THE CHALLENGES OF NUCLEAR WASTE DISPOSAL –INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL LAW PERSPECTIVE

Orsolya Johanna Sziebig
Additional contact information
Orsolya Johanna Sziebig: University of Szeged Faculty of Law and Political Sciences, Department of International and European Law, senior lecturer, LLM in environmental Law, PhD. University of Szeged Faculty of Law and Political Sciences, HUNGARY.

Curentul Juridic, The Juridical Current, Le Courant Juridique, 2021, vol. 86, 88-100

Abstract: Nuclear energy is a central part of European and worldwide energy production since it is a component in the energy mix of 13 EU Member States, accounting for almost 26% of the electricity produced in the European sphere. Also, it provides about 10% of the world's electricity from about 440 power reactors. Nuclear energy also fits the plan of a climate-neutral European continent because the direct CO2 emission is significantly lower than in the case of fossil fuels. On the other hand, there is a significant concern about nuclear energy production and nuclear technologies in general ‒ radioactive (nuclear waste). Since the beginning of the first experiments with fissile materials, radioactive waste disposal has been an unsolved problem. Especially high-level radioactive waste and spent fuel causing severe issues for the international community. This article focuses on radioactive waste disposal from an environmental point of view, includes the main categorisation of radioactive waste, and provides an informative description of disposal solutions. The Fukushima accident also unavoidable because it highly influenced some countries energy policy and decisions concerning nuclear energy in general. Nuclear energy always has been a “grey” area of energy production, in the centre of opposing benefits and great threats. The paper aims to answer whether nuclear energy remained a dream that never lived up to the expectations or just the benefits shadowed by the harsh reality of unsolved nuclear waste disposal.

Keywords: nuclear waste; challenges; environmental law; multinational storage; spent fuel. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: K32 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.upm.ro/facultati_departamente/ea/RePEc/ ... 1/recjurid213_6F.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pmu:cjurid:v:86:y:2021:p:88-100

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Curentul Juridic, The Juridical Current, Le Courant Juridique from Petru Maior University, Faculty of Economics Law and Administrative Sciences and Pro Iure Foundation Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Bogdan Voaidas ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).