scholarly journals Science underpinning the safety case of deep geological repositories − challenges in the past and in the future and how to maintain knowledge and competence during operation

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 24
Author(s):  
Johan Andersson
Keyword(s):  
International Cooperation ◽  
Safety Assessment ◽  
Spent Nuclear Fuel ◽  
Research Strategy ◽  
Version Control ◽  
The Past ◽  
Safety Case ◽  
Long Time ◽  
New Challenges ◽  
New Phase

Final repositories for spent nuclear fuel are approaching implementation. A prerequisite for these advancements is that it has been shown that the repository can be constructed and operated in practice in such a way that safety can be assured both during operation and over very long time scales. The success rests on decades of structured and objective-driven research and development. A key element of the research strategy has been to ensure adequate in-house competence and expertise. Also, openness and international cooperation are essential. Workable procedures for data qualification, version control as well as internal and external peer review have gained importance. When the programmes now enter a new phase of construction and operation new challenges will arise. Even if the implementing organisations would need to keep a core competence on post closure safety assessment international cooperation will be even more important on developing, sharing and managing the knowledge needed.

scholarly journals Deep Borehole Disposal Safety Case

Energies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (11) ◽  
pp. 2141 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geoff A. Freeze ◽  
Emily Stein ◽  
Patrick V. Brady ◽  
Carlos Lopez ◽  
David Sassani ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Reactive Transport ◽  
Safety Assessment ◽  
Spent Nuclear Fuel ◽  
Deep Borehole ◽  
Safety Case ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
Safety Assessments ◽  
Engineered Barriers ◽  
Technical Basis ◽  
Safety Strategy

The safety case for deep borehole disposal of nuclear wastes contains a safety strategy, an assessment basis, and a safety assessment. The safety strategy includes strategies for management, siting and design, and assessment. The assessment basis considers site selection, pre-closure, and post-closure, which includes waste and engineered barriers, the geosphere/natural barriers, and the biosphere and surface environment. The safety assessment entails a pre-closure safety analysis, a post-closure performance assessment, and confidence enhancement analyses. This paper outlines the assessment basis and safety assessment aspects of a deep borehole disposal safety case. The safety case presented here is specific to deep borehole disposal of Cs and Sr capsules, but is generally applicable to other waste forms, such as spent nuclear fuel. The safety assessments for pre-closure and post-closure are briefly summarized from other sources; key issues for confidence enhancement are described in greater detail. These confidence enhancement analyses require building the technical basis for geologically old, reducing, highly saline brines at the depth of waste emplacement, and using reactive-transport codes to predict their movement in post-closure. The development and emplacement of borehole seals above the waste emplacement zone is also important to confidence enhancement.

Formation of the research tradition of studying the institute Parliamentarism as a mechanism for the establishment of democracy

2017 ◽  
pp. 187-198
Author(s):  
Akil Ibrahim Al-Zuhari
Keyword(s):  
Balance Of Power ◽  
Research Strategy ◽  
The State ◽  
Executive Power ◽  
Research Tradition ◽  
Stage Of Development ◽  
The People ◽  
Long Time ◽  
The Government ◽  
Parliamentary Regimes

The article defines the features of the process of forming the research tradition of studying the institute of parliamentarism as a mechanism for the formation of democracy. It is established that parliamentarism acts as one of the varieties of the regime of functioning of the state, to which the independence of the representative body from the people is inherent, its actual primacy in the state mechanism, the division of functions between the legislative and executive branches of government, the responsibility and accountability of the government to the parliament. It is justified that, in addition to the regime that fully meets the stated requirements of classical parliamentarism, there are regimes that can be characterized as limited parliamentary regimes. The conclusions point out that parliamentarism does not necessarily lead to a democracy regime. At the first stage of development of statehood, it functions for a long time in the absence of many attributes of democracy, but at the present stage, without parliamentarism, democracy will be substantially limited. Modern researchers of parliamentarism recognize that this institution is undergoing changes with the development of the processes of democracy and democratization. This is what produces different approaches to its definition. However, most scientists under classical parliamentarianism understand such a system, which is based on the balance of power. This approach seeks to justify limiting the rights of parliament and strengthening executive power. Keywords: Parliamentarism, research strategy, theory of parliamentarism, types of parliamentarism

scholarly journals Predicting Fraud Victimization Using Classical Machine Learning

Entropy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 300
Author(s):  
Mark Lokanan ◽  
Susan Liu
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Financial Literacy ◽  
Learning Algorithm ◽  
Demographic Characteristics ◽  
Financial Knowledge ◽  
The Past ◽  
Machine Learning Model ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Regulatory Organization ◽  
Investment Fraud

Protecting financial consumers from investment fraud has been a recurring problem in Canada. The purpose of this paper is to predict the demographic characteristics of investors who are likely to be victims of investment fraud. Data for this paper came from the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada’s (IIROC) database between January of 2009 and December of 2019. In total, 4575 investors were coded as victims of investment fraud. The study employed a machine-learning algorithm to predict the probability of fraud victimization. The machine learning model deployed in this paper predicted the typical demographic profile of fraud victims as investors who classify as female, have poor financial knowledge, know the advisor from the past, and are retired. Investors who are characterized as having limited financial literacy but a long-time relationship with their advisor have reduced probabilities of being victimized. However, male investors with low or moderate-level investment knowledge were more likely to be preyed upon by their investment advisors. While not statistically significant, older adults, in general, are at greater risk of being victimized. The findings from this paper can be used by Canadian self-regulatory organizations and securities commissions to inform their investors’ protection mandates.

scholarly journals New Book Chronicle

Antiquity ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 91 (359) ◽  
pp. 1401-1411
Author(s):  
Robert Witcher
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
North Africa ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Trade Agreements ◽  
Technology Change ◽  
Belt And Road Initiative ◽  
The Past ◽  
Transfer Of Technology ◽  
Belt And Road ◽  
New Phase

Is the era of globalisation on the wane or on the cusp of a new phase of extraordinary expansion? US president Trump's abandonment of trade agreements and the rise of protectionism coincide with China's ‘Belt and Road Initiative’, an unprecedented investment in infrastructure across Asia, Europe and North Africa to improve the connectivity of China with its markets by both land and sea. The future is therefore anyone's guess, but what about the past? There has been much discussion by archaeologists about ancient globalisations (most recently, Hodos 2017), but archaeological studies have often typically been set within the looser framework of ‘connectivity’—the interconnectedness of people and places and the movement of material culture and ideas. The books reviewed here are concerned with various aspects of connectivity, focusing on the Eastern Mediterranean and its European hinterland. All of the volumes are edited collections, each adopting a different unifying theme—the influence of Braudel, a single country as microcosm, the transfer of technology, changevstradition, and the effects of boundaries and frontiers. Do any wider insights into connectivity in the past emerge? And where might archaeological studies of connectivity go next?

Challenges and Developments in Navigational Risk Assessment With Large Uncertainty

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xinping Yan ◽  
Jinfen Zhang ◽  
Di Zhang ◽  
Carlos Guedes Soares
Keyword(s):  
Risk Assessment ◽  
Safety Assessment ◽  
Oil Spills ◽  
Rule Base ◽  
Event Tree ◽  
Event Tree Analysis ◽  
General Application ◽  
The Past ◽  
Formal Safety Assessment ◽  
Belief Rule Base

Concerns have been raised to navigational safety worldwide because of the increasing throughput and the passing ships during the past decades while maritime accidents such as collisions, groundings, overturns, oil-spills and fires have occurred, causing serious consequences. Formal Safety Assessment (FSA) has been acknowledged to be a framework widely used in maritime risk assessment. Under this framework, this paper discusses certain existing challenges when an effective safety assessment is carried out under a variety of uncertainties. Some theories and methodologies are proposed to overcome the present challenges, e.g., Fault/Event Tree Analysis (FTA/ETA), Evidential Reasoning (ER), Bayesian Belief Network (BBN) and Belief Rule Base (BRB). Subsequently, three typical case studies that have been carried out in the Yangtze River are introduced to illustrate the general application of those approaches. These examples aim to demonstrate how advanced methodologies can facilitate navigational risk assessment under high uncertainties.

1993 Soichiro Honda Lecture: The Challenges of Change in the Auto Industry: Why Alternative Fuels?

1994 ◽  
Vol 116 (4) ◽  
pp. 727-732 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. J. Nichols
Keyword(s):  
Air Quality ◽  
Alternative Fuels ◽  
Combustion Engine ◽  
Auto Industry ◽  
Transportation Fuel ◽  
Alternative Fuel Vehicles ◽  
The Past ◽  
Entire Country ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Difficult Transition

Development of vehicles to operate on nonpetroleum fuels began in earnest in response to the energy shocks of the 1970s. While petroleum will remain the predominant transportation fuel for a long time, petroleum supplies are finite, so it is not too soon to begin the difficult transition to new sources of energy. In the past decade, composition of the fuel utilized in the internal combustion engine has gained recognition as a major factor in the control of emissions from the tailpipe of the automobile and the rate of formation of ozone in the atmosphere. Improvements in air quality can be realized by using vechicles that operate on natural gas, propane, methanol, ethanol, or electricity, but introduction of these alternative fuel vehicles presents major technical and economic challenges to the auto industry, as well as the entire country, as long as gasoline remains plentiful and inexpensive.

International responses to weather modification

1975 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 805-826 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edith Brown Weiss
Keyword(s):  
International Cooperation ◽  
New Technology ◽  
International Community ◽  
Weather Modification ◽  
Weather System ◽  
The Past ◽  
Time Horizons ◽  
Weather And Climate ◽  
Potential Problems ◽  
Do So

In the past few decades we have been improving our understanding of the weather system and exploring ways to modify it. Over sixty countries have experimented with modifying the weather. The new technology of weather and climate modification will raise important political problems which will demand new responses from the international community. Whether states will be able to establish the cooperative measures necessary to develop and manage new technology depends upon whether there are sufficient incentives to do so. This article analyzes the historical patterns of international cooperation in meteorology, and then plots against several time horizons projected developments and capabilities in weather modification technology and the potential problems emerging from using the technology. It derives a tentative picture of the responsibilities demanded, compares the likely responses with those needed, and assesses whether they will be adequate for the problems projected.

The SR 97 Safety Assessment of a KBS 3 Repository for Spent Nuclear Fuel – Overview, Review Comments and New Developments

2002 ◽  
Vol 713 ◽  
Author(s):  
Allan Hedin ◽  
Ulrik Kautsky ◽  
Lena Morén ◽  
Patrik Sellin ◽  
Jan-Olof Selroos
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Fuel ◽  
Safety Assessment ◽  
Spent Nuclear Fuel ◽  
Bentonite Clay ◽  
Research Programme ◽  
High Strength ◽  
Functional Requirements ◽  
Future Evolution ◽  
Site Investigations ◽  
Potential Safety

ABSTRACTIn preparation for coming site investigations for siting of a deep repository for spent nuclear fuel, the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company, SKB has carried out the longterm safety assessment SR 97, requested by the Swedish Government. The repository is of the KBS-3 type, where the fuel is placed in isolating copper canisters with a high-strength cast iron insert. The canisters are surrounded by bentonite clay in individual deposition holes at a depth of 500 m in granitic bedrock. Geological data are taken from three sites in Sweden to shed light on different conditions in Swedish granitic bedrock.The future evolution of the repository system is analysed in the form of five scenarios. The first is a base scenario where the repository is postulated to be built entirely according to specifications and where present-day conditions in the surroundings, including climate, persist. The four other scenarios show the evolution if the repository contains a few initially defective canisters, in the event of climate change, in the event of earthquakes, and in the event of future inadvertent human intrusion.The principal conclusion of the assessment is that the prospects of building a safe deep repository for spent nuclear fuel in Swedish granitic bedrock are very good. The results of the assessment also serve as a basis for formulating requirements and preferences regarding the bedrock in site investigations, for designing a programme for site investigations, for formulating functional requirements on the repository's barriers, and for prioritisation of research.SR 97 has been reviewed both by an international group of OECD/NEA experts and by Swedish authorities. The NEA reviewers concluded that “SR 97 provides a sensible illustration of the potential safety of the KBS-3 concept”, and no issues were identified that need to be resolved prior to proceeding to the investigation of potential sites. The authorities' conclusions were in principal consistent with those of the NEA.Uncertainties and lack of knowledge in different areas identified in SR 97 have strongly influenced the contents and structure of SKBs most recent research programme, RD&DProgramme 2001.Since SR 97, the methodology for probabilistic consequence analyses have been further developed. Analytic approximations to the numerical transport models used in SR 97 have been developed. The new models have been used to extend the probabilistic calculations in SR 97.

scholarly journals CYCLIC UNIVERSE AND INFINITE PAST

2007 ◽  
Vol 22 (34) ◽  
pp. 2587-2592 ◽  
Author(s):  
PAUL H. FRAMPTON
Keyword(s):  
Null Geodesic ◽  
Infinite Length ◽  
Infinite Time ◽  
Cyclic Universe ◽  
The Past ◽  
Long Time

We address two questions about the past for infinitely cyclic cosmology. The first is whether it can contain an infinite length null geodesic into the past in view of the Borde–Guth–Vilenkin (BGV) "no-go" theorem, The second is whether, given that a small fraction of spawned universes fail to cycle, there is an adequate probability for a successful universe after an infinite time. We give positive answers to both questions and then show that in infinite cyclicity the total number of universes has been infinite for an arbitrarily long time.

Diplomatic Affairs and International Law, 1913

1914 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-49
Author(s):  
Alfred L. P. Dennis
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Cooperation ◽  
Economic Loss ◽  
Panama Canal ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
The Past ◽  
True Value

War has marked the year 1913; and charges and countercharges as to alleged atrocities by belligerents have been rife. Treaties were drawn to be promptly torn up; and solemn declarations of intention and policy often proved futile. The existence of internal disorder and the outbreak of domestic revolutions in several countries have also exerted disturbing influences on international relations. The result was economic loss and diplomatic tension even well beyond the field of military operations. And these conditions have led to renewed activity in the struggle for concessions and investment in renascent communities. Racial and religious sentiments have also aroused bitter feeling; while political leaders in several countries compel renewed consideration of the weight of individuals in the determination of the world's affairs.In large part the problems of 1913 were historic; but in part they were affected by apparently impending changes which we cannot as yet define. Thus the influence of socialism and of various forms of radical thought on international relations is a factor. The adoption of oil as a naval fuel, the opening of the Panama Canal, the plans for administrative reorganization of Turkey, and its capitalistic development, the renewed debate as to the Monroe doctrine, and the problem of China are all matters whose future significance scarcely concern us here; but their influence in the past year has been unquestionably great. We cannot estimate as yet the true value of many recommendations touching various fields of international coöperation; and the value of delay in international action still remains in dispute. So on the whole the year 1913 has apparently been the year of the cynic.

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