On April 30, the FutureSpace team had the honour of leading the Strategic Foresight workshop “Too Late to Regulate? Nuclear Power in Outer Space in the Year 2050 – Backcasting for Regulatory Agility” at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) International Conference on Effective Nuclear and Radiation Regulatory Systems. The session began with a Keynote by Nina Klimburg-Witjes, entitled “When the Future Arrives Before the Rules Do,” exploring the nexus of nuclear and space technology, regulation, and governance over time.
This keynote provided the basis for the Strategic Foresight workshop that followed, moderated by Nina, Philipp Kürten and Pepijn Deroo, as well as Sara Ortega Ramírez and Roxana Helena Demeter from the INNORES research project. In the hour-long workshop, 60 regulators participated in lively discussions and imaginative headline-writing, moving from a hypothetical 2050 scenario involving poorly regulated nuclear power in space, back in time to the 2040s and 2030s, to find leverage points where different decisions could have been made. A special thank you to Laura Videla Schulman, Katherine Asfaw and Kaye Mathies for the invitation and excellent organisation!
