scholarly journals WHILE WE WAIT - NUCLEAR WASTE FACILITY RISØ

Detritus ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Ravnborg

​This project addresses issues associated with the disposal of Danish nuclear waste generated during the operations and decommissioning of the Risø Research Centre. The issue is highly relevant in view of the alarm created by current storage of the waste at Risø. Due to the poor condition of the concrete canisters containing the radioactive waste, a decision as to how best to manage the waste is a priority matter. The most appropriate solution would be represented by use of a depot: a building complex developed to house and encase the radioactive waste for several future generations. The depot would represent a unique structure, the distinctive and mysterious function of which would undoubtedly generate a great deal of debate. The project is a concrete idea of how disposal can be incorporated into an extended societal context. Storage of radioactive substances is a global problem frequently associated with strong feelings. By addressing the issue from an architectural point of view, hopefully a humane dimension can be conveyed to a highly inhumane subject, and potentially result in the erection of a monument that gives something back to its surroundings rather than acting as an unpleasant burden.

Author(s):  
Matti Kojo ◽  
Phil Richardson

In some countries nuclear waste facility siting programs include social and economic benefits, compensation, local empowerment and motivation measures and other incentives for the potential host community. This can generally be referred to as an ‘added value approach’. Demonstration of the safety of a repository is seen as a precondition of an added value approach. Recently much focus has been placed on studying and developing public participation approaches but less on the use of such incentive and community benefit packages, although they are becoming a more common element in many site selection strategies for nuclear waste management facilities. The primary objective of this paper is to report on an ongoing study of stakeholders’ opinions of the use of an added value approach in siting a radioactive waste facility in the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovenia. The paper argues that an added value approach should adapt to the interests and needs of stakeholders during different stages of a siting process. The main question posed in the study is as follows: What are the measures which should be included in ‘added value approach’ according to the stakeholders? The research data consists of stakeholders’ responses to a survey focusing on the use of added value (community benefits) and incentives in siting nuclear waste management facilities. The survey involved use of a questionnaire developed as part of the EU-funded IPPA* project in three countries: the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovenia. (* Implementing Public Participation Approaches in Radioactive Waste Disposal, FP7 Contract Number: 269849). The target audiences for the questionnaires were the stakeholders represented in the national stakeholder groups established to discuss site selection for a nuclear waste repository in their country. A total of 105 questionnaires were sent to the stakeholders between November 2011 and January 2012. 44 questionnaires were returned, resulting in a total response rate of 41% (10/29 in the Czech Republic, 11/14 in Poland and in 23/64 in Slovenia).


2021 ◽  
pp. 108602662110316
Author(s):  
Tiziana Russo-Spena ◽  
Nadia Di Paola ◽  
Aidan O’Driscoll

An effective climate change action involves the critical role that companies must play in assuring the long-term human and social well-being of future generations. In our study, we offer a more holistic, inclusive, both–and approach to the challenge of environmental innovation (EI) that uses a novel methodology to identify relevant configurations for firms engaging in a superior EI strategy. A conceptual framework is proposed that identifies six sets of driving characteristics of EI and two sets of beneficial outcomes, all inherently tensional. Our analysis utilizes a complementary rather than an oppositional point of view. A data set of 65 companies in the ICT value chain is analyzed via fuzzy-set comparative analysis (fsQCA) and a post-QCA procedure. The results reveal that achieving a superior EI strategy is possible in several scenarios. Specifically, after close examination, two main configuration groups emerge, referred to as technological environmental innovators and organizational environmental innovators.


2003 ◽  
Vol 807 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Advocat ◽  
F. Jorion ◽  
T. Marcillat ◽  
G. Leturcq ◽  
X. Deschanels ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTZirconolite is a potential inorganic matrix that is currently investigated in France, in the framework of the 1991 radioactive waste management law, with a view to provide durable containment of the trivalent and tetravalent minor actinides like neptunium, curium, americium and small quantities of unrecyclable plutonium separated from other nuclear waste. To confirm the actinide loading capacity of the zirconolite calcium site and to study the physical and chemical stability of this type of ceramic when subjected to alpha self-irradiation, zirconolite ceramic pellets were fabricated with 10 wt% plutonium oxide (isotope 239 or 238). The 55 pellets are dense (> 93.3% of the theoretical density on average) and free of cracks. They are characterized by a grain size of between 10 and 20 micrometers. X-ray diffraction analyses confirmed the presence of the zirconolite 2M crystalline structure.


Exchange ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 149-166 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henri Gooren

AbstractThe central question of this article — why people may change their religious affiliation or become disaffiliated — is relevant from both an academic and a practical point of view. The article makes first an inventory of existing literature on religious conversion. Next I sketch the contours of the new conversion careers approach I am currently working on. I make some comparisons with a region that is not usually mentioned in the literature on conversion: Latin America. These comparisons are based on my earlier fieldwork on Roman Catholicism, Pentecostalism, and Mormonism in Costa Rica and Guatemala (H. Gooren, Rich among the Poor: Church, Firm, and Household among Small-scale Entrepreneurs in Guatemala City, Amsterdam: Thela Thesis 1999).


Philosophies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 66
Author(s):  
Fuminori Akiba

From the perspective of sustainability, empowering people to live positively without being dominated by death is an important issue. One thing we can do in this vein is to expand one’s own physical sensation, which is the basis for us to live. From this point of view, Shusaku Arakawa and Madeline Gins’ idea of “landing sites” is very important. Landing sites are physical experiences that result from person–environment collaboration. In order to make as many people as possible aware of their physical sensations through landing sites, Arakawa and Gins created artificial environments such as “Site of Reversible Destiny Yoro” where people could gain new physical sensations. They wanted people to build new ethics and move toward social reformation based on their new physical sensations. However, at present, these artificial environments have some problems. It is the time to seriously consider how we can pass on the experience of landing sites to future generations. The aim of this paper is to provide an answer to the question by Yasuhiro Suzuki’s scientific research on tactile sense, called tactileology. I first introduce Arakawa and Gin’s text about the idea of “landing sites” and make clear its importance. Next, I point out that, now, “landing sites” present certain difficulties. I then confirm that tactileology inherits the idea of “landing sites”.


Author(s):  
Marion Hourdequin ◽  
David B. Wong

This chapter explains how early Confucianism can ground a distinctly relational perspective on intergenerational ethics. The Analects of Confucius foregrounds intergenerational relations by rooting ethics in relationships between parents and children and presenting as moral exemplars sage-kings from generations ago. From a Confucian point of view, persons are understood as persons-in-relation, embedded in networks of connection across space and time. Self-cultivation thus involves taking one’s place in a community where one’s own identity and welfare are deeply bound to those of others. In this view, gratitude and reciprocity emerge as central values. A Confucian understanding of gratitude and reciprocity involves not only dyadic relations but broader connections within a temporally extended social web. Thus, Confucian reciprocity might involve honoring one’s parents by nurturing one’s own children in turn or expressing gratitude for what past generations have provided by ensuring that future generations can flourish. Genuine ethical relations between current and future generations reflect care and concern for ongoing human communities; for the triad of heaven, earth, and humanity; and for realization of the Dao in the world.


2018 ◽  
Vol 618 ◽  
pp. A117 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Zhang

Context. CLEAN algorithms are excellent deconvolution solvers that remove the sidelobes of the dirty beam to clean the dirty image. From the point of view of the scale, there are two types: scale-insensitive CLEAN algorithms, and scale-sensitive CLEAN algorithms. Scale-insensitive CLEAN algorithms perform excellently well for compact emission and perform poorly for diffuse emission, while scale-sensitive CLEAN algorithms are good for both point-like emission and diffuse emission but are often computationally expensive. However, observed images often contain both compact and diffuse emission. An algorithm that can simultaneously process compact and diffuse emission well is therefore required. Aims. We propose a new deconvolution algorithm by combining a scale-insensitive CLEAN algorithm and a scale-sensitive CLEAN algorithm. The new algorithm combines the advantages of scale-insensitive algorithms for compact emission and scale-sensitive algorithms for diffuse emission. At the same time, it avoids the poor performance of scale-insensitive algorithms for diffuse emission and the great computational load of scale-sensitive algorithms for compact emission in residuals. Methods. We propose a fuse mechanism to combine two algorithms: the Asp-Clean2016 algorithm, which solves the computationally expensive problem of convolution operation in the fitting procedure, and the classical Högbom CLEAN (Hg-Clean) algorithm, which is faster and works equally well for compact emission. It is called fused CLEAN (fused-Clean) in this paper. Results. We apply the fused-Clean algorithm to simulated EVLA data and compare it to widely used algorithms: the Hg-Clean algorithm, the multi-scale CLEAN (Ms-Clean), and the Asp-Clean2016 algorithm. The results show that it performs better and is computationally effective.


1984 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Winter ◽  
D. Fenster ◽  
M. O'Hare ◽  
D. Zillman ◽  
W. Harrison ◽  
...  

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