Social Institutions and Nuclear Energy

Weinberg, Alvin M.

doi:10.1126/science.177.4043.27

Cited by 115 publications

(37 citation statements)

References 4 publications

(3 reference statements)

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“…59 Nuclear power fosters an unbreakable commitment whereby society benefits from electricity-generation for a few decades, but in return has to bear the costs of managing nuclear waste for astonishingly long periods, often measured in millennia-one physicist even termed this a "Faustian Bargain." 60 . Put in terms perhaps easier to comprehend, nuclear reactors produce waste that will persist longer than our civilization has practiced Catholicism, longer than humans have cultivated crops, and longer than our species has existed, provoking some to classify them as essentially "immortal."…”

Section: Nuclear Waste As An Insult To Future Generationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Energy decisions reframed as justice and ethical concerns

et al. 2016

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Abstract:All too often, energy policy and technology discussions are limited to the domains of engineering and economics. Many energy consumers, and even analysts and policymakers, confront and frame energy and climate risks in a moral vacuum, rarely incorporating broader social justice concerns. Here, to remedy this gap, we investigate how concepts from justice and ethics can inform energy decision-making by reframing five energy problems-nuclear waste, involuntary resettlement, energy pollution, energy poverty, and climate change-as pressing justice concerns. We conclude by proposing an energy justice framework centred on availability, affordability, due process, transparency and accountability, sustainability, equity, and responsibility, which highlights the futurity, fairness, and equity dimensions of energy production and use.Energy justice 2

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Section: Nuclear Waste As An Insult To Future Generationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Energy decisions reframed as justice and ethical concerns

et al. 2016

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“…Alvin Weinberg's famous comment about the "nuclear priesthood" making a Faustian bargain with society reveals a belief deeply held by many nuclear experts, that they have an obligation to develop waste disposal technologies that transcend the lifetimes of human institutions. 5 This belief has led to federal regulations calling for reliance on geological barriers that haven't moved for centuries or millenia, instead of engineered barriers for which our experience is limited to a few centuries. It has also led to a near-obsession with preventing inadvertent human intrusion, in the event records are lost due to war or other events.…”

Section: Storage Vs Disposalmentioning

confidence: 99%

Issues in Low-Level Radioactive Waste Management

Bullard¹

1987

JAPCA

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“…Conceiving of this technology as a social experiment is not new. Authors such as Weinberg (1972Weinberg ( , 1978 and van de Poel (2011) have for instance pointed out the inevitable uncertainties involved in long-term radioactive waste management (RWM), related to the lack of complete knowledge of chemical, physical and biological processes over time, and the impossibility of predicting how people in the far future will deal with geological repositories (van de Poel 2011, p. 286). Drawing on combined insights from the fields of technology assessment, responsible innovation and science and technology studies we will take this conception further by describing it thoroughly and exploring how it could be addressed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Geological Disposal of Radioactive Waste: A Long-Term Socio-Technical Experiment

Schröder

2015

Sci Eng Ethics

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In this article we investigate whether long-term radioactive waste management by means of geological disposal can be understood as a social experiment. Geological disposal is a rather particular technology in the way it deals with the analytical and ethical complexities implied by the idea of technological innovation as social experimentation, because it is presented as a technology that ultimately functions without human involvement. We argue that, even when the long term function of the 'social' is foreseen to be restricted to safeguarding the functioning of the 'technical', geological disposal is still a social experiment. In order to better understand this argument and explore how it could be addressed, we elaborate the idea of social experimentation with the notion of co-production and the analytical tools of delegation, prescription and network as developed by actor-network theory. In doing so we emphasize that geological disposal inherently involves relations between surface and subsurface, between humans and nonhumans, between the social, material and natural realm, and that these relations require recognition and further elaboration. In other words, we argue that geological disposal concurrently is a social and a technical experiment, or better, a long-term socio-technical experiment. We end with proposing the idea of 'actor-networking' as a sensitizing concept for future research into what geological disposal as a socio-technical experiment could look like.

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Social Institutions and Nuclear Energy

Cited by 115 publications

References 4 publications

Energy decisions reframed as justice and ethical concerns

Energy decisions reframed as justice and ethical concerns

Issues in Low-Level Radioactive Waste Management

Geological Disposal of Radioactive Waste: A Long-Term Socio-Technical Experiment

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