Within our transdisciplinary research project (www.transens.de), we work jointly with 14 citizens (citizen working group or CWG) who are interested in the topic without being activists or having a specific agenda. The CWG helps us to enrich the research process with experiential knowledge. Parallel to gaining scientific knowledge, trust can be built due to close collaboration.

In the first part, we highlight the twofold responsibility concerning the current generation’s decision-making perspective for present and future generations. According to our survey data and a debate with citizens, we see the need to discuss the respective weighing of directly affected generations during the next few decades (until the repository’s closure, which affects about four to five generations) compared to justice for (five +) future generations in the following decades and centuries.

In our project, several disciplines work on issues concerning the management of high-level nuclear waste in Germany. In our sub-project on trust, we have enlisted a group of 16 citizens, reflecting with us on our research questions and approaches. From joint workshops of researchers and these citizens on the role of trust in scientists we find that participants generally want to be taken seriously. Transparent and binding rules for all participants could be the key to a trusting relationship.