The (non)-Effects of Public Experiments on High-Level Radioactive Waste Programs

Abstract

Siting processes of high-level radioactive wastes remain a sensitive step for nuclear waste management organizations. At this stage, radioactive wastes programs become highly visible. Such concreteness increases controversies leading to modification or temporary standstill of the program (see e.g. strong local oppositions in the 80's in Canada and in France). These controversies have often forced nuclear waste management organizations to include larger societal groups (civil society, NGO's, parliamentarians, lay people,…) and to recognize the societal dimension of such issue. The program is thus recognized as a sociotechnical one, compelling authorities to a new approach to territorial development (Leloup 2010). At the local scale, new instruments and strategies have been adopted and implemented to tackle this territorial question. One of these tools is the local information committee. Considering nuclear waste management as an art of government (Dean, 2010), this presentation focuses on the siting processes of radioactive wastes programs and analyzes the coproduction between territory and program (Jasanoff 2004). It therefore studies the influence on the programs of the local publics through their local information committee in two specific cases: the French and the Canadian high-level radioactive wastes programs. To do so, it mobilizes official documents, participatory observations, two ethnographic fieldworks (Bure – France and Manitouwadge, Ignace, Schreiber and Nipigon – Canada), and semi-structured interviews. These interviews were conducted with French and Canadian nuclear waste management organizations' member, regulators, local representatives and local consultation committee's members. In analyzing such siting processes, we first analytically describe the shift from a national radioactive waste management program to a territorialized management in France and in Canada. Second, it aims at understanding the concrete and sometimes unanticipated effects of implementing a management program at the local level by focusing on the integration of local publics and stakeholders in the decision-making of such processes. Finally, it discusses the dual relationship between program and territory in these processes. Our results highlight that the territorial development of the high-level radioactive wastes programs started within R&D programs although the program was officially presented as "placeless" (Murphy 2009). They also show that the siting processes have been designed very differently. In Canada, the siting process has been co-designed with publics while the French national Parliament has imposed a siting location for the industrial project. Third, through the (in)actions of such local committees considered as invited critics (Wynne 2007), new socio-technical adjustments has occurred in these programs. Even though, we stress that the dichotomy between expert-based and participatory is still pregnant (for different reasons) and reinforce the dichotomy between nature/experts/underground and society/publics/ground.