Uranium Tailings There are 200 million tons of sand-like uranium tailings in Canada, mostly in Ontario and Saskatchewan. These radioactive wastes will remain hazardous for hundreds of thousands of years. They contain some of the most powerful carcinogens known: radium, radon gas, polonium, thorium and others. Radio-active tailings also result from phosphate ores and other ores rich in uranium. In 1978, an Ontario Royal Commission recommended that a panel of world class ecologists study the long-term problem of radioactive tailings and that the future of nuclear power be assessed in view of their findings. The government has ignored these recommendations. Port Hope Wastes In 1975, St. Mary's School in Port Hope was evacuated because of high radiation levels in the cafeteria. It was soon learned that large volumes of radioactive wastes from uranium refining operations had been used as construction material in the school and all over town. Hundreds of homes were contaminated. Other problems came to light: three waste dumps leaking radioactivity, a radioactive public beach, radioactive wastes dumped in the harbour and radioactive materials in open ravines around town. In all, 800,000 tons of radioactive waste were identified for removal from Port Hope to be stored elsewhere. A federal Task Force spent eight years looking for a site for these wastes. Deep River, the bedroom community of Chalk River Laboratories, was the only candidate site to emerge. However, the federal government's refusal to guarantee jobs at Chalk River resulted in a rejection of the deal in 1997. The nuclear waste remains at Port Hope. Other Reactor Wastes Radioactive mops, rags, clothing, tools, and contaminated equipment such as filters and pressure tubes, are temporarily stored in shallow underground containers at the Bruce Nuclear Complex and elsewhere. At Bruce, a radwaste incinerator reduces the volume of combustible radioactive waste materials. Nuclear Lab Wastes Chalk River has many waste problems: six underground tanks of high level radioactive liquid waste, a spent fuel pool which has leaked for 30 years, pits where isotopes have been dumped for decades, radioactive parts of damaged reactors buried on site and a "dispersal area" where millions of gallons of radioactive liquids have been poured into shallow trenches near the Ottawa River. The Whiteshell Nuclear Research Establishment has likewise created so much radioactive contamination that it will be expensive to close down. The Auditor General of Canada reports that Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (responsible for both labs) has not properly accounted for the financial cost of restoring these sites. High Level Waste High level nuclear waste is spent fuel bundles from CANDU nuclear reactors. It gives off gamma radiation so powerful it can kill a nearby unprotected person within a few minutes and remains dangerous for hundreds of thousands of years. Canada currently has around 1.3 million spent fuel bundles - each containing over 200 different radioactive nuclides - in temporary storage facilities and produces an additional 85,000 per year. Canada's nuclear industry has spent 15 years and nearly $600 million on a proposal to bury this highly radioactive waste in the Canadian Shield. The Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency spent $7 million and nearly 10 years analyzing the proposal. They concluded that public opposition was too great for the proposal to proceed. Decommissioning Wastes Structural materials in the core of an operating reactor become radioactive from neutron bombardment. The cost of dismantling such a radioactive structure approaches the cost of building it in the first place. Current plans are to wait forty years, then use underwater cutting techniques to minimize radiation exposures to the workers. Hundreds of truckloads of radioactive rubble will result from each dismantled reactor.
Photo copyright Robert Del Tredici
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