Burying uncertainty : risk and the case against geological disposal of nuclear waste / K.S. Shrader-Frechette.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 253-327) and indexes.

Print version record.

The Riddle of Nuclear Waste -- The Status Quo: Promoting Permanent Disposal -- The Mistakes of the Past -- Understanding the Origins of the Problem -- Radioactive Waste: Technical Background -- Radioactive Waste: Historical Background -- The Current Status of High-Level Radioactive Waste -- Radioactive Waste: Legal and Regulatory Background -- Reliance on Value Judgments in Repository Risk Assessment -- Science and Methodological Value Judgments -- Quantitative Risk Assessment and Value Judgments -- Value Judgments in Estimating Risks -- Value Judgments in Evaluating Risks -- Subjective Estimates of Repository Risks -- Repository Risk Estimates Rely on Questionable Value Judgments -- Value Judgments about Long-term Risks -- Value Judgments about Model Reliability -- Value Judgments about Simplification of the Phenomena -- Value Judgments about Reliability of Sampling -- Value Judgments about Laboratory Predictions -- Value Judgments about Fractured, Unsaturated Media -- Value Judgments that Interpolations Are Acceptable -- Value Judgments that Human Error Is Not Significant -- Problems with Yucca Mountain versus Problems with Permanent Disposal -- Subjective Evaluations of Repository Risks -- Value Judgments that a Given Magnitude of Risk Is Acceptable -- Value Judgments that Risk Reductions Are Sufficient -- Value Judgments that Worst-case Hazards Are Not Credible -- Value Judgments that Average Risks Are Acceptable -- Value Judgments that More Recent Assessments Are More Reliable -- Value Judgments that Utilitarian Risk Theories Are Just.

Shrader-Frechette looks at current U.S. government policy regarding the nation's high-level radioactive waste both scientifically and ethically.What should be done with our nation's high-level radioactive waste, which will remain hazardous for thousands of years? This is one of the most pressing problems faced by the nuclear power industry, and current U.S. government policy is to bury "radwastes" in specially designed deep repositories.K. S. Shrader-Frechette argues that this policy is profoundly misguided on both scientific and ethical grounds. Scientifically--because we cannot trust the precision of 10,000-year predictions that promise containment of the waste. Ethically--because geological disposal ignores the rights of present and future generations to equal treatment, due process, and free informed consent.Shrader-Frechette focuses her argument on the world's first proposed high-level radioactive waste facility at Yucca Mountain, Nevada. Analyzing a mass of technical literature, she demonstrates the weaknesses in the professional risk-assessors' arguments that claim the site is sufficiently safe for such a plan. We should postpone the question of geological disposal for at least a century and use monitored, retrievable, above-ground storage of the waste until then. Her message regarding radwaste is clear: what you can't see can hurt you.

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