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An investigation is under way to determine if a leak that led to the shutdown of the nuclear reactor in Chalk River last week — and the looming interruption of the country’s medical isotope supply — has any connection with another leak in December.
Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, which runs the 52-year-old National Research Universal reactor, said Tuesday the leak of heavy water — water that acts as a stabilizer during nuclear fission — was discovered in a routine maintenance check last week after the reactor was taken off-line following a power outage.
The leak is coming from the base of the reactor where a wall has eroded.
The reactor, about 150 kilometres west of Ottawa, produces half of the world’s medical isotopes.
In December 2008, a small heavy-water leak forced officials to shut the reactor for three days. The 47-litre leak stopped on its own and no repairs were made at the time.
AECL spokesman Dale Coffin said workers are trying to determine whether the leaks are connected.
“At this point, we’re not sure,” he said Tuesday. “We’re checking the leak from December. It stopped and didn’t reappear again. It was difficult because we couldn’t isolate it to one particular area.”
The shutdown of the NRU reactor will have repercussions for hospitals across the country that rely on life-saving medical isotopes to screen for illnesses such as cancer and heart disease.
MDS Nordion — the company that buys isotopes from AECL and sells them to pharmaceutical manufacturers — said in a statement Tuesday it’s been advised by AECL that the Chalk River reactor “will remain out of service for more than one month.”
“MDS Nordion expects the impact of this shutdown to begin to be felt this week,” the statement said. “While MDS Nordion is working closely with its supply network to source additional isotopes … the company expects that the medical community and their patients will experience a significant shortage of isotopes worldwide.”
The Canadian Society of Nuclear Medicine also said Tuesday that hospitals will see a shortage in their medical-isotope supply as early as next week.
“Depending on how long the shutdown lasts, it will be a considerable problem in Eastern Canada,” society president Doug Abrams said in Edmonton. “Next week is going to be the start of a real shortage.”
Abrams said hospitals were notified about the probability of a shortage, expected as early as Saturday.
Talks are continuing with a nuclear facility in Europe, which supplies most of the medical isotopes for Western Canada and the U.S., he said.
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