The Ethics of nuclear energy. Risk, Justice, and Democracy in the post-Fukushima Era

538 Pages·2.923 MB·English

by  Benham Taebi, Roeser Sabina (eds.)

Table of Contents
Half title
Title page
Imprints page
Contents
Figures and tables
Contributors
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
1 The ethics of nuclear energy: an introduction
1.1 Introduction
1.2 Nuclear ethics: a field in evolution
1.3 Overview of the book
Part I: Risk
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Part II: Justice
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Part III: Democracy
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
1.5 Conclusion
Part I Risk
2 Nuclear energy and the ethics of radiation protection
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Collective and individual dose
2.3 Workers and the general population
2.4 Sensitive individuals
2.5 Low-probability events
2.6 Weighing risks against benefits
2.7 Natural radiation
2.8 Future people
2.9 Conclusion
3 The unknowable ceilings of safety: three ways that nuclear accidents escape the
calculus of risk assessments
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Framing limitations
3.3 Systemic limitations
3.4 Epistemic limitations
3.5 Conclusion
4 Rights to know and the Fukushima, Chernobyl, and Three Mile Island accidents
4.1 Introduction
4.2 The right to know
4.3 Rights to know about nuclear-accident threats
4.4 The 2011 Fukushima, Japan accident
4.5 The 1986 Chernobyl (Ukraine) accident
4.6 The 1979 Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania accident
4.7 Nuclear-accident violations of rights to know
4.8 Why there are nuclear-accident violations of rights to know
4.9 Conclusion
5 Gender, ethical voices, and UK nuclear energy policy in the post-Fukushima era
5.1 Introduction
5.2 UK energy policy and public risk perceptions: the devil’s bargain
5.3 Fathoming the complexity of risk governance and nuclear ethics
5.4 Gendering risk: conceptual issues
5.4.1 An interpretive, qualitative approach to inquiring into gender and
risk perception
5.5 Explaining the gender-risk effect: findings from a UK study
5.5.1 Epistemic subjects: positions, knowledge, and risk
5.5.2 Technocentrism, responsibility, and care
5.6 Gender, risk, and policy-making: a question of nuclear energy or nuclear
ethics?
Acknowledgments
Part II Justice
6 The need for a public “explosion” in the ethics of radiological protection, especially
for nuclear power
6.1 Standing threats
6.1.1 Epistemic asymmetry
6.1.2 Spatial asymmetry
6.1.3 The temporal asymmetry
6.2 A methodological pluralism
6.2.1 On principles
6.2.2 ICRP principles
6.3 Procedural principles
6.3.1 Inclusiveness
6.3.2 Accountability
6.3.3 Publicity
6.4 Collective welfare principles
6.4.1 Justification
6.4.2 Maximizing cost–benefit
6.4.3 Net benefit
6.4.4 Offsetting harm
6.4.5 Presumptive net benefit
6.5 Minimization principles
6.5.1 Optimization
6.5.2 Optimal balancing
6.5.3 Subordinate minimization
6.5.4 Comparative minimization
6.5.5 Necessity
6.5.6 “Anything goes”
6.6 Individual protection
6.6.1 Dose limits
6.6.2 Authority
6.6.3 Excessive harm
6.6.4 No harm
6.6.4 Comparable risk
6.6.5 Background of nature
6.6.6 Pragmatism
6.7 Equity
6.7.1 Dose constraints
6.7.2 Proportionality, special representation, and vulnerability
6.8 Intergenerational principles
6.8.1 Intergenerational buck-passing
6.8.2 Protection
6.8.3 Current impacts
6.8.4 Undue burdens
6.8.5 Minimal practical level
6.8.6 Generator’s responsibility
6.8.7 No significant action
6.9 Conclusion
7 Distributive versus procedural justice in nuclear waste repository siting
7.1 Introduction
7.2 Distributive and procedural justice
7.3 Nuclear waste management featuring justice issues
7.4 Evidence from the Swiss repository site selection processes
7.4.1 Phase I: 1972–2002 featuring the former Wellenberg project
7.4.2 Phase II: 2003 until today, new stepwise approach
7.5 Discussion
7.6 Outlook
Acknowledgments
8 Nuclear energy, justice, and power: the case of the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station
license renewal
8.1 Introduction
8.2 Pilgrim’s first forty years
8.3 The relicensing process
8.4 Post relicensing
8.5 Discussion
8.6 Conclusion
9 Non-anthropocentric nuclear energy ethics
9.1 Introduction
9.2 Non-anthropocentric ethics
9.3 Variations in scope
9.4 Variations in aim: deontology versus consequentialism
9.5 The ranking problem
9.6 Biocentric consequentialism
9.7 Temporal range
9.8 The problem of nuclear energy
9.9 Potential harms of nuclear energy
9.10 Potential harms of fossil fuels
9.11 Potential harms of renewables
9.12 Determining the energy mix
9.13 Non-anthropocentric fusion energy ethics
9.14 Conclusions
Acknowledgment
Part III Democracy
10 Morally experimenting with nuclear energy
10.1 Introduction: the experimental nature of nuclear energy
10.2 Four episodes from the history of nuclear energy
10.2.1 Probabilistic risk assessment and core meltdown
10.2.2 Rapid upscaling and failure in the USA
10.2.3 The Fukushima disaster
10.2.4 Nuclear waste
10.3 Epistemological reasons for and objections against calling the
employment of nuclear energy a real-world experiment
10.3.1 Epistemological reasons for calling nuclear energy a real-world
experiment
Uncertainty and lack of knowledge
Improved learning through deliberate experimentation
10.3.2 Epistemological objections against considering nuclear energy a
real-world experiment
First epistemological objection: Nuclear energy is no longer
experimental
Second epistemological objection: Real-world experiments are
uncontrolled experiments and therefore not real experiments
Third epistemological objection: The experimental nature of
nuclear technology has already been recognized
10.4 Moral reasons for and objections against calling the employment of
nuclear energy a real-world experiment
10.4.1 Moral reasons for calling nuclear energy a real-world experiment
Recognizing uncertainty in the moral debate
Shifting the moral debate away from the stalemate between
opponents and proponents of nuclear energy
A moral framework for responsible experimentation
Moral learning and experimentation
10.4.2 Moral objections against considering nuclear energy a real-world
experiment
First moral objection: Conceiving of nuclear energy as real-world
experiment short-circuits the moral debate
Second objection: Conceiving of nuclear energy as real-world
experiment does not answer the question whether nuclear energy
is acceptable
Third moral objection: The question whether it is acceptable to
experiment in the real world with nuclear technology is hard to
answer
10.5 Conclusions
Acknowledgment
11 Global nuclear energy and international security
11.1 Introduction
11.2 Conceiving international security
11.3 A brief history of the NPT
11.4 The morality of nuclear non-proliferation
11.4.1 Plank 1: International legal ethics
11.4.2 Plank 2: the ethics of collective security
11.5 Justice, international security, and global nuclear energy
11.6 Implications for nuclear aspirant states
Acknowledgments
12 Nuclear energy, the capability approach, and the developing world
12.1 Introduction
12.2 Background
12.2.1 Sustainability
12.2.2 Safety
12.2.3 Security
12.3 Contemporary debates in developing contexts
12.4 A capability approach to sustainable development and risks
12.4.1 Sustainable development from a capability approach
12.4.2 Risk from a capability approach
12.5 Nuclear energy in the developing world
12.6 Conclusions
Acknowledgments
13 The role of nuclear energy in the future energy landscape: energy scenarios,
nuclear energy, and sustainability
13.1 Introduction
13.2 Framing the decision to withdraw from nuclear energy
13.2.1 Various energy technologies and their uses
13.2.2 Various values
13.2.3 The broad spatial and temporal decision horizon
13.3 Energy and sustainability
13.3.1 Indicators for sustainable energy supply
13.3.2 Whose needs? In need of a theory for well-being
13.4 A capability perspective on energy supply and demand
13.4.1 Energy and freedom
13.4.2 The under-determination of the morally correct energy landscape
13.5 The open energy future: energy demand and uncertain scenarios
Bibliography
Index