Tout d’abord, merci beaucoup d’avoir pris le temps de me répondre.
Mais j’avais déjà exploré google avant de poser cette question.
J’avais aussi réussi à identifier les scripts ayant un lien avec ces points de montage à l’aide d’un petit grep -ris /lib/init/rw /etc/init.d
/etc/init.d/umountnfs.sh: /|/proc|/dev|/dev/pts|/dev/shm|/proc/*|/sys|/lib/init/rw)
/etc/init.d/mountkernfs.sh: domount tmpfs "" /lib/init/rw tmpfs -omode=0755,nosuid$RW_OPT
/etc/init.d/mountkernfs.sh: touch /lib/init/rw/.ramfs
/etc/init.d/mtab.sh: domtab tmpfs /lib/init/rw tmpfs -omode=0755,nosuid$RW_OPT
/etc/init.d/umountfs: /|/proc|/dev|/.dev|/dev/pts|/dev/shm|/dev/.static/dev|/proc/*|/sys|/lib/init/rw)
/etc/init.d/checkroot.sh: # fails we create a temporary node in /lib/init/rw.
/etc/init.d/checkroot.sh: rm -f /lib/init/rw/rootdev \
/etc/init.d/checkroot.sh: && mknod -m 600 /lib/init/rw/rootdev b ${rdev%:*} ${rdev#*:} \
/etc/init.d/checkroot.sh: && [ -e /lib/init/rw/rootdev ]
/etc/init.d/checkroot.sh: rootdev=/lib/init/rw/rootdev
/etc/init.d/checkroot.sh:The system is also unable to create a temporary node in /lib/init/rw.
/etc/init.d/checkroot.sh: # Remove /lib/init/rw/rootdev if we created it.
/etc/init.d/checkroot.sh: rm -f /lib/init/rw/rootdev
/etc/init.d/mdadm-raid:for dir in /lib/init/rw /dev/shm /dev; do
Mes recherches sur debian.org m’ont ensuite apporté quelques précisions, entre autre les rapports de bug bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=403863
et bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=483643
[quote]> I can’t find any information about the way tmpfs_size is calculated,
but on two boxes, it is the half of system memory.
The kernel uses half the memory by default. A different size can be
specified at mount time.
The problem is that on one I get /lib/init/rw and /dev/shm sized to
1.8 Gbytes and the other sized to 500 Mbytes, which seems to be very
very much just to keep a few Kbytes.
The capacity of a tmpfs is not the amount memory used by it. The
memory used by a tmpfs is the amount stored on the file system. So
neither 1.8 GB nor 600 MB is “used” to keep the few kilobytes. Only
the few kilobytes is spent.[/quote]
Ce qui m’a rassuré, à propos du fait que ces points de montage ne gaspillent pas ma précieuse mémoire vive 
Je n’ai pas encore tout à fait compris la nécessité de conserver ces montages en place une fois le système démarré, mais au moins il ne semble pas qu’ils “plombent” le système.