Accessibility and Access Keys [0]
Environmentalists in Pembroke have applauded the decision of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission to refuse to renew a Pembroke company’s licence to process a radioactive substance used in the manufacture of glow in the dark emergency signs.
“Years of hard work have paid off,” said Kelly O’Grady, spokeswoman for the Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County and an intervener in recent commission hearings. “We are very elated with this news.”
Though she was delighted the company, SRB Technologies, will not be processing radioactive tritium, a substance that emits light in the dark, Ms. O’Grady’s delight was shaded by concern about whether the company will be able to clean up the contamination 14 years of manufacturing has caused.
“The soil around the facility is so contaminated any developer needs special permission. The site is now basically unusable,” she said.
The commission explained its decision by saying SRB Technologies “will not make adequate provision for the protection of the environment when carrying out activities that include the processing of tritium.”
However, the commission added “the tritium releases resulting from the operation of the facility have not posed a health and safety risk to the public.”
The commission did decide to issue an 18-month possession licence to the company. The possession licence would allow the company “the general possession, transfer, management, storage and disposal of nuclear substances that are part of the facility.”
SRB Technologies president Stéphane Levesque could not be reached for comment Thursday. It is not known what effect the commission’s decision will have on the company or its roughly 35 employees.
Groundwater on the company site was once found to contain up to 80 times the level of radioactive tritium Health Canada allows in drinking water — and that Canadian standard is itself nearly 10 times more lenient than that enforced by the United State’s Environmental Protection Agency. Wells within 200 metres of the plant show levels of tritium within the drinking water guideline, but up to 500 times the natural “background” level.
The commission’s staff had recommended the company be granted a short 18-month operating licence, but the commission board, in the face of arguments from many interveners in recent hearings, opted for caution.
In a statement, the Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County blamed both the company and the commission for the contamination of the area: “SRB Technologies was operating for a full eight years before the CNSC visited the area to collect environmental samples to validate this company’s predictions.”
SRBT still has no financial guarantee in place to cover the costs of remediation of the site after any eventual shutdown. In its decision, the commission orders the company to have a guarantee for safe shutdown in place by July 31, and a guarantee for full decommissioning in place by May 31, 2008.
Ole Hendrickson, an Environment Canada ecologist and also an intervener at the hearings, said he doubted the company could have been made safe enough to operate near residential areas.
“It would be far better to locate such a facility outside of a town, with much less risk to the public,” he said. “That’s why nuclear facilities, for example, have buffer zones.”
Wes Stuber, also an intervener, welcomed the decision. “We’ve been told the company’s emissions are safe, but I don’t believe it. I had cancer six years ago, and just last November, my wife, Sonja, learned she has cancer that’s spread all over her body. …
“We’ve been raising and eating vegetables, huge amounts of them, for years — and analysis showed they had 20 times the tritium of vegetables from Gatineau and places like that. … The best decision is that the company move away from here.”