Geologic Disposal of Radioactive Waste in Perspective

One of the challenges facing the continued availability of nuclear energy is that of ensuring the safe, environmentally acceptable and economic management of the waste generated during its production. There is a broad scientific and technical consensus that disposal of high-level, long-lived radioactive waste in deep geologic formations is an appropriate and safe means of isolating it from the biosphere for very long time scales. There have, however, been setbacks in the disposal programmes in many countries, primarily due to the failure of the waste management community to win sufficient publ