Socioeconomic Studies of High-Level Nuclear Waste Disposal - 1994

[abqmufc]

(pretty nice cross discipline study on impacts...I quote "There is no clear precedent for solution from another country".)

"ABSTRACT

The socioeconomic investigations of possible impacts of the proposed repository for high-level nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, have been unprecedented in several respects. They bear on the public decision that sooner or later will be made as to where and how to dispose permanently of the waste presently at military weapons installations and that continues to accumulate at nuclear power stations. No final decision has yet been made. There is no clear precedent from other countries. The organization of state and federal studies is unique. The state studies involve more disciplines than any previous efforts. They have been carried out in parallel to federal studies and have pioneered in defining some problems and appropriate research methods. A recent annotated bibliography provides interested scientists with a compact guide to the 178 published reports, as well as to relevant journal articles and related documents.

The interdisciplinary investigations of socioeconomic aspects of proposed disposal of high-level nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, NV, address problems of technical and scientific analysis of unprecedented complexity while employing methods hitherto untried. The central problem is that of designing safe, permanent storage for the steadily growing quantity of spent fuel from the nation's 110 nuclear power reactors and for the radioactive materials remaining at installations for the production of nuclear weapons. The spent fuel currently is stored temporarily in pools at the reactor sites. The military materials are retained temporarily at production sites. Some of the materials are expected to remain radioactive for 100,000 to 1,000,000 years, and large uncertainties exist as to the effects on human health and safety. There is no clear precedent for solution from another country.

Because Yucca Mountain was selected in 1987 as the tentative disposal site by a highly political process and without comparison with other possible sites, or indication of what will be done if Yucca Mountain is not approved, and because there has been heavy pressure to begin getting the waste into permanent storage by 1998, there has been widespread interest in the consequences for public safety and well being. The decision has generated the largest inquiry into the feasibility of any action that Congress has ever proposed. The outlay for all types of studies already has reached more than two billion dollars, and a decision to proceed or not proceed remains at least several years off. In these circumstances the studies of possible social and economic consequences may have special significance for a final decision. They also deserve attention because they explore new methods and a unique organization of science for appraising a massive human intervention into the environment.

This review sketches briefly the background for the socioeconomic investigations, comments upon the organizational innovations and problems they have encountered, and reports a selection of the major findings. It does not offer judgments as to appropriate public policy or as to the quality and suitability of the activities of other research groups-- governmental or nongovernmental. It is intended to alert a wider audience among the scientific community to the availability of the diverse set of studies and to a few issues relating to organization for such research. "

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http://www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/yucca/socio02.htm