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OTTAWA (CP) – A $520-million plan to clean up nuclear research sites in Canada includes a proposal for underground waste disposal in caverns near the Ottawa River.
Natural Resources Minister Gary Lunn said Friday previous governments have failed to deal with the legacy of radioactive waste from nuclear research and development dating to the 1940s.
“Today as part of the government’s plan to deliver clean air, water, land and energy to our citizens, we are making a funding commitment of $520 million over five years to clean up the waste from past activities,” he said at a news conference.
“This plan will reduce risks and liabilities over the long term and is consistent with international best practices.”
The initiative is intended to clean up Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. facilities at Deep River, Ont., the Whiteshell Laboratories at Pinawa, Man., and three prototype reactors in Quebec and Ontario.
The waste is considered to be at the low or intermediate level in terms of radioactivity. It does not include highly radioactive spent fuel from Candu power reactors.
Lunn announced the plan at AECL’s Chalk River Laboratories near the town of Deep River. The small community is situated next to the Ottawa River.
Lunn did not mention the potential use of underground caverns beside the large river.
However, Bill Cupfer-Schmidt of AECL confirmed that underground storage of low-to-intermediate level nuclear waste is being considered.
“We certainly have in the late 1980s and 1990s been looking at the Chalk River site to determine whether it is an appropriate site for that very purpose. Preliminary studies were very positive and it’s certainly one of the options.”
People in the Deep River area are worried about the proposal, said Ole Hendrickson of the group Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County.
“This is a site that’s got fractured bedrock, high rates of water movement right next to the river, and it’s seismically active. This is not the place for permanent disposal of nuclear waste.”
Hendrickson is calling for a full-scale review under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.
AECL is promising public consultations, but has not committed to a review under the act.
Sean Patrick-Stensil, a campaigner with environmental group Greenpeace, said the Chalk River site is not appropriate for nuclear waste disposal.
“These toxins need to be isolated from the environment for thousands and thousands of years and there’s no guarantee that a man-made structure buried on the banks of the Ottawa River can stop that from entering the environment.”