The Bloc Quebecois is calling on Canada's federal government to halt any further transportation of nuclear waste to a disposal facility in Chalk River, Ontario, that has also been opposed by 10 First Nations in Ontario and Quebec, plus citizens' groups and municipalities.
"It is with dismay that we learned of your government's ambition to use the Chalk River site as a 'radioactive dump' to house the waste irradiated from at least three different nuclear reactors," states the letter addressed to Tim Hodgson, Minister of Energy and Natural Resources, in a translation posted online by nuclear-news.
The letter is signed by the Bloc's natural resources critics Mario Simard, environment and climate change critic Patrick Bonin, and Indigenous relations critic Sebastien Lemire. They say the action is even more distressing now that they've learned the federal government approved transportation of tonnes of spent nuclear fuel to the facility over this past summer.
"We remind you, Mr. Minister, that the site used in Chalk River is located very close to the source of drinking water for millions of Quebecers," the three MPs write. "This is probably one of the worst possible and imaginable places to decide to store nuclear waste."
A nuclear waste disposal site at Chalk River Laboratories along the Ottawa River was first proposed in 2016. Despite strong opposition from nearby municipalities, First Nations, and nuclear safety groups, the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission amended Chalk River Laboratories' licence this past January to allow it to build a near surface disposal facility to store contaminated soil, industrial radiation sources, and radioactive demolition debris in a 25-metre-high stack of lined and covered disposal cells.
In March, the plan was stalled after a federal court sided with First Nations who said consultation with Indigenous communities had been inadequate, though Chalk River Laboratories is appealing to have the ruling overturned, says CBC.
And yet, over the summer the Canadian National Energy Alliance-a consortium of multinational corporations that has held a federal contract to manage Canadian nuclear laboratories since 2015-secretly transported high-level radioactive waste from the defunct Gentilly-1 nuclear reactor in Quebec to the Chalk River site, reports Le Journal de Montreal.
The Bloc Quebecois MPs remind Hodgson in their letter that more than 140 Quebec and Ontario municipalities, as well as the Kebaowek First Nation, oppose disposing of nuclear waste at Chalk River Laboratories.
"This is an irresponsible project that unnecessarily risks an ecological and environmental disaster with effects for decades and a direct impact on millions of human lives," the letter states in French.
"There is no reason, no reason at all, to justify the lack of transparency and consideration that your government has shown in this matter," add Simard, Bonin, and Lemire.
"We're talking about decisions that affect millions of people and an entire ecosystem: they can't be taken lightly. The bare minimum should be to listen to the views of those affected and to take into account the consequences that such a choice would have for our world."
Source: The Energy Mix
