April 4, 2011

Announcement: The End of the Interviews with my Dad, a Nuclear Engineer

Posted by Evelyn Mervine

As my dad and I just announced in Interview 17, we have decided to do just two more interviews about the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster in Japan.

We will conduct a last interview update on Thursday, April 7th. This will be the last interview in which we address questions from listeners, so please email any remaining questions you may have to [email protected] as soon as possible.

On Saturday, April 9th we will conduct a final interview in which we summarize the previous interviews. In this final interview my dad will also discuss newer generations of nuclear power plants and talk a little about a proposed idea to use thorium, rather than uranium, as a fuel source in nuclear power plants.

After Saturday, we will not conduct any more interviews unless there is a major development at Fukushima. We may also conduct the occasional interview from time to time to remind people that the nuclear disaster at Fukushima will take months to years to fully resolve and overcome.

We hope that these interviews have been helpful for people. As I mentioned in a previous note, I will be compiling all of the interview transcripts in an easy-to-read book form. My father and I will be self-publishing this book on Lulu (unless a publisher wants to come forth and help us?), and we will donate 25% of the book profits to earthquake and tsunami disaster relief in Japan. The book will include all of the interviews through the interview we will be doing on Saturday, and there will also be some extra information on my father and I (including a collection of family photos) and a chapter compiling some of the many, many emails and comments we have received over the course of doing these interviews. The interviews will remain freely available here always; I just thought that some people might like the interview transcripts available in an easier-to-read book form.

There are still a few interviews that need transcriptions. If anyone would like to transcribe some or all of Interviews 14, 15, 16, and 17, my father and I would be most grateful. I can send payment in the form of pretty rocks or gear from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, where I am a graduate student.