The Middle Ground for Nuclear Waste Management

2012 ◽  
pp. 306-318
Author(s):  
Alan Marshall
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Waste ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
Seismic Events ◽  
Nuclear Waste Management ◽  
Community Acceptance ◽  
Present Generation ◽  
The Usa ◽  
Deep Underground ◽  
Social And Ethical Issues

The 2001 terrorist attacks in the USA and the 2011 seismic events in Japan have brought into sharp relief the vulnerabilities involved in storing nuclear waste on the land’s surface. Nuclear engineers and waste managers are deciding that disposing nuclear waste deep underground is the preferred management option. However, deep disposal of nuclear waste is replete with enormous technical uncertainties. A proposed solution to protect against both the technical vagaries of deep disposal and the dangers of surface events is to store the nuclear waste at shallow depths underground. This paper explores social and ethical issues that are relevant to such shallow storage, including security motivations, intergenerational equity, nuclear stigma, and community acceptance. One of the main ethical questions to emerge is whether it is right for the present generation to burden local communities and future generations with these problems since neither local peoples nor future people have sanctioned the industrial and military processes that have produced the waste in the first place.

The Middle Ground for Nuclear Waste Management

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Marshall
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Waste ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
Seismic Events ◽  
Middle Ground ◽  
Community Acceptance ◽  
Present Generation ◽  
The Usa ◽  
Deep Underground ◽  
Social And Ethical Issues

The 2001 terrorist attacks in the USA and the 2011 seismic events in Japan have brought into sharp relief the vulnerabilities involved in storing nuclear waste on the land’s surface. Nuclear engineers and waste managers are deciding that disposing nuclear waste deep underground is the preferred management option. However, deep disposal of nuclear waste is replete with enormous technical uncertainties. A proposed solution to protect against both the technical vagaries of deep disposal and the dangers of surface events is to store the nuclear waste at shallow depths underground. This paper explores social and ethical issues that are relevant to such shallow storage, including security motivations, intergenerational equity, nuclear stigma, and community acceptance. One of the main ethical questions to emerge is whether it is right for the present generation to burden local communities and future generations with these problems since neither local peoples nor future people have sanctioned the industrial and military processes that have produced the waste in the first place.

scholarly journals Intergenerational Ethical Issues and Communication Related to High-Level Nuclear Waste Repositories

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 338-343
Author(s):  
Martin Tondel ◽  
Lena Lindahl
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Waste Management ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Nuclear Waste ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
The Future ◽  
High Level Nuclear Waste ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
High Level

Abstract Purpose of Review The nuclear power industry started in the 1950s and has now reached a phase of disposing high-level nuclear waste. Since the 1980s, the United Nations has developed a concept of sustainable development and governments have accordingly made ethical commitments to take responsibility towards future generations. The purpose of this review is to examine ethical dilemmas related to high-level nuclear waste disposal in a long-term perspective including potential access to the waste in the future. The time span considered here is 100,000 years based on current experts’ assessment of the radiological toxicity of the waste. Recent Findings In this review, we take into account findings on ethical issues related to the disposal of high-level nuclear waste put forward by the Radioactive Waste Management Committee (RWMC), the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP), nuclear waste management companies (SKB in Sweden and Posiva Oy in Finland), and several researchers. Some historical examples are presented for potential guidance on methods of communication into the future. Summary According to the sustainable development ethical principle, adopted by the United Nations, we conclude that governments with nuclear energy have committed themselves to protect future generations from harm related to high-level nuclear waste. This commitment involves the necessity to convey information together with the nuclear waste. Our paper examines disposal options chosen by Sweden and Finland, as well as some contemporary and historical efforts to design messages towards the future. We conclude that the international community still needs to find methods to communicate in an intelligible way over long periods of time.

scholarly journals Three models for the regulation of polygenic scores in reproduction

2021 ◽  
pp. medethics-2020-106588
Author(s):  
Sarah Munday ◽  
Julian Savulescu
Keyword(s):  
Human Genetics ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Embryo Selection ◽  
Risk Scores ◽  
Regulatory Regime ◽  
Polygenic Scores ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact

The past few years have brought significant breakthroughs in understanding human genetics. This knowledge has been used to develop ‘polygenic scores’ (or ‘polygenic risk scores’) which provide probabilistic information about the development of polygenic conditions such as diabetes or schizophrenia. They are already being used in reproduction to select for embryos at lower risk of developing disease. Currently, the use of polygenic scores for embryo selection is subject to existing regulations concerning embryo testing and selection. Existing regulatory approaches include ‘disease-based' models which limit embryo selection to avoiding disease characteristics (employed in various formats in Australia, the UK, Italy, Switzerland and France, among others), and 'laissez-faire' or 'libertarian' models, under which embryo testing and selection remain unregulated (as in the USA). We introduce a novel 'Welfarist Model' which limits embryo selection according to the impact of the predicted trait on well-being. We compare the strengths and weaknesses of each model as a way of regulating polygenic scores. Polygenic scores create the potential for existing embryo selection technologies to be used to select for a wider range of predicted genetically influenced characteristics including continuous traits. Indeed, polygenic scores exist to predict future intelligence, and there have been suggestions that they will be used to make predictions within the normal range in the USA in embryo selection. We examine how these three models would apply to the prediction of non-disease traits such as intelligence. The genetics of intelligence remains controversial both scientifically and ethically. This paper does not attempt to resolve these issues. However, as with many biomedical advances, an effective regulatory regime must be in place as soon as the technology is available. If there is no regulation in place, then the market effectively decides ethical issues.

Using information technology to integrate social and ethical issues into the computer science and information systems curriculum

1997 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 38-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary J. Granger ◽  
Elizabeth S. Adams ◽  
Christina Björkman ◽  
Don Gotterbarn ◽  
Diana D. Juettner ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Information Technology ◽  
Information Systems ◽  
Computer Science ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Social And Ethical Issues ◽  
Information Systems Curriculum

A “Natural” Proposal for Addressing Climate Change

2014 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 359-363 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas E. Lovejoy
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Greenhouse Gases ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Time Lag ◽  
Radiant Heat ◽  
Time Frame ◽  
Future Generations ◽  
Considerable Time ◽  
Long Time

One of the fundamental challenges of climate change is that we contribute to it increment by increment, and experience it increment by increment after a considerable time lag. As a consequence, it is very difficult to see what we are doing to ourselves, to future generations, and to the living planet as a whole. There are monumental ethical issues involved, but they are obscured by the incremental nature of the process and the long time frame before reaching the concentration of greenhouse gases and the ensuing accumulation of radiant heat—and consequent climate change—that ensues.

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