In spite of the “sickening human and social devastation on full display” in northern Japan, moderator Richard Samuels wonders, “Is it possible to follow the train of cause and effect into the future imagining what happens from here on?” In this session convened just days after the March 11th earthquake and tsunami, panelists bring eyewitness accounts as well as expert testimony on the current crisis and possible future developments in Japan. Samuels first sets the scene with background on Japan’s energy sector, where consumption has “long been skewed toward industrial uses.” Ten privately held utilities, regional monopolies, manage electric power. Keenly aware of its dependence on the outside world for oil and other fuels, Japan has moved decisively in the past half century toward nuclear power for electricity generation. The government agency responsible for regulating nuclear power producers and utilities, notes Samuels, sits inside the same ministry for promoting the power industry — a situation “not unfamiliar to Americans.” The Japanese public, shaken by accidents inside and outside the country, has not shared the enthusiasm of the Japanese government and business for nuclear power, nor for plans to achieve energy independence by building more and better reactors. Local citizens groups fight construction of new plants, and question government responses to power plant incidents. However, in the current crisis, the government has mobilized 100 thousand troops -- their largest deployment since the Pacific war. Says Samuels, “It remains to be seen whether this “or any government is up to the unprecedented, daunting task.” At the six-reactor nuclear complex of Fukushima Daiichi, Michael Golay says, critical safety problems have arisen because the loss of electrical power makes it impossible to keep the reactor cores and spent fuel swimming in cool water. These boiling water reactors are not designed “to handle the strongest conceivable earthquake” nor inun...