In the absence of a federal geologic repository or consolidated, interim storage in the United States, commercial spent fuel will remain stranded at some 75 sites across the country. Currently, these include 18 “orphaned sites” where spent fuel has been left at decommissioned reactor sites.

In November 2007, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE or Department) re‐established its Environmental Justice (EJ) Task Force to review and update the 1995 Environmental Justice Strategy and develop an Environmental Justice Five‐Year Implementation Plan.

The Department of Energy (hereinafter DOE or the Department) is responsible for ensuring the Nation’s security and prosperity by addressing its energy, environmental and nuclear challenges through transformative science and technology solutions. DOE maintains the Nation’s nuclear weapons stockpile, reduces the threat of nuclear proliferation, oversees the Nation’s energy supply, leads the Nation in areas of federally sponsored basic research critical to U.S.

Conventional ways of communicating about the transition to renewable energy in North America presuppose that energy systems can be changed while sustaining existing social, political, and economic relations. Energy democracy counters such ostensibly apolitical narratives by emphasizing the socially transformative potential of this transition. Yet energy democracy, as both organizing principle and social movement, is itself increasingly recognized as flexible and contested.

Studies indicate that the energy burden — energy costs as a percentage of annual family income — on low-income families is inordinately high, compared to that of the rest of the population. Rising fuel costs exacerbate this problem. Residential solar energy systems can help address this situation by furnishing a price-stable energy source with the added benefit of reduced greenhouse gas emissions. However, without appropriate incentives, these systems are prohibitively expensive for low-income families.

Introduction

A. The Biden-Harris Administration’s Commitment to Environmental Justice 

By using long run case studies and comparative analysis, I will address different processes by which alerts and criticisms are taken seriously by different actors and lead them to transform or to defend devices, norms and institutions. To deal with this kind of process, I will present an analytical model which runs on the recent controversies about radioactivity, GMOs and nanotechnologies. For many years, these fields have been marked by struggles in which scientific arguments are seldom dominant but are nevertheless relevant.

Mainstream approaches to energy democracy and public engagement with energy transitions tend to adopt specific, pre-given meanings of both “democracy” and “publics.” Different approaches impose prescriptive assumptions about the model of participation, the identity of public participants, and what it means to participate well.

The goal of this literature review is to bring together the different concepts, respective definitions and perspectives that have been used to study the participation of non-professionals in scientific activities. We start by presenting a short definition of citizen science and the perceived benefits of such approaches to the production of scientific knowledge. We then clarify the difference between today’s citizen science projects and their ancestors in the field sciences by highlighting technological and social changes.

The purpose of this report is to equip the Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology) with evidence-based recommendations to further equity and environmental justice (EJ) efforts within their capacity as the state’s environmental regulatory agency, in service of advancing EJ for those who live, work, and play in Washington. This report is intended to share promising trends and tools, acknowledge common barriers and ideas for overcoming those barriers, elevate successes, and amplify equitable practices for defining, measuring, mobilizing, and sustaining meaningful EJ work.

The U.S. nuclear waste management program has labored for decades at a cost of billions of dollars each year, and yet there is still no active disposal program either for spent nuclear fuel from commercial reactors or for the high-level radioactive legacy waste and spent nuclear fuel from defense programs.

About the WHEJAC: