About 40 young adults accepted the invitation to consider how to involve young people in the search for a disposal site on Wednesday 24 March 2021. The Federal Office for the Safety of Nuclear Waste Management (BASE) and BGE, the Federal Company for Radioactive Waste Disposal, had jointly invited people to share their ideas; the goal was to develop a meeting format for the young generation in May.

For three hours, the participants shared ideas in several discussion forums involving small groups; they considered what content might appeal to this target group, how they can become involved in discussions about the search for a disposal site, what means could be used to appeal to young people and what this kind of meeting might look like. Somebody suggested, for example, offering a small series of meetings with different major topics. Social media like Instagram should play a greater role in advertising the events, according to the advice from the predominantly young students given to the organisers. Young people also need plenty of basic information. They were the main results of the discussions on 24 March.

Claudia Schulz from BASE was delighted by many new ideas. “We heard very many exciting ideas on what other formats might look like for the young generation and how we can better reach young people and young adults. I’m now looking forward to assessing and introducing them.”

Dagmar Dehmer from BGE says, “I’m delighted by the individual creative suggestions that the young people made. We can use them to put together an attractive package of meetings.” The workshop also seemed to motivate the participants to do more. Two thirds of them said that they planned to attend the meeting in May, according to a small survey at the end of the three-hour video conference.

In addition to the two major players in the search for a disposal site, the National Civic Society Board, which is independently supporting the search for a disposal site for high-level radioactive waste, and the preparatory group for the Sub-areas Conference, where twelve people jointly prepared the last discussion meeting in June, presented their work too. It was particularly important for Svenja Fassbinder from the preparatory group for the Sub-areas Conference, like most of the participants, that the voice of the youth meetings be heard at the Sub-areas Conference, the first formal public participation format in the site selection procedure. BASE and BGE share this interest too. The organisers hope that the meeting in May will build a bridge for young people to the Sub-areas Conference and to public participation in the search for a disposal site.