Building of multilevel stakeholder consensus in radioactive waste repository siting

This report considers the problem of multilevel consensus building for siting and construction of shared multinational/regional repositories for radioactive waste (RW) deep disposal. In the siting of a multinational repository there appears an essential innovative component of stakeholder consensus building, namely: to reach consent - political, social, economic, ecological - among international partners, in addition to solving the whole set of intra-national consensus building items. An entire partnering country is considered as a higher-level stakeholder - the national stakeholder, represented by the national government, being faced to simultaneous seeking an upward (international) and a downward (intra-national) consensus in a psychologically stressed environment, possibly being characterized by diverse political, economic and social interests. The following theses as a possible interdisciplinary approach towards building of shared understanding and stakeholder consensus on the international scale of RW disposal are forwarded and developed: a) building of international stakeholder consensus would be promoted by activating and diversifying on the international scale multilateral interactions between intra- and international stakeholders, including web-based networks of the RW disposal site investigations and decision-making, as well as networks for international cooperation among government authorities in nuclear safety, b) gradual progress in intergovernmental consensus and reaching multilateral agreements on shared deep repositories will be the result of democratic dialogue, via observing the whole set of various interests and common resolving of emerged controversies by using advanced synergetic approaches of conflict resolution, c) cross-cultural thinking and world perception, mental flexibility, creativity and knowledge are considered as basic prerogatives for gaining a higher level of mutual understanding and consensus for seeking further consensus, for advancing the preparedness to act together, and ultimately - for achieving desired shared goals. It is proposed that self-organized social learning will make it possible to promote adequate perception of risk and prevent, by diminishing uncertainties and unknown factors, social amplification of an imagined risk, as well as to increase the trust level and facilitate more adequate equity perception. The proposed approach to the multilevel stakeholder consensus building on international scale is extrapolated to the present-day activities of siting of such near-surface RW disposal facilities which supposedly could have non-negligible trans-boundary impact. A multilevel stakeholder interaction process is considered for the case of resolving of emerged problems in site selection for the planned near-surface RW repository in vicinity of the Lithuanian-Latvian border foreseen for disposal of short lived low- and intermediate level waste arising from the decommissioning of the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant. (authors)