EVOLUTION OF NRC AND PUBLIC ATTITUDES 

REGARDING PUBLIC OUTREACH 

Prepared for 

U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission 

Contact NRC–02–07–006 

Prepared by 

Miriam Juckett 

Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory Analyses 

San Antonio, Texas 

September 2011 
ii 

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 

This report was prepared to document work performed by the Center for Nuclear Waste 

Regulatory Analyses (CNWRA®) for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (USNRC) under 

Contract No. NRC–02–007–006. The studies and analyses reported here were performed on 

behalf of the USNRC Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards, Division of High-Level 

Waste Repository Safety. The report is an independent product of CNWRA and does not 

necessarily reflect the views or regulatory position of USNRC. 

The author thanks E. Pearcy for technical review and J. Winterle for programmatic review. The 

authors also thank A. Ramos for support in report preparation and L. Mulverhill for 

editorial review. 

QUALITY OF DATA, ANALYSES, AND CODE DEVELOPMENT 

DATA: All CNWRA-generated original data contained in this report meet the quality assurance 

requirements described in the Geosciences and Engineering Division Quality Assurance 

Manual. Sources for other data should be consulted for determining the level of quality for 

those data.

ANALYSES AND CODES: No scientific or engineering software was used in the analyses 

contained in this report.
1 

EVOLUTION OF NRC AND PUBLIC ATTITUDES REGARDING PUBLIC 

OUTREACH—LETTER REPORT 

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Yucca Mountain public outreach program 

began in 1999 with the purpose of conveying information to stakeholders and the public in an 

open, transparent way. The public outreach team was drawn from NRC and Center for Nuclear 

Waste Regulatory Analyses (CNWRA®, or the Center) staff members engaged in other 

Yucca Mountain-related technical projects who could contribute to public outreach. The 

first public meetings were held in Las Vegas and Beatty, Nevada, on March 23 and 25, 1999, 

and discussed the proposed 10 CFR Part 63 rule. During these meetings, the public outreach 

team encountered a lack of trust and suspicion among the members of the public. One 

attendee at the Beatty meeting was quoted as saying, “I hear what you’re saying, but I don’t 

believe you.”1

 The staff realized that there were many misconceptions and barriers that needed 

to be overcome to create a relationship of trust and began earnest efforts to create an 

effective public outreach program. This report includes descriptions of two major areas of 

focus—communication media and public meetings—as well as a discussion about the evolution 

of national and agency attitudes throughout the course of the program. 

Communication media is an important part of a public outreach program. The team made 

significant efforts to develop educational tools to help NRC convey its messages in a clear and 

trustworthy way. Recognizing that each audience is different and that there are a variety of 

learning styles, the team utilized a number of different media. The development of these tools 

was a learning process, and the team continually improved its approaches and added products 

to its collection of resources. The main types of media included Microsoft® PowerPoint®

presentations, posters, fact sheets, and a brochure, a slideshow, and a 3D model. This report 

summarizes the media used in the public outreach program and discusses the perceived 

success of these types of media. 

During the first public meetings in 1999, NRC came prepared with PowerPoint presentations 

and copies of the Federal Register notice. Presentations for the outreach program were usually 

about 30 minutes or less in length and covered a single specific subject. The presenter was 

typically a technical expert for the subject matter or worked on a team that considered the 

particular topic (Figure 1). While PowerPoint presentations remain a staple form of media used 

by the public outreach program, initially, they were not used to best advantage, nor were they 

well tailored to the audiences to which they were presented. Over time, however, as the 

outreach program grew in sophistication, every presentation went through individual and team 

reviews before each public meeting. These reviews ensured that the content fit the audience 

and context of the meeting, accurately represented factual information, adequately met legal 

requirements, and was clear and easy to understand. Authors learned to use a mix of text, 

pictures, and occasionally video on the slides, being careful to keep the slides uncrowded and 

easy to view from a distance. Presentations were sometimes made available ahead of time to 

meeting participants via email or the NRC website, or were printed to distribute at the meetings. 

Afterward, presentations were archived into the NRC Documents Access and Management 

System and often posted to the NRC Website. Separate from presentations at public meetings, 

two oral presentations utilizing PowerPoint were also made at the Geological Society of America 

(GSA) convention in fall 2009 as a public outreach effort. 

 

1

J. Kotra, personal communication, November 10, 2010. 
2 

Figure 1. A Technical Staff Member Gives a PowerPoint Presentation at a Public Meeting 

in Tecopa, California 

As a result of the 1999 public meetings, the staff recognized that additional visual aids would be 

helpful. The public outreach team began quickly developing three posters for use at an 

upcoming meeting. The first poster was titled “Protecting Public Health and Safety at the 

Proposed Geologic Repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada.” The poster shows the roles of 

federal agencies involved in the licensing process (Figure 2). The second poster, titled 

“U.S. NRC Oversight of the Proposed Repository at Yucca Mountain: Opportunities for Public 

Involvement,” depicted the steps in the licensing process and suggested ways for the public to 

be involved in these steps (Figure 3). Among the ideas that NRC wanted to convey in these two 

posters was the independence of NRC and the large role that NRC plays in the licensing 

process. Size and placement of the NRC representation in the graphics was carefully 

considered to stress the agency’s importance. Special attention was also given to the colors, 

fonts, and shapes used in the posters to avoid visual cues that might be negative or alarming. 

The third poster explained the CNWRA technical capabilities and its role in assisting NRC in the 

licensing decision (Figure 4). The content of the poster included more text and several 
3 

Figure 2. One of the First Public Outreach Posters, “Protecting Public Health and Safety 

at the Proposed Geologic Repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada” 
4 

Figure 3. Another of the First Public Outreach Posters, “U.S. NRC Oversight of the 

Proposed Repository at Yucca Mountain: Opportunities for Public Involvement” 
5 

Figure 4. Third of the Original Posters, “CNWRA Technical Capabilities and Its Role in 

Assisting the NRC in the Licensing Decision” 
6 

photographs of investigative activities, including laboratory and field work. These three posters 

were displayed on easels at the meeting and served as focal points for discussions with meeting 

attendees. The posters were subsequently heavily used at other meetings and open house 

events and were displayed at the On-Site Representatives office and at NRC headquarters. 

Additional posters were added later, including a performance assessment poster and a large 

map of the Yucca Mountain vicinity featuring locations important to licensing. The three original 

posters, and later the performance assessment poster, were also printed in an 11 × 17-in size to 

use as handouts. The team added a page of explanatory text to the back side of these sheets, 

and these became the first information sheets or fact sheets, the most common form of media 

used in the NRC public outreach program. The fact sheets were designed to concisely explain 

a specific legal aspect or regulatory requirement concept. The format of subsequent fact sheets 

was an 8.5 × 11-in sheet, double or single sided, often in question and answer format 

(Figure 5). Some fact sheets had a graphical depiction on one side, designed to grab the 

viewer’s attention and introduce a concept, while the text on the other side elaborated on the 

concept and provided more in-depth information. 

Designing the information sheets required thoughtful input and cross-discipline effort. While the 

technical staff provided most of the technical content, a plain language version of the text was 

required to make the information sheets useful and understandable to a nontechnical audience. 

The public outreach team utilized nontechnical NRC staff and support staff, to screen the 

information sheets for readability. Once the language was modified satisfactorily to accurately 

convey the intended messages in an understandable way, Office of the General Counsel staff 

reviewed the materials and ensured that they accurately represented and complied with the 

legal obligations of NRC. 

One of the fact sheets that took considerable effort to put together was the two-sided “Key 

Technical Issues” fact sheet (Figures 6 and 7). This was particularly challenging because the 

input was solicited from many technical staff that did not normally work on the public outreach 

team, and many of the staff found it difficult to condense their task descriptions into plain 

language. However, once completed, this particular fact sheet was highly successful and was 

even used in a news interview 2 weeks after its release. Rather than having to summarize the 

technical subjects, the journalist was able to use language directly from the fact sheet, 

avoiding loss of accuracy in translation. The effort to put technical terms into lay terms proved 

to be worthwhile. 

An NRC calling card was also developed as a simple, small handout. The size of a business 

card, the calling card carried basic information about the NRC purpose and how to contact NRC 

for more information about the program. Figures 8 and 9 show the outside and inside of the 

card. Because these cards were portable, staff members distributed these cards at meetings, 

open houses, conferences, and casual events. 

The public outreach team conducted multiple workshops for tribal governments and for affected 

units of local government. Staff prepared notebooks to distribute to workshop attendees. The 

notebooks contained copies of the fact sheets, printouts of PowerPoint presentations, and small 

versions of the posters, as well as newly developed glossaries to improve understanding of 
7 

Figure 5. Single-Sided Fact Sheet “Responding to Public Concerns and Comments...” in 

Question-Answer Format 
8 

Figure 6. Key Technical Issues Fact Sheet, Front and Back Sides 
9 

Figure 7. Key Technical Issues Fact Sheet, Front and Back Sides
10 

Figure 8. Exterior of the NRC Calling Card. The Card Was Folded in Half to Form a 

Regular Business-Card-Sized Handout. 

Figure 9. Interior of the NRC Calling Card. The Card Was Folded in Half To Form a 

Regular Business-Card-Sized Handout. 
11 

terminology used during the workshops. Workshop attendees found the notebooks to be useful, 

and they also served as good resources for staff members for subsequent interactions. 

The 10 CFR Part 63 rule played an important role in the licensing of Yucca Mountain and was a 

crucial aspect to explain to stakeholders and the public. Because staff felt that more information 

was needed than could be contained in a single fact sheet, the team developed a full color, 

20-page brochure entitled “Judging the Safety of a Repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada.” 

The brochure included discussions about standards and regulations used, multiple barrier 

requirements, what makes a repository safe and postclosure activities. It also included a 

glossary drawn from the notebooks used for tribal workshops and a postage-paid feedback 

card. While the brochure was widely distributed and received significant praise from the 

recipients, none of the feedback cards were returned. 

A self-contained computer slide show was another form of media used to convey information 

about the NRC partnership with CNWRA. The slide show, which ran automatically on a 

continuous loop, was approximately 8.5 minutes long and had an instrumental soundtrack. The 

slides presented the CNWRA technical capabilities, including computer modeling, laboratory 

investigations, field studies, and performance assessment. Each of the nine key technical 

issues was presented, including appropriate visual representations of experiments or models. 

The slide show ran during NRC Open House events and the annual reviews at the Center. The 

slide show highlighted the work that the Center did to support the NRC independent review. 

The slide show was well received at these events: participants at the meetings stopped to watch 

the presentation video and made positive comments. The slide show was also intended for use 

at a kiosk at future conference events, but the opportunity for use in those venues did not arise. 

The NRC website served as another form of media for public outreach. Use of this resource 

was somewhat limited, however, due to heavy administrative constraints on the format and 

content. Also, because a separate organization controlled updates to the website, public 

outreach team members could not work on the site themselves. The rigorous approval process 

requiring multiple levels of authorization also slowed down the process of updating the website, 

making it difficult to post timely information. Because of these limitations, the website mostly 

functioned to distribute basic information in the form of text rather than having a variety of 

pictures, graphics, videos, or interactive tools and was a one-way street with no opportunity for 

direct user interaction. Feedback on the website has been limited, but much of the feedback 

has reflected a need for a more user-friendly interface and a less stilted structure. 

The public outreach team developed a booth for use at a GSA conference. Booth development 

was partially motivated by the meeting location (Reno, Nevada) and partially by the audience, 

as GSA meetings are the largest formal gatherings of geoscientists. NRC and Center staff 

hosted the booth, talking with hundreds of visitors over several days and distributing copies of 

the fact sheets and posters. Visitors to the booth included advisory board members, employees 

of the U.S. Department of Energy, professors, students, and researchers. The booth exhibit 

contained the large previously developed posters (Figures 10 and 11). The primary messages 

discussed (i) that, NRC is the independent regulator and (ii) how NRC would evaluate safety 

through performance assessment. The booth also featured a poster promoting other talks that 

NRC staff were presenting on Yucca Mountain-related issues at the conference. Feedback on 

the booth was very positive, and NRC staff members were often asked at subsequent 

conventions whether they had a booth again.
12 

Figure 10. Photo of the Booth at the Geological Society of America Meeting 

Lastly, the team developed a three-dimensional (3D) model of a cross section of 

Yucca Mountain as a visualization tool (Figure 12). The model measured about 3 ft tall, 2 ft 

across, and 1 ft wide. Representative layers of the underground, including the various layers of 

tuff, the saturated zone, and the repository horizon, were carefully scaled. A mock drift was 

added in the center to show placement and also at the side of the model as a cutaway to 

show placement of the waste packages (Figure 13). To make the model interactive, small 

light-emitting diode lights and a soundboard were added with prerecorded informational sound 

bites. If one of the buttons was pushed, a light would come on at the appropriate location and a 

sound bite describing the feature would play. This model was displayed at public meetings, at 

the On-Site Representatives office and at NRC headquarters. While it proved difficult to 

transport, it was a useful focal point and received significant attention from viewers. 

Most public outreach products were designed for a broad, nontechnical audience. However, a 

few additional posters and fact sheets were created that targeted a more technically 

knowledgeable audience. These fact sheets were generally used at conventions, technical 

exchanges, or visits to the NRC headquarters or On-Site Representatives office. Additionally, 
13 

Figure 11. Visitors at the Geological Society of America Booth Talking With NRC and 

CNWRA Staff 

the materials developed for the public outreach program gained much wider usage throughout 

the agency by providing preapproved text and graphics that could be easily copied and pasted 

into other documents or presentations. Several other forms of media were considered for the 

public outreach program but were not utilized. First, the team drafted a storyboard concept for 

computer visualization tool. This visualization tool would have been an animated, narrated 

video distributable via website or CD-ROM explaining the Yucca Mountain biosphere, the 

process by which water travels through Yucca Mountain, and how radionuclides might be 

transported to the surrounding environs. Because of decreased funding, lower time allotments, 

and other staff commitments, this project was not developed past the initial draft. Another form 

of media considered but not used was holographic images. The holograms are visualization 

tools that could have depicted various aspects of Yucca Mountain, similar to a 3D poster. 

These tools were not used, primarily because of the prohibitive expense, but also because of 

the limited portability and use and because additional supporting materials such as posters 

would also have been required. Lastly, the public outreach staff discussed the use of podcasts 

and weblogs to distribute information about the Yucca Mountain hearings. Because the 

hearings never took place, these tools were not developed past the initial brainstorming phase. 
14 

Figure 12. The 3D Model of Yucca Mountain Showing a Cutaway View of the 

Underground Repository Area 

Overall, the media used in public outreach have been designed with two major purposes in 

mind: (i) convey a key idea in a clear, concise way and (ii) create products with a long shelf life 

that could be usable in a variety of applications, so that a library of resources could be built for 

future use. This approach was very successful. The simpler and more clear the material, the 

wider the audience it could serve. Adding additional technical information and complicating 

layers was not helpful if the message was lost. As the program progressed, fact sheets 

underwent periodic, minor revisions to ensure currency and accuracy, and a few sheets were 

closed out, but for the most part the materials produced became a permanent part of the 

repertoire and the newer material supplemented the older material. Furthermore, this approach 

helped relieve the stressful schedule often associated with developing new products. Because 

there was often a very short lead time before public meetings or events, new materials had to 

be developed on a compressed timeline. The short schedule was complicated by the large 

amount of input required from various offices and all of the public outreach staff working only 

“part time” on the project while actively engaged in other departments. Early in the program, the 

staff realized the benefit of having a set of materials that could apply to a wide variety of 

audiences and that did not expire quickly. 
15 

Figure 13. A Cutaway Area of a “Drift” on the 3D Model Showing Model Waste Packages 

and the LED Indicator Lights 

The public outreach staff learned four important lessons that applied to all media types. First, 

accessibility and portability made media easier to utilize. Keeping a library of presentations, fact 

sheets, and brochures on hand facilitated quick preparation for meetings or visits. Posters 

could be posted at sign-in tables, handed out as information sheets, sent as mailers, put into 

notebooks, or posted on the NRC website. The larger 3D model and booth materials were more 

difficult to transport and were used less often and with fewer audiences. Second, staff tried to 

adapt to stakeholder needs rather than expecting the stakeholders to adapt to the agency. 

While still introducing new materials that conveyed information that the staff deemed important, 

media were particularly well received when they were presented as a direct response to 

stakeholder input because the public and stakeholders felt they were being heard. Third lesson 

learned was the importance of having a diverse public outreach team. Having a variety of 

technical and nontechnical backgrounds helped ensure that the materials produced were 

understandable to the broadest possible audience. The nontechnical team members were most 

adept at providing a perspective on the transparency of the information and ensuring plain 

language was used. 
16 

Fourth, the development of the media used for public outreach has been a continual and 

positive learning process for the staff. These tools explain the NRC role at Yucca Mountain for 

stakeholders and the general public in a clear and transparent way. Feedback on the materials 

may not necessarily have been verbal or written, but the tools allowed a longer, more focused 

dialogue with stakeholders that strengthened positive relationships and opened avenues for 

more effective communication. The experience gained regarding communication media through 

the public outreach program is not only useful and applicable to future repository programs, but 

also to other programs throughout NRC. 

Public meetings have been one of the most important methods of communication in the NRC 

Yucca Mountain public outreach program. NRC staff held public meetings to educate and 

inform the public, as well as to gather important feedback and input for NRC decisionmaking. 

Over the course of the program, the structure and format of the public meetings evolved as 

more experience was gained. Staff learned many important lessons throughout the 

development of the program, and these lessons contributed to continual improvement and 

overall success. 

When the outreach program began, the agency had recently begun enhanced public 

rulemaking, including more in-depth stakeholder interactions, specifically about controversial 

rulemakings. These rulemakings were expected to receive many public comments, and it 

became necessary to collect comments in a different way than the typical format of written 

submissions. The intent was to assure the public that concerns were being heard by taking 

transcripts of public meetings and giving the comments made during those interactions the 

same attention as written comments. This approach allowed the agency to reach a broader 

audience and solicit input from groups that might not otherwise be aware of the rulemakings or 

feel comfortable providing written remarks. 

The first NRC public meeting pertaining to Yucca Mountain issues was held in March 1999. At 

that time, a proposed 10 CFR Part 63 had been published for comment. Some staff felt that 

stakeholders were put off, perceiving that the proposal seemed fully formed and that it was likely 

that no additional input would be included. Although the meeting was held to explain, gather 

additional input, and hear concerns about the proposed rulemaking, no plain language 

summaries or materials were made available to explain the process or contents of the rule. 

Several NRC staff members were present, including Janet Kotra and Tim McCartin, who had 

assisted in drafting the 10 CFR Part 63 proposed rule. A discussion panel also included 

U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) staff, advocacy group members, and representatives of Nye 

and Clark Counties. NRC and DOE staff gave presentations, and then the panelists led a 

question-answer session. Two meetings were held: the first at University of Nevada 

Las Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada, and the second at the community center in Beatty, Nevada. 

The presentations were the same for each meeting, but the audience was different in 

each community. 

At these meetings, NRC staff faced negative feelings from many audience members as a 

result of prior experiences as “downwinders” with U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) actions. 

NRC had not yet established credibility with the stakeholders, and staff were viewed with 

skepticism due to a lack of demonstrated independence from other government agencies from 

Washington, DC, that the communities clearly did not trust. Many questions posed were 

unanticipated and centered around transportation, DOE and DOD actions, and the ways criteria 

were being applied differently at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant versus Yucca Mountain. Many 

of the questions were not in NRC’s purview. Staff felt that the answers they could provide were 

not convincing and that they were less than effective and not adequately prepared. The 
17 

questions in Beatty, Nevada, were even more difficult: they included a wider range of topic 

areas, and NRC preparation had focused narrowly on the proposed rule. Staff felt that the lack 

of preparation was more obvious in that venue. Questions addressed to NRC staff included 

why Yucca Mountain had been designated as the site of study, how NRC was distinct from 

DOE, and how NRC would deal with previous “messes” created by government entities. 

Citizens who had viewed pilots from Nellis Air Force Base flying stunts raised emergency 

planning as a topic of importance. Previously, DOE had had a lack of attendance at its 

meetings, but audience members had driven hundreds of miles to attend the NRC meeting and 

ask these questions. Preparation for difficult and off-topic questions at these meetings had not 

been given priority, but based on the experiences of these meetings, preparation strategy and 

priorities changed. 

NRC staff began gathering information on how to improve their public interactions. Based on 

information gained at a seminar on risk communication, staff began message mapping, 

anticipating follow-up questions that might be asked during the meetings, and preparing 

answers. For the 10 CFR Part 63 proposed rule, the public comment period was extended in 

response to public comments. The next meetings were held in June 1999 in Las Vegas, 

Amargosa Valley, and Caliente, Nevada. In preparation for these meetings, NRC staff worked 

through the NRC training center with Beverly Silverberg. The topical areas covered were 

broadened, and an introduction was included in the presentations giving information on the role 

and responsibilities of NRC and explaining how NRC’s public comment period works. The 

speaker base was broadened to include expertise on transportation and biological effects. For 

the first time in the outreach program, preparation included dry runs with videotaping and plain 

language edits to viewgraphs. The preparation helped team members feel comfortable, 

supported, and more self-aware. The increased success of these three meetings proved the 

effectiveness of advance preparation. This set a positive precedent for future meetings. 

The meeting in Caliente provided a unique opportunity for NRC to garner trust with the public. 

Some community members came to the meeting to protest, but attempts were made to 

discourage distribution of protest literature and opposition signage. The NRC branch chief, 

Bill Reamer, stepped in and enabled the protestors to attend the meeting and have their 

literature displayed, but on a separate table. The citizens expressed concern about why they 

felt they couldn’t trust the government and were afraid of being lied to. The welcoming of 

opponents at the meeting helped attendees feel less defensive and feel that NRC listened fairly 

to all parties in attendance. 

Additional lessons learned from these meetings included how to make members of the public 

feel welcome in the meetings and not be defensive. Furthermore, interactions with stakeholders 

at these and previous meetings had indicated a significant need for more background on 

program history. Because some staff members were tasked with many activities (logistics 

coordination, interactions with stakeholders, preparation of materials, and speaking at the 

meeting), another important lesson learned was to include enough staff members so staff would 

not be overtasked. Spreading the team too thinly caused undue stress on the staff members 

and hindered proper preparation. Finally, another lesson learned was the importance of 

breaking down the hierarchy inherent in organizations to include every team member’s input. 

Valuable contributions were gained from all staff members on the team, regardless of their 

position level in the agency, and each team member was encouraged to contribute freely. 

Team members without technical backgrounds often tend to understand technical matters in a 

manner more akin to members of the lay public. Consequently, they may provide useful input 

for improving the language used in outreach materials. 
18 

One challenge in preparation was communication between internal offices at NRC. There was 

concern that press releases or positions taken by one branch might conflict with those of 

another branch or otherwise cause public concern. The issue of waste being shipped through 

downtown Las Vegas, Nevada, was one such conflict, which occurred when a bounding 

analysis in an impact evaluation was released in a document published by another office. 

Without a context for those scenarios, stakeholders became very concerned and public 

outreach staff were not aware that the issue had arisen. Significant coordination was 

required to ensure that whenever possible, the public outreach team knew what messages 

from other NRC offices were being released in case questions about those positions or 

documents arise at public meetings. 

In November 1999, a new format was introduced for public meetings. A roundtable discussion 

was held to discuss Yucca Mountain technical issues, such as whether subsystem criteria or a 

more risk-informed approach should be used. Staff wanted a public discussion with 

representatives holding differing points of view to discuss why performance-based standards 

were to significant the decisionmaking, and whether that approach lessened stringency of 

standards and was therefore less protective. At this meeting, major interests were represented 

at the table, including advocacy groups, DOE, and NRC. Presentations were interspersed with 

opportunities for questions from the audience, and the table discussion was broken into discrete 

topics to help the audience follow the conversation. This effort to change the format was based 

on previous experiences, as segments of shorter length allowed people to ask questions in a 

more timely fashion. The intention was to create a dialogue, having a conversation with the 

audience rather than lecturing. This approach received an overall positive response. 

Comments from the audience that were off topic were easier to incorporate if they were shared 

more often throughout the discussions. While the comment period was over by the time this 

meeting was held, NRC staff included as much of the input received as possible into the final 

development of 10 CFR Part 63. 

In May 2000, the staff planned to hold public meetings based on feedback received from the 

1999 Beatty, Nevada, meeting that the hearing process was not well understood. Planning and 

preparation for the meetings proceeded on schedule until 3 weeks before the meetings, it was 

decided that public meetings could not be held about the NRC hearing process. With very little 

notice, the staff then had to change the content of the meeting to cover the licensing process to 

make it more general, and another speaker was brought in to talk about the inspection process 

that would be applied to Yucca Mountain if it received a construction authorization. This public 

meeting was also held in two parts: a daytime meeting in Las Vegas, Nevada, for “professional” 

stakeholders who worked in related fields, and an evening meeting in Pahrump for a broader lay 

audience. Presentation topics included the NRC role and responsibilities, the licensing support 

network (LSN), the process of an acceptance review, the docketing procedure, and what would 

happen when the license application was filed. The turnout for the meeting was good: it 

included national nongovernmental organizations as well as local organizations, and 

interactions with the groups were constructive. 

Despite the success and good reception of the meetings, many new challenges arose. For one, 

a last-minute change of venue was required to ensure enough space for participants. This 

situation underscored the importance of visiting the venues ahead of time to ensure proper 

facility size and accommodations. Also, a decision had been made not to have public outreach 

meetings discussing the NRC hearing process because of the possibility that the process would 

change, but the public viewed making the hearing process less formal as a potential “fast track 

to Yucca.” The audience still wanted to have a later meeting concerning the hearing process. 

Additionally, because the meetings were not limited to a specific length of time, staff found 
19 

themselves pressed for time and exhausted by holding two lengthy meetings in one day. Staff 

struggled to balance being responsive and answering all the questions with respecting 

attendees’ time. NRC attorneys also faced the new challenge of defining the line between staff 

answering legitimate questions about NRC’s licensing process and what could be perceived as 

offering legal advice. This challenge persisted throughout the program. Lastly, NRC staff 

received comments by one meeting attendee that could be taken as threatening, and security at 

the meetings became a larger focus. After this meeting, staff corrdinated in advance with staff 

from security for all public outreach meetings. 

In 2001, NRC staff finally held public outreach meetings with information about the hearing 

process. These meetings provided another step in the learning process about meeting 

preparation. During the dry run for these meetings, now standard practice, tensions arose 

between the technical staff and Office of the General Counsel staff about the content as well as 

the understandability of the presentations to the lay public. This tension was based, in part, on 

fundamentally different views of the public and stakeholders held by the attorneys and the staff 

members. Staff struggled to reach agreement about the acceptability of presenting general 

information about NRC’s adjudicatory process as opposed to providing legal advice. Staff 

members from the two offices also disagreed extensively over how best to edit presentations for 

plain language. Because the dry run was not perceived as successful, another dress rehearsal 

was needed, and this subsequently became common practice. In the end, the final meetings 

went well and were well received. County representatives felt that they received needed 

answers to give to their constituents. 

Staff gained important experience about how the makeup of a community can affect the course 

and reception of a public outreach meeting during the Mesquite, Nevada, meeting in 2001. At a 

previous meeting, NRC staff had received a request to visit Mesquite, Nevada. Many meeting 

attendees were retired military or had traveled from across the Arizona and Utah borders. The 

meeting, held at the local community center, had a different atmosphere than many previous 

meetings because of the makeup of the population. Most of the citizens were very patriotic, 

pro-Nevada Test Site, and pro-government, and they were suspicious about environmental 

groups or advocacy groups. The attendees had many questions about safety and the roles of 

DOE versus NRC and had a different approach to the situation than those attendees at 

Clark County meetings held in Las Vegas. The group showed some skepticism, but was 

openminded and eager to hear about NRC’s role and responsibilities. The atmosphere 

provided the opportunity to explain the processes as well as convey a message of openness. 

Because the previous stakeholder interactions were not representative of the viewpoints of 

those encountered in Mesquite, this experience was valuable in showing the importance of 

reaching out to communities besides those immediately surrounding Las Vegas, Nevada, and 

being prepared for a response to meetings based on differing stakeholder composition. The 

NRC staff made more concerted efforts to reach out to or visit as many affected units of local 

government (AULG) as possible. 

During April 2002, NRC staff visited several communities in Nevada to present an overview of 

activities related to the potential repository. The trip served as an opportunity to demonstrate a 

visible “passing of the baton” from Bill Reamer to Janet Schlueter, the incoming branch chief for 

the High-Level Waste Division, and preserve a sense of continuity to the public. As part of 

building long-term relationships with the communities, the staff felt it was important to have a 

familiar format and familiar faces. The meeting held in Tonopah, Nevada, provided another 

unique perspective for NRC staff, as Tonopah had been home for the development of the 

stealth bomber, and citizens were very proud of this achievement and very patriotic. While 

there was still some “anti-Yucca” sentiment, the community was interested in potential economic 
20 

benefits of having rail lines to support Yucca Mountain. Citizens expressed suspicion that the 

Las Vegas, Nevada, community would stonewall the project, or use political clout and take the 

economic and labor force benefits if the project did go through, and therefore appreciated the 

attention NRC had given to Tonopah residents. Many citizens in different parts of the state, 

whose issues primarily focused on transportation, wanted to have input into the environmental 

impact statement (EIS). The NRC staff needed to be able to explain the NRC process, with the 

evolving understanding that most public concerns had to do with the National Environmental 

Policy Act and the EIS. An important lesson learned was how to anticipate concerns of the 

community and explain how individuals and affected communities could put their concerns 

forward to the appropriate regulatory bodies. 

In Ely, Nevada, NRC staff had an opportunity to address the town council. This opportunity was 

important because Ely had specifically requested that NRC visit, which is generally a good 

indicator that communication with NRC staff is viewed as positive and useful. Eureka County, 

Nevada, representatives also drove to Ely to talk with NRC staff. Eureka County, Nevada, was 

primarily interested in pragmatic issues such as timing of input, how to participate in the hearing 

process, how to learn about the process of submitting contentions, and becoming a party to 

NRC’s hearing process. Prompted by these inquiries, NRC staff developed material to explain 

these points for later workshops. 

Two important lessons came from the Yucca Mountain Review Plan (YMRP) public meetings. 

First, at one of the meetings a local politician attended the meeting with his own television 

reporter and used the meeting as a venue for grandstanding. His comments off camera to the 

NRC staff were very complimentary, but on camera he took a much harsher stance. The staff 

were courteous and answered his questions, but learned to prepare for politicians who may use 

the meetings as personal campaigning venues and to plan for dealing with the situation 

accordingly to keep discussions on topic. Secondly, at another YMRP public meeting, NRC 

staff answered questions from a reporter, who subsequently printed only part of the discussion. 

The printed story prompted questions from a Commissioner, who called on the NRC staff 

member to explain the situation and the answer that had been given. Having a transcript clearly 

demonstrated that staff had given an acceptable answer to the question. Transcripts could be 

used not only for sharing information about the meeting with members of the public who could 

not attend, but also for internal review and demonstration of adherence to agency policies. 

Effective advertising and notification of public meetings were other important lessons learned 

throughout this process. Small newspapers and circulars were used to advertise the meetings, 

and the NRC onsite representatives were able to find local publications or other news 

distribution points. While larger ads sometimes drew inflammatory attention from outside 

activist groups, local ads posted on community bulletin boards or local news sites effectively 

reached people in advance of meetings. Federal register notices and appropriate press 

releases were also issued according to NRC practice. 

Obtaining an appropriate facility proved key to all of the public meetings. Not only was facility 

size an important factor, but also the technical capabilities in the room, such as screen size for 

presentation slides, sound systems, and transcription equipment. Comfortable and adequate 

seating was crucial, but having space for side conversations, poster display areas, and snack 

areas also enhanced the overall atmosphere and hence the effectiveness of the meetings. 

Furthermore, having the right staff on hand for meetings was extremely important. Not only 

were public outreach staff necessary for meetings, well-prepared technical experts ready to 

answer technical questions and legal staff to assist with legal matters were also needed. A 
21 

variety of expertise on the team from both NRC and the Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory 

Analyses contributed to overall success, as members of the team were drawn from not only the 

high-level waste branch, but also from transportation, environmental, and fuel cycle staff. 

Discussions were kept on track and fruitful by having an expert facilitator, who also assisted 

in forming a prioritized agenda and contacting appropriate parties to participate in discussions. 

An additional general lesson learned was the significance that stakeholders place on evidence 

that their concerns are heard. After citizens in Beatty, Nevada, commented about emergency 

planning concerns, NRC staff made efforts to incorporate those concerns into subsequent 

presentations on how emergency preparedness plans were written and interpreted. Staff also 

received positive feedback from occasions when NRC speakers were able to remember and 

repeat input received during previous meetings, including personal concerns from individual 

attendees. Not surprisingly, it was important to the stakeholders to not only feel that NRC staff 

listened attentively, but also were willing to act on the issues that were presented. 

While these first meetings laid the foundation for the public outreach work, throughout the 

duration of the program, several additional public outreach meetings were held that built on the 

success and lessons learned from previous meetings. Topics included further explanation of 

the NRC roles and responsibilities, the licensing process, regulation of transportation of 

nuclear waste, and the YMRP. The format typically included brief presentations by NRC staff 

(10-15 minutes) and subject matter experts interspersed with question-answer sessions with the 

audiences and roundtable discussions. Venues for the public outreach meetings varied 

depending on the nature of the meeting, but outreach staff continued to make every effort 

possible to hold meetings in the directly affected communities. Community centers continued to 

be commonly used. For meetings or workshops that included many different communities, 

Las Vegas, Nevada, often served as a central and easy to travel to location. Once in place, the 

NRC hearing facility at Las Vegas, Nevada, was used several times. Public meetings were 

consistently well received and attended by representatives of a wide variety of interests. 

Feedback from the meetings continued to be positive. 

Aside from the public meetings, the public outreach team held stakeholder workshops and 

meetings for Native American tribes. The tribal workshops started because very few 

representatives from Native American tribes attended the public meetings. In an effort to better 

serve that community, mailing lists of tribal contacts were obtained from other agencies and 

used for notification of a variety of agency actions. Tribal participants offered perspectives on 

sovereignty and history regarding Yucca Mountain and views on the NRC regulatory framework, 

and NRC provided information on the NRC role, issues surrounding 10 CFR Part 63, and 

transportation. Overarching discussions included factors that affected tribal government 

understanding and evaluation of documents on high-level radioactive waste disposal and 

transportation, and whether there were unique Native American cultural perspectives on science 

and the natural world that might affect NRC approaches to providing information to or obtaining 

information from tribal governments. Considering the sensitive nature of past relationships 

between tribal governments and the U.S. government, NRC staff felt that it was particularly 

important to actively seek out and demonstrate attentiveness to Native American concerns. 

Three workshops were also held for AULGs, including tribal governments. Participants at the 

workshops included representatives from most city and county governments surrounding the 

Yucca Mountain area, as well as citizen groups. NRC staff members spoke about several 

subjects pertinent to the AULGs, including NRC’s licensing process, the formal hearing process, 

criteria governing adoption of a final environmental impact statement for the proposed repository 

at Yucca Mountain, transport of spent nuclear fuel, and the role and use of the LSN. 
22 

Opportunities were given for question-answer sessions with members of the public as well. 

Particular focus was placed on how AULGs could participate in the hearing and contention 

processes. These meetings were well attended and well received, with the original meeting 

followed by two requested subsequent meetings. NRC staff learned that Native American tribal 

governments were different than other stakeholder groups and expected to be treated as 

sovereign nations rather than “just members of the public.” Although the tribal requests could 

not always be fully satisfied, staff strove to treat the spirit behind these requests with dignity. 

These tribal interactions occurred primarily before NRC had many of its current tribal 

communications support resources in place, and members of the public outreach team were 

able to contribute to these internal improvements. 

The NRC high-level waste repository safety public outreach team also benefitted from 

stakeholder interactions in international circles. In August 2000, the Forum on Stakeholder 

Confidence, or FSC, was established when the Radioactive Waste Management Committee 

(RWMC) of the Nuclear Energy Agency decided that it needed to form a group to take a 

disciplined look at societal factors affecting the management of radioactive waste management 

facilities. RWMC had noted the lack of public acceptance that had plagued earlier programs in 

Canada, the United Kingdom, and Sweden, and the considerable opposition that arose when 

new sites were considered for characterization. Another common problem that FSC was 

expected to confront was the inability of technical and policy experts to understand or be 

understood when they spoke to concerned members of the lay public. Another promising focus 

for the new forum was the increasingly visible role of the regulator in building public confidence. 

At the initial forum meeting, Janet Kotra gave a talk on the efforts being made to improve the 

NRC meeting format, the goals for future meetings, how NRC explained its agency role, and 

NRC’s efforts at creating a dialogue with the stakeholders. 

The FSC structure includes technical meetings as well as site and stakeholder visits, with 

emphasis not on technical matters but on interactions with the local communities. All of these 

venues provided an opportunity to interact with other agencies and discover both unique and 

common problems among stakeholder groups. Issues of safety and confidence do not always 

have the same definitions based on the sensitivity of the stakeholders, and working groups 

could solve problems together with a variety of experience bases. The forum follows changes in 

the international radioactive waste management community and allows sharing of experiences 

and growing together. However, participating countries had to be careful not to appear to send 

an unofficial national endorsement of a country’s preferred course, or send a particular message 

to the public or stakeholders. Literature from the forum has been useful in helping NRC 

understand other outreach programs and results. Also, participation in this forum has informed 

NRC actions in the public outreach realm and was needed for information and validation. 

Participation also opened up other opportunities because of personal connections, international 

visibility for NRC, and increased awareness of other international activities. 

The insights gained from the public outreach meetings and stakeholder interactions benefitted 

not only the stakeholder communities and the NRC high-level waste repository safety program, 

but also other parts of the agency. Other groups around the agency noticed the success of the 

high-level waste repository safety outreach program and requested public outreach team input 

and materials. In 2003, the agency began to recognize the need to increase stakeholder 

confidence in NRC. Members of the public outreach team were invited to join the Commission’s 

task force to evaluate public communications and to provide strategies for enhancing 

communications at all levels of the agency. The outreach staff provided useful insights to the 

team based on experience gained in public outreach meetings and international interactions. 
23 

It is also important to note that over the course of the program, both the attitude of the nation 

and technology underwent significant changes that affected the program. It is commonly 

understood that over the past decades, the attitude of American society toward government has 

become less trustful and more skeptical. Societal attitudes during the era of nuclear weapons 

development evolved to include expectations for open dialogue, transparency, and citizen 

participation in decision making. Public outreach, as a whole, has increased significantly over 

the past decade during which the Yucca Mountain public outreach program was active, 

including public outreach for government programs in the sciences. Under the older paradigm, 

information was traditionally passed in a one-way manner—government to citizens. With the 

explosion of readily available information via search engines on the internet, the public is now 

able to gather its own information and come to conclusions and understandings that are not 

necessarily consistent with information passed on from the government agencies. Demand has 

increased for transparency and citizen engagement because of this increase in knowledge and 

a stronger sense of entitlement for participation in government activities. Agency and 

government views, therefore, have had to evolve along the lines of these expectations and 

provide additional opportunities for participation and feedback. Evidence of this cultural change 

can be seen in the NRC “Open Government Plan,” issued June 7, 2010, which includes an 

initiative for enhancing stakeholder engagement. 

When the Yucca Mountain outreach program began in earnest in 1999, the World Wide Web 

was still in a relatively early stage of development and social media was a fledgling idea. 

Communication about the early meetings was primarily accomplished through phone calls, 

emails, and paper-notice distribution. By the end of the program, NRC had in large part moved 

toward an internet-based information distribution system, where meeting notices, transcripts, 

presentations, and other media were available via the NRC High-Level Waste website, and 

notifications were sent to meeting participants primarily via electronic means. However, the 

HLW staff faced new challenges within the NRC organization when attempting to use of the 

internet for communication. As previously discussed, posting timely information to the NRC 

website was burdensome due to the heavy administrative constraints and multiple-level required 

reviews. As the organization as a whole moved toward embracing the “e-government” 

movement and the need for more thorough internet communications, additional resources were 

brought to NRC for web development and more information could be posted to the websites 

with fewer hindrances. As recently as April 2011, the NRC website underwent a significant 

redesign that reflects the agency’s recognition of a need for better internet presence. 

NRC never fully embraced social media for use in the Yucca Mountain public outreach program. 

Because of agency caution about the potential for negative interactions, inability to provide 

timely responses, and concerns about demands on staff time, weblogs, Facebook, and other 

social media outlets were not added to the NRC’s public outreach portfolio. However, note that 

during 2011, NRC added a blog to its main site and has begun (in some departments) using 

web conferencing and webcasts to increase participation in public meetings. As technology 

continues to develop and social media gains further acceptance among government agencies, 

social media could come to play an important role for NRC in effectively communicating with the 

public in future repository programs. 

NRC staff attitudes toward public outreach generally became more positive as the program 

progressed. As mentioned in other parts of this report, some challenges arose among staff 

regarding what information should be presented to the public and what, if any, advice was 

appropriate to give regarding stakeholder participation. Toward the beginning of the program, 

messages and dialogue were more tightly controlled, with little room afforded for deviation from 

preapproved text. Although diligence in ensuring technically and legally correct responses 
24 

always remained critically important, staff recognized the positive response of the public to open 

dialogue rather than prepared scripts. As more staff members gained experience interacting 

with the public, comfort rose, and staff began encouraging this type of open approach not only 

in the public outreach program but also elsewhere within the agency. 

Overall, the Yucca Mountain program interactions with stakeholders, especially through public 

meetings and educational media, improved greatly over the course of the program and were 

seen as beneficial and positive by both the agency and stakeholder communities. The meetings 

conveyed information to the public and gathered important input for decisionmaking. Through 

effective preparation, carefully considered messages, and meaningful discussions, NRC was 

able to build trust, confidence, and long-term relationships. Lessons learned in this program 

can benefit future public outreach programs and ensure continued success with 

stakeholder interactions.