Send message to Author

Short abstract:

We propose to view and analyze regulatory activities concerning nuclear infrastructure carried out in the aftermath of the 2003 heatwave, as a maintenance and repair work. We reflect on the implications of this view, in the context of a nuclear “revival” based on the notion of stewardship.

Long abstract:

In 2003, an unprecedented heatwave disturbed the operations of nuclear power plants reactor , on the French territory. This event revealed the vulnerability of the whole nuclear infrastructure of electricity production facing this type of events and the fragility of important materials and technical systems supporting the operations and many safety requirements of NPP. Our analysis reveals that the organizational routines implemented during the “crisis management period”, enacted the existence of two distinct communities and a social division of the maintenance and repair labor. The heatwave opened a window where a first community (micro-local level) had to and could explore various courses of actions, bricolages, improvisations. A second community (macro-central level) assess, select and produce calibrated new regulations based on the work done at the micro-local level. Our analyze of the latter part of the maintenance work reveal the existence of “residual” problems : local fragilities that will claim a continuous care in the long run and the maintenance of specific technical knowledge and organizational routines. They explain the vulnerability of the whole infrastructure : objects of an invisible work parts of a fragile socio-material order. We would like to discuss the possible implications of our work in terms of governance and institutional organization of the nuclear infrastructures in the long run. Stewardship appears to be a possible horizon and an interesting one to explore/ Our work can illuminate what type of organizations, skills and knowledge may be required to implement stewardship as a new hybrid form of socio-technical control.