Global School Professor Appointed to U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board

Global School Professor Appointed to U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board

Seth Tuler, associate professor in the Department of Integrative and Global Studies in The Global School at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, has been appointed by President Biden to serve as a member of the U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board.

The board is an independent federal agency that performs technical and scientific peer reviews of nuclear waste management and disposal activities in the United States. It also issues reports and recommendations to the U.S. Secretary of Energy and Congress regarding the U.S. Department of Energy's activities concerning high-level radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel.

Tuler joins a board of eleven members who serve part-time, each for four years. The president appoints candidates from a list of nominees submitted by the National Academy of Sciences.

By law, nominees to the board must have established records of eminence in a field of science or engineering. Current board members have expertise in fields including nuclear science, hydrology, civil engineering, mechanical engineering, materials science, and environmental health sciences.

"I am very excited and honored to be appointed by President Biden to the Board," said Tuler. "What to do with high-level waste and spent nuclear fuel has been a serious conundrum for decades. The Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board can play an important role in the design of a program to safely manage spent nuclear fuel and high-level waste over centuries. As a social scientist I intend to help the Board contribute input and advice about how the federal government can craft programs that ensure opportunities for meaningful public and stakeholder involvement, address concerns about equity, and build public and stakeholder confidence in the program."

Tuler has conducted research focused on the clean-up of sites in the U.S. nuclear weapons complex, nuclear waste management, and community climate change adaptation planning.

He previously served as a member of the federal Advisory Committee for Energy-Related Epidemiologic Research, which advised the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on health studies associated with U.S. nuclear weapons facilities.

He also served on several National Academies' committees, including the Committee on Transportation of Spent Nuclear Fuel and High-Level Radioactive Waste, the Standing Committee on Chemical Demilitarization, and the Committee on Alternatives for the Demilitarization of Conventional Munitions.

He is a co-director of WPI's Boston Project Centerin the Global Projects Program, and co-director of the Global Lab.

Through his service, research, and writings, Tuler has advocated for greater inclusion of social science expertise and stakeholder engagement in nuclear waste management, contaminated site cleanups, and renewable energy facility siting. He has suggested that a safer and more timely system of managing spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste could be developed if the federal government adopted a consent-based approach involving communities.

Tuler says the Department of Energy has initiated a program to design a consent-based approach, but adds,"much work remains to be done to ensure the program is designed and implemented well, and-more important-that over the long term, work focuses on ways to manage and dispose of the radiological waste safely over the duration of many centuries." He hopes his appointment will provide him with a role to help ensure that happens.

At WPI, Tuler has advised undergraduates on a project at the Santa Fe, New Mexico, Project Center that began to trace the spread of plutonium from the Los Alamos National Laboratory nuclear weapons site into surrounding soil and groundwater. He's also working on a project at the Global Lab that seeks to track and visualize the disposal destinations for low-level radioactive waste from the now-closed Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

Tuler is not the only board member with a WPI connection. WPI alumnus Ronald G. Ballinger '75, Mechanical Engineering, MIT professor emeritus of nuclear science and engineering, and materials science and engineering, has served on the board since 2022.