Public Consent for the Geological Disposal of Highly Radioactive Waste and Spent Nuclear Fuel

Abstract

A global consensus exists for the geological disposal of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive wastes, plus interim storage until public consent is obtained. To reach consent, social scientists want a process like consensus-seeking that is less competitive than the majority rule of democracies, often a barrier to consent. However, the competition for consent improves the quality of a choice and its stability with a public when later faced by adverse events (e.g., with a consensus process and no consent, Japan’s repository program was set-back after its tsunami in 2011). We hypothesize that the best path to stable choice occurs when the voices from government, scientific and public interactions compete for the best choice, which generates and processes the information needed to reach and secure consent. We review our theory and the status of consent for the geologic disposal of SNF and HLW in the USA, Japan, UK and Europe.