes, we will proceed to do that. we have looked at a lot of those kinds of questions when we do our approvals for the more densely packed spent fuel pools. to some extent, the ability to cool the pools is a matter

of providing a supply of water. following 9/11, we looked at spent fuel pools. we did require utilities to have the ability and a dire situation -- in a dire situation, to have a backup to the backup situation to get water into the pools and to continue to ensure that they keep the radiation levels down. guest: we think we are better than they are? guest: we think we have a program anin place. what they are dealing with in japan is a very difficult situation. there will be plenty of opportunity when the crisis is resolved to figure out what happened and how we can all learn from it here in the u.s., or japan. guest: with the response by the tokyo electric power company, japan's nuclear industry, or the

japanese government, has anything surprise you personally in the last week and a half? guest: i think this is a very difficult situation. these situations present new information and new challenges. anytime i have been involved in any type of emergency response, i find information is more difficult to obtain and we think it is. and we always have more conflicting information than we would like. in that sense, that is a lot of what we are seeing. that is not necessarily a surprise. it is one of the challenges of dealing with a fast-moving scenario like this. when you have the devastation that you are seeing as the result of the hurricane and a tsunami. host: what can we do and the u.s.? guest: the more that you prepare a new plan, the better the decision making will be and the better your information flow will be. there always be a degree of

conflicting information and just uncertainty. the challenge is to try and build in systems that reduce that as much as possible. guest: some environmental seven accused your agency of being beholden to the nuclear industry -- some environmentalists have accused your agency of being beholden to the nuclear industry. guest: we have 4000 employees to come to work every day with one focus and that is to ensure public safety when it comes to the use of nuclear material. if i had any reason it would be those 4000 people and that would be 4000 reasons in my mind. we're all about protecting public health and safety. we want to do that in way that we think is based on good science and good technical judgment, but we will do what we need to do to ensure public health and safety. guest: earlier in to your career, you worked for congressman markey, who is an

outspoken critic of nuclear power. you also worked for harry reid. to what extent did that influence your view on nuclear power and the industry? guest: i cannot say that i have views on nuclear power. i have use of nuclear safety. nuclear safety is an issue that most people agree on. and we agree on the right kinds of approaches. and the importance of nuclear safety be number one issue in the nuclear industry. as i have talked to people in the industry, public adjusters, that is always the number one focus for everyone. it is a unique aspect to this industry. the industry itself has a lot of ways that they do that. they haven't organization called the institute for nuclear power operations that serves as an industry, self-regulatory body. focus is on excellence and safety. we have the nrc whose focus is

on adequate protection of the public. then you have an industry organization that helps get excellent in that area. the public interest groups, with members of congress, safety is something that we agree is the number one priority. guest: the commission will soon make a decision on the ap1000, a new design. you have four new designs appear to euro of them are supposed to have passive -- two of them are supposed to have the safety mechanisms and case of an earthquake. are you looking at those, again now, in light of events of japan? do you think those have a better ability to respond to this kind of challenge than a generation out there now? guest: we will take a look at everything we are getting out of japan and see if it has an impact for this design.

as i said, those are designed, at the earliest, would be finalized sometime in the late summer, early fall. i think we will have some information, if not all of the information of the japanese event by then to inform any decisions we need to make about those designs. i do not want to speculate that right now. so-called passive plants are the solution because we simply do not know what was the most relevant phenomenon there. what we do know is that in this country, through the analysis we have done of nuclear reactors and the safety issues, that this kind of situation, where you lose all of the electric power for an extended period of time, is a -- situation. they would insure they had plans in place to recover the of site

power and be able to cope with the situation for it. time that it would take him to recover that of such power. right now, the exact facts are not totally clear. when we get those, we will take a look at everything we have in front of us in terms of licensing or any other actions we may have and see if there are lessons we need to apply. host: one of your former nrc commissioner says this event will lead to a slowdown in licenses. are an you not willing to concede that? because of the need to divert manpower and strutted this accident and the lessons learned and incorporate this, will it have some affect on the pace to which you could make decisions? guest: and this will be a significant workload for the agency. we will take a look at how we can deal with this work load an