Beyond Nuclear decries Canadian radioactive waste dump on Great Lakes shore, vows intensified resistance
OPG's proposed so-called Deep Geologic Repository for radioactive waste burial would be located 3/4ths of a mile from the Great Lakes shoreline.As long feared, the trigger has been pulled. The Canadian federal Joint Review Panel (JRP), representing both the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) and Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency (CEAA), has issued its Environmental Assessment Report on Ontario Power Generation's (OPG) proposed Deep Geologic Repository (DGR) for so-called "low" and "intermediate" level radioactive waste burial on the Lake Huron shore. Incredibly, despite decades of concerted grassroots opposition, and years of formal testimony and revelations to the contrary, the JRP has concluded the planned radioactive waste dump "is not likely to cause significant adverse environmental effects, taking into account the implementation of the mitigation measures committed to by OPG together with the mitigation measures recommended by the Panel."
In other words, "trust us, we're experts," and "if everything is done right, what could possibly go wrong?!". But we do not trust them. And since when do accidents or attacks unfold in a predictable, scripted manner? The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico is a good case study. WIPP was not supposed to leak radioactivity to the environment for 10,000, or even hundreds of thousands of years. But it did do so, in 2014, after just 15 years of operations. Tellingly, OPG's DGR is modelled after WIPP!
Beyond Nuclear, an official intervenor against the DGR in the JRP proceeding of the past few years, today issued a media statement.
The Toronto Star quoted Beyond Nuclear's Radioactive Waste Watchdog, Kevin Kamps, in response to the JRP report:
...“In our opinion, there are still a lot of half-baked aspects to this proposal, so it’s very disconcerting that it’s this deep into the decision-making process,” he said.
Kamps raised several concerns, including the risk of transport accidents involving vehicles shipping materials to the DGR, and potential leaks from the crypt into the environment, including the Great Lakes.
“The drinking water supplies 40 million people in two countries, yes, and that’s going to continue on for generations into the future … these wastes are hazardous for hundreds of thousands of years, if not longer,” he said...
The article also quoted Beverly Fernandez of Stop the Great Lakes Nuclear Dump. Beverly Fernandez was also interviewed on a CBC program, rebutting OPG.
The Times Herald also reported on this story, quoting Ed McArdle of Sierra Club Southeast Michigan Group. Ed, as a resident of Melvindale, MI, downstream of the DGR, activated his State Senator, Hoon-Yung Hopgood, on this issue, which led to a unanimous, bipartisan resolution in the MI State Senate opposing the DGR in 2013. Numerous Republican and Democratic Michigan congressional and state legislators are also quoted in the article, all expressing continued resistance.
The Owen Sound Sun-Times reports that the chief of the Saugeen Ojibwe First Nation (SON), Vernon Roote, is withholding the requisite permission that OPG has acknolwedged is needed for the DGR to proceed. Blackburn News also reported on SON Chief Roote's determination to fight OPG legally, if it proceeds with the DGR without the SON's consent.
The Agenda reports "a decades-long fight" ahead, before the dump-site would be able to open for business.
The JRP submitted its Environmental Assessment Report to the Canadian federal Environment Minister, Leona Aglukkaq, early in the afternoon of May 6th. Environment Minister Aglukkaq then made it available to the public several hours later, in the early evening. Aglukkaq will now review the Report, and within the next 120 days, will make her recommendation to Prime Minister Harper's federal Cabinet, bypassing Parliament. At that point, the Prime Minister and his Cabinet could approve construction and operation of the DGR, despite widespread, and growing, opposition throughout the Great Lakes Basin.
This groundswell of resistance is reflected in the 154 resolutions from various levels of government, from all eight U.S. states on the Great Lakes, as well as Ontario. Altogether, as reported by Stop the Great Lakes Nuclear Dump (STGLND), these resolutions represent a total population of Great Lakes residents numbering 21 million (see STGLND's excellent map showing the extent of these resolutions!). That's more than half of the Americans, Canadians, and Native American First Nations members who rely on the Great Lakes for drinking water. (But we need to get resolutions from the other half of the 40 million people, in the eight U.S. states, two Canadian provinces, and large number of Native American First Nations who depend on the Great Lakes for drinking water. If your city, county, or state has not yet passed a resolution, contact Beyond Nuclear's Radioactive Waste Watchdog, Kevin Kamps, at (240) 462-3216 or kevin@beyondnuclear.org, to learn how you can help get this done!)
STGLND's own petition has garnered over 75,000 signatures. Please sign on if you haven't already, and spread the word!
In addition, resolutions opposing the DGR, and calling on President Obama to take action to block it, have been reintroduced in both houses of the U.S. Congress. See Canadian television network CTV's coverage of the reintroduction of these congressional resolutions last month (and CTV's U.S. Senate coverage here).
U.S. Rep. Kildee (D-MI) has taken the lead in the U.S. House with H. Res. 194, and has been joined by the following 19 co-sponsors: Benishek (R-MI); Bishop (R-MI); Conyers (D-MI); Dingell (D-MI); Dold (R-IL); Duckworth (D-IL); Duffy (R-WI); Fudge (D-OH); Gibson (R-NY); Higgins (D-NY); Joyce (R-OH); Kaptur (D-OH); Lawrence (D-MI); Levin (D-MI); Miller (R-MI); Moolenaar (R-MI); Renacci (R-OH); Schakowsky (D-IL); Slaughter (D-NY); and Trott (R-MI).
U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) has taken the lead in the U.S. Senate on S. Res. 134, and has been joined by the following four co-sponsors: Baldwin (D-WI); Durbin (D-IL); Kirk (R-IL); and Peters (D-MI).
The bipartisan co-sponsorship of these resolutions is a key factor bolstering their chance of gaining traction in both houses of Congress. But if opposition to this radioactive waste dump on the shore of the Great Lakes doesn't deserve bipartisan support, it's not clear what would!
If your Members of Congress are already co-sponsoring these resolutions, please contact their offices and thank them. You can be patched through to your two Senators and your Representative by calling the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121. Or look up your House Member and Senators for additional ways to contact their offices.
If your Congress Members have not yet co-sponsored these resolutions, please urge them to do so.
Please also contact President Obama, and urge him to block this threat to the drinking water supply of tens of millions of Americans, including in his own home town of Chicago! In the 1980s, the Canadian federal government requested the U.S. federal government to discontinue consideration of a radioactive waste dump near the border in New England, which could have impacted joint watersheds. It is time for the Canadian federal government to return the favor on the Great Lakes -- but the Obama administration has to make the request!
Various news media have recently reported on this issue, as the JRP's May 6, 2015 report publication deadline approached. These have included: WMUK radio (Kalamazoo, MI); "The Environment Report" on Michigan Radio; WZZM t.v. (MI); Niagara This Week (ON); the Associated Press; and CTV, as well as a three-part installment in the Toronto Star: "Drilling down for the Deep Geologic Repository"; "Is a Kincardine deep geological repository the solution for nuclear waste?"; "What nuclear waste would be stored in Kincardine?".
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The following transcript shows that the DGR issue is creating some buzz on the floor of the Ontario Provincial Parliament:
From Queen’s Park Today
Nuclear waste
NDP MPP [New Democratic Party Member of the Provincial Parliament] Peter Tabuns told Environment Minister Glenn Murray not to trust [federal] Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s environmental assessment on nuclear waste dumping off the shore of Lake Huron. Tabuns said Ontario cannot count on the federal government to do due diligence with environmental assessments.
He said it is ironic the provincial government is threatening Lake Huron with a nuclear waste dump at the same time as it is introducing legislation to protect the Great Lakes.
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The Associated Press, CBC News, CTV News (London, Ontario; see also the Detroit Free Press, the Detroit News, the Mining Journal, the (Port Huron, MI) Times Herald, the (northern Macomb and St. Clair Counties, MI) Voice, (Sarnia, Ontario) Observer, and FOX News (quoting Jim Riccio of Greenpeace) have reported on this story.
The Sarnia Observer also ran an article focused on the Saugeen Ojibwe Nation's current non-consent to the DGR proceeding.
As Ole Hendrickson has written at rabble.ca, the CNSC President, Michael Binder, told pro-DGR local leaders, at one of many secretive and likely illegal meetings, that he "would be at the ribbon-cutting ceremony" for the DGR. But, as Hendrickson concludes, "In the unlikely event that this hare-brained scheme goes ahead, the CNSC's Dr. Binder might find himself joined by a large crowd of angry people at the ribbon-cutting ceremony."
U.S. Rep. Kildee (D-MI), U.S. Rep. Candice Miller (R-MI), U.S. Sen. Stabenow (D-MI), and U.S. Sen. Peters (D-MI), have issued statements, blasting the JRP's recommendation.
Michigan State Senator Pavlov (R) called the JRP's decision "a staggering mistake." Pavlov traveled to Kincardine, ON to testify against the DGR, before the JRP, in person.
Michigan State Representative Roberts (D) and Michigan State Senator Hopgood (D) likewise condemned the decision. Roberts and Hopgood launched Michigan State Legislature action against the DGR years ago, resulting in a unanimous, bipartisan State Senate resolution introduced by Sen. Hopgood. Roberts and Hopgood also testified in person before the JRP at hearngs held in Kincardine, ON.