Stakeholder Dialogue: Experience and Lessons for Young and Old Experts and Researchers
Background

At its December 2012 meeting, the CRPPH Bureau suggested that the CRPPH could organise a webinar to bring together young and experienced professionals to exchange information for dealing with stakeholder concerns. Radiological protection professionals, who have had significant experience working with concerned stakeholders to understand and help address their views, could present their opinions on how to most effectively accomplish this objective. Young radiological protection professionals could, in their turn, present their views on how to best take advantage of modern social media to effectively reach broad groups of stakeholders in order to bring radiological protection science to their service.

This initiative was unanimously supported at the 73rd meeting of the CRPPH in Paris in April 2015, and further expanded at the Fourth Workshop on Science and Values in Radiological Protection Decision-Making in Moscow, Russian Federation in June 2015. The workshop highlighted the importance of issues such as consent, equity, control and responsibility for defining and imposing appropriate radiological protection measures and criteria.

In order to keep in step with modern-day approaches to interactions, and to facilitate the broadest participation, it had been agreed that the stakeholder dialogue webinar should be entirely online, so that speakers and listeners could participate remotely (e.g. from their work or home computers) without having to travel to a meeting venue.

Objective

The objective of this webinar was to share stakeholder dialogue and social media experience between all radiological protection professionals.

Format

Recognising the difficulty that many younger professionals may have to travel, it was proposed that this workshop should be webcast, and that the IRPA should be involved so that the largest number of national society young professional branches could participate. In order to take advantage of ongoing work within the NEA, the CNRA Working Group on Public Communication of Nuclear Regulatory Organisations (WGPC) and the RWMC Forum on Stakeholder Confidence (FSC) were involved in the development of this webinar.

The webinar format consisted of three two-hour plenary sessions held from 13:00 to 15:00 (Central European Time) on Wednesdays over three consecutive weeks from February-March 2016. The webinar was managed through a central website by the NEA secretariat using WebEx. Attendees participated electronically via their computer. Details of the mechanics of participation, discussion and presentation were developed and tested, and these were communicated to the registered participants as they were finalised.

Organization

Audience

The target audience for this webinar was broadly members of the radiological protection profession who had been or would be involved in stakeholder engagement including public meetings, small group or individual conversations, and interactions with journalists. The audience included regulators, members of industry and research scientists.

Language

The webinar was conducted entirely in English.

Programme

Day one 17 February 2016

13:00 Welcome from the NEA and the co-organisers

           Technical and organisational issues

13:10-15:00 Session 1: Radiological Protection at the Service of Society: An Overview of Stakeholder Involvement

This session will present the evolution of stakeholder involvement in the radiological protection community, and the direction that stakeholder involvement is taking in terms of decision-making in complex radiological protection situations.

Stakeholder Involvement and the CRPPH: A Learning Process

(Presenter: Michael Boyd, Chair of CRPPH; Office of Radiation and Indoor Air, Radiation Protection Division, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency; e-mail: boyd.mike@epa.gov)

IRPA Guiding Principles for Radiation Protection Professionals on Stakeholder Engagement

(Presenter: Renate Czarwinski, President of the International Radiation Protection Association (IRPA); Federal Office for Radiation Protection, Institute for Applied Radiation Protection Physics, Berlin, Germany; e-mail: president@irpa.net)

Discussion

15:00 End of day one

Day two 24 February 2016

13:00 Welcome to day two, Michael Boyd, CRPPH Chair

           Feedback from day one

           Technical and organisational issues

13:10-15:00 Session 2: Experience with Stakeholder Dialogue in Complex Radiological Protection Situations

This session will include a series of presentations by world-class radiological protection experts who, during their careers, were required to address complex situations through various stakeholder dialogue processes. They will summarise their experience, noting the key aspects that are needed to achieve accepted and sustainable radiological protection decisions. The question of addressing risk perception versus risk assessment will be included.

Development of Release Criteria for Contaminated Areas: Experience from the US Rocky Flats Plant Situation

(Presenter: Dr John E. Till, President of Risk Assessment Corporation (RAC), South Carolina, USA; e-mail: johntill@mindspring.com)

Accepted and Sustainable Radiological Protection Decisions During Nuclear Reactor Decommissioning: Experience in Sweden from a Regulator's Point of View

(Presenter: Simon Carroll, Analyst, Swedish Radiation Protection Authority (SSM), Stockholm, Sweden; e-mail: simon.carroll@ssm.se)

Discussion

15:00 End of day two

Day three 2 March 2016

13:00 Welcome to day three, Michael Boyd, CRPPH Chair

           Feedback from days one and two

           Technical and organisational issues

13:10-15:00 Session 3: The Use of Social Networks and Social Media to Assist in Developing Interactions with Stakeholders, and to Facilitate the Implementation of Protective Actions

This session will include a series of presentations by young radiological protection experts who will present their views and expertise in the use of the internet and social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) to effectively interact with stakeholders in order to better understand and address their concerns.

Social Media – Web Sources (Blogs, Wiki, Webinars)

(Presenter: Sophie Palmer, Interactive Communications Manager, NDA, UK; e-mail: sophie.palmer@nda.gov.uk)

Social Networks – Facebook, Twitter, etc.

(Presenter: Sven Nagels, Radiation Protection Expert, Business Unit Radiation Protection, Energy Systems and Automation, TÜV Rheinland Industrie Service, Cologne, Germany; e-mail: sven.nagels@de.tuv.com)

Final discussion

15:00 End of webinar

 

Webinar sessions

Session 1 : Experience and lessons for young and old experts and researchers

Date and time: Wednesday, 17 February 2016 1:00 p.m., Central European Time (Paris GMT +1:00)

Session 2 : Experience and lessons for young and old experts and researchers

Date and time: Wednesday, 24 February 2016 1:00 p.m., Central European Time (Paris GMT +1:00)

Session 3 : Experience and lessons for young and old experts and researchers

Date and time: Wednesday, 2 March 2016 1:00 p.m, Central European Time (Paris GMT +1:00)