start with our bigger picture discussion beyond fukushima last month an in-depth conversation with paul gunter and kevin camps of beyond nuclear we discussed a variety of challenges the nation of japan and the fukushima nuclear plant still face and we touched on the role nuclear power still has in the world despite its obvious health and safety concerns here is our bigger picture discussion beyond fukushima. on the afternoon of march eleventh two thousand and eleven a massive nine point zero earthquake struck just off the main island of japan rattling that nation to its core nestled on the east coast of japan not too far from the epicenter of that quake was the fukushima daiichi nuclear plant that was six nuclear reactors three of which weren't designed to handle an earthquake of that magnitude better for the ground started shaking reactors one two and three at the plant went into automatic shutdown reactors four five and six were already shut down for inspection the main power source to keep the reactors cool the electric grid was knocked out by the earthquake so thirteen emergency diesel gen

debate over waste storage wake up enough people to the fact that nuclear power just isn't worth it paul gunter joins me now he's the director of the reactor oversight project at beyond nuclear paul welcome back to shanks again sam so are you encouraged at all by this decision that i guess the n.r.c. was kind of forced into here they were forced into following the laws as written under the national environmental policy act as it was brought forward by the state attorneys general from new york new jersey connecticut vermont and twenty four environmental groups from around the country that's what forced this decision do you think that the ruling that this court ruling had anything to do with what's going on in fukushima i think that the the accident in fukushima has certainly raised the just how significant and serious the environmental impacts of a nuclear waste fire could be and as we fear it still could be in japan and i think that it's you know people need to understand that where fukushima has you know for has one hundred thirty five metric tons plants like davis bessie have more than a thou