The first worldwide review of geological problems in radioactive waste isolation was published by the Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) in 1991 (Witherspoon, 1991). This review was a compilation of reports that had been submitted to a workshop held in conjunction with the 28th International Geological Congress that took place July 9Ð19, 1989, in Washington, D.C.

Following the guidelines set forth by the Ministry of Trade and Industry (now Ministry of Employment and Economy) Posiva is preparing to submit the construction license application for a spent fuel repository by the end of the year 2012. The long-term safety section supporting the license application is based on a safety case, which, according to the internationally adopted definition, is a compilation of the evidence, analyses and arguments that quantify and substantiate the safety and the level of expert confidence in the safety of the planned repository.

This report aims to clarify the dynamics of socio-technical challenges in the implementation of geological disposal (GD) for High Level Waste (HLW) and Spent Nuclear Fuel (SNF). Drawing on the 14 country reports produced within InSOTEC’s WP1 the synthesis focuses on socio-technical challenges that appear across national contexts. The synthesis report elucidates issues made visible through bringing together the analyses of different national contexts.

The first world wide review of the geological problems in radioactive waste isolation was published by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in 1991. This review was a compilation of reports that had been submitted to a workshop held in conjunction with the 28th International Geological Congress that took place July 9-19,1989 in Washington, D.C.