Author: CREDNB

Nuclear power is dirty and dangerous now and for many generations to come.

Read or download 11 Reasons Why Nuclear Power Has No Future – with links to references and supporting materials.

The Government of New Brunswick just posted online the EIA registration document for the ARC-100 SMR that NB Power proposes to develop at the Point Lepreau nuclear site on the Bay of Fundy. The full document pdf, 297 pages, is HERE.

Some background:

The ARC-100 project is currently exempt from the Impact Assessment Act, so it will not require a federal review. There is currently an outstanding request filed March 31 to Minister Guilbeault from the Sierra Club Canada, We the Nuclear Free North, Protect Our Waterways and CRED-NB. We asked the Minister to designate the project for an Impact Assessment. We are awaiting the response, which is way overdue, from the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada. This was our second attempt for an IA designation. More info HERE.

Without the federal IA, we’re stuck with the NB provincial EIA and CNSC review, which will not cover all the activities within the lifespan of the project, from development through to decommissioning, including project impacts that are direct or incidental to the project. We know that the federal IA is itself inadequate but it would at least give many of us with concerns about the project to bring all our concerns to the public.

This commentary was published by The Hill Times and the NB Media Co-op.

Wishful thinking about nuclear energy won’t get us to net zero

M. V. Ramana and Susan O’Donnell

On June 20, the Canada Energy Regulator (CER) released its 2023 Canada’s Energy Future report, developing scenarios for a path to net zero by 2050. These scenarios project roughly a tripling of nuclear energy generation capacity in Canada by 2050, seemingly reinforcing former Natural Resources Minister Seamus O’Regan’s statement in 2020 that there is “no path to net-zero without nuclear.”

However, underlying both the scenarios and O’Regan’s contention is wishful thinking about the economics of nuclear energy and how fast nuclear power can be scaled up.

The new nuclear capacity that the report envisions consists of so-called small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs), which have so far not been built in Canada. Aside from refurbishing existing CANDU reactors, the CER does not think any more standard sized nuclear reactors will be built in Canada. Most of this buildup is to happen between 2035 and 2050, meaning that nuclear power will not help meet the government’s stated goal of decarbonizing the electricity grid by 2035.

But can SMRs be built rapidly after 2035? Only two crown companies in the business of generating electricity for the grid have proposed to build SMRs: NB Power in New Brunswick and Ontario Power Generation (OPG).

The reactor designs proposed for New Brunswick are cooled by molten salts and liquid sodium metal. Despite decades of development work and billions invested, major technical challenges have prevented molten salt reactors and sodium cooled reactors from commercial viability, making it highly unlikely that the New Brunswick designs can be rapidly deployed in the time frame envisioned by the CER.

Assuming that OPG’s chosen design – the 300-megawatt BWRX-300 – is the one to be deployed widely, then around 70 SMR units would need to be built and operating effectively on the grid between 2030 and 2050. The BWRX-300 design is yet to be even approved by any safety regulator anywhere in the world.

But the report has an even more serious problem: economics. Nuclear power cannot compete economically, which is why its share of global electricity generation has declined from 17.5 percent in 1996 to 9.8 percent in 2021. Because SMRs lose out on economies of scale, they will produce even more expensive electricity.

The CER’s scenarios for nuclear power are based on the Electricity Supply Model, meant to calculate “the most efficient and cost-effective way to meet electricity demand in each region.” Such models are widely used in energy analysis and policy making but their utility depends on the validity of the assumptions used; garbage in, garbage out.

Two key parameters underlie the report’s scenarios—the capital cost of an SMR and how that cost evolves with time. The CER’s assumptions in the two Net Zero scenarios are that a SMR costs $9,262 per kilowatt in 2020, falling to $8,348/kW by 2030, and to $6,519/kW by 2050. Both these assumptions are ridiculously out of touch with the real world.

Consider the CAREM-25 SMR designed to feed 25 megawatts of electricity into the grid, being built in Argentina since 2014. Its original cost estimate of $446 million (2014 US dollars), has escalated significantly since then, but even using these original costs, the project costs nearly $30,000 per kilowatt in 2022 Canadian dollars.

The NuScale design, arguably the closest to deployment in the United States, has been in development since 2007 with the build not yet begun. The January 2023 cost estimate for six NuScale SMRs with a total capacity of 462 megawatts is $9.3 billion, or over $26,000 per kilowatt in Canadian dollars.

Finally, the cost of the 5-megawatt Micro Modular Reactor Project at Chalk River in Ontario was estimated by the proponent in May 2020 to be between $100 and $200 million. In 2022 Canadian dollars, that works out to $22,000 to $44,000 per kilowatt.

In other words, the CER’s cost assumptions are wild underestimates, 2.5 to four times lower than the current evidence.

The second incorrect assumption is that costs will decrease with time. Both in the United States and France, the countries with the highest number of nuclear plants, the trend was the opposite: costs went up, not down, as more reactors were built. In both countries, the estimated construction cost of the most recent reactors being built—Vogtle in the United States, and Flamanville-3 in France—have broken new records.

We need government organizations to do better. The climate problem is too serious for such unrealistic modelling exercises. Wishful thinking will only thwart our ability to act meaningfully to lower emissions rapidly.

M.V. Ramana is the Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security and professor at the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, University of British Columbia. Susan O’Donnell is adjunct research professor and primary investigator of the CEDAR project at St. Thomas University in Fredericton.

SMR Education Task Force

For immediate release

June 22, 2023

Version française ici

Nuclear-based fantasies are holding back real climate action

Today a network of groups across Canada announces the launch of the SMR Education Task Force to share under-reported facts about small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs) with members of Parliament and provincial legislatures.

We begin with the latest report from Canada Energy Regulator (CER). This federal document, called Canada’s Energy Future, projects that enough new nuclear reactors (SMRs) will be operational by 2050 to more than double Canada’s existing nuclear electricity generation.

Canada currently has 19 operating power reactors, built over 58 years. The new report claims that we will build more than 50 new reactors in much less time.

This fantasy has no basis in reality. It is inconsistent with independent analyses by energy researchers not tied to the nuclear industry. One such study in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists makes it clear that SMRs have at best a marginal role to play in a truly effective climate action plan. SMRs fail the tests of timeliness and affordability – they take too long and cost too much.

In addition to Ontario and Alberta, the CER report imagines deploying SMRs in Quebec and British Columbia. This is news to citizens in those provinces. BC ratepayers have rejected nuclear power in the past, and Quebec phased out of nuclear power in 2012. With every reactor comes long-lived radioactive waste — including the structure itself, which is a provincial responsibility to safeguard for thousands of years after shutdown.

Yesterday, the Coalition for Responsible Energy Development in New Brunswick (CRED-NB) sent a letter to Canada’s Natural Resources Minister reminding him that more than 120 civil society, public interest, faith-based and Indigenous groups across Canada have signed a statement warning that SMRs are a dirty, dangerous distraction from urgent climate action.

These groups understand that responding to the climate emergency does not require gambling on untested nuclear reactors. They know that energy efficiency measures and renewable sources cost at least 3 to 7 times less than nuclear power per tonne of carbon emissions avoided.

The groups oppose using public funds earmarked for climate action to support the nuclear industry’s eager experimentation with novel reactor designs. We are challenging the government to release the research and data that support its nuclear-based strategy.

Nuclear promoters, with long-standing allies embedded in the federal and provincial governments, are making unsubstantiated promises about SMRs in an audacious attempt to grab as much public funding as possible to keep their dying industry alive.

Worldwide, nuclear’s share of global electricity has dropped over the last 25 years from 17% to less than 10%. The International Energy Agency forecasts that more than 90% of all new electricity installations worldwide over the next 5 years will be non-hydro renewables.

The industry’s money-grab will succeed only if our public representatives remain uninformed about the facts. That is why we are pleased to announce the SMR Education Task Force and look forward in the months ahead to share information about SMRs based on independent science and research.

-30-

For more information:

Gordon Edwards, PhD, President
Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility
ccnr@web.ca
514-839-7214

Susan O’Donnell, PhD, Spokesperson
Coalition for Responsible Energy Development in New Brunswick
info@crednb.ca
506-261-1727

Note: On June 29, The NB Media Co-op published a story and video about this event, HERE.

The Climate Justice Coalition (Moncton) and Extinction Rebellion NB are collaborating with 350.org to organize a Moncton rally for the national day of emergency action:

Wednesday, June 28, 12:00 PM
Outside the office of MP Ginette Petitpas Taylor
272 St-George Street
Moncton, New Brunswick

Please join the rally to to demand that the federal government stop fueling climate chaos!

In recent weeks, major wildfires swept through nearly every Canadian province and territory. These fires have scorched a record-breaking area of land — over 5 million hectares. And it’s only June. This month global surface air temperatures rose to 1.5 C above pre-industrial levels for the first time. To meet the Paris Agreement’s goal of maintaining livable conditions, increases in global surface air temperature to the 1.5 C level will need to be limited to a brief period.

Unfortunately, we are entering an El Niño period, which is expected to warm 2024 to a higher level than 2023. Furthermore, the El Niño phase could last years.

However, if dramatic emission reductions start immediately the world can keep within 1.5 degrees. But instead, the government has just handed over another 3 billion in tax-payer money to fossil fuels knowing that investing in new fossil fuel infrastructure is now considered “moral and economic madness” by scientists and experts the world over. In Trudeau’s own words, “Canada is burning” but his government is still failing to do even the bare minimum when it comes to climate action.

Communities across Canada are rising up to demand an immediate end to fossil fuel subsidies and a just transition to 100% renewable energy. Please join us to demand:

1. Stop the fossil fuel industry: no more subsidies, no new projects, and no more industry influence over our politics.
2. Enact a Just Transition: urgently shift us to 100% renewables while
generating millions of unionized jobs, following Indigenous leadership, and aligning with climate science.

As we face unprecedented impacts from climate change, it’s up to us to hold politicians responsible and force them to change course.

On June 28th, while catastrophic fires rage and smoke blankets much of the continent, Moncton will bring the heat to MP Petitpas Taylor to demand that the Federal Government stops fueling climate chaos. Join us at MP Petitpas Taylor’s office to demand action to end fossil fuel subsidies and implement a just transition. Together, we can bring the intensity of the climate crisis to the government’s doorstep. Bring face masks, signs, and friends as we push our representatives to muster up the courage to combat the climate crisis.

le français suit

OTTAWA, April 25, 2023—Green Party leader Elizabeth May, Liberal MP Jenica Atwin, Bloc Québécois MP Mario Simard and NDP MP Alexandre Boulerice joined with representatives from civil society today to express serious concerns about an expansion of nuclear energy and the development of small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs).

In a non-partisan press conference at the National Press Theatre, the four Parliamentarians called for Ottawa to hit the pause button on federal funding to develop experimental SMRs until Parliament and independent scientific experts have critically reviewed these plans.

Civil society representatives said that SMRs are not a cost-effective or smart climate option. New nuclear is already far more expensive than proven renewable energy sources like wind and solar, and there is no guarantee these nuclear experiments will ever generate electricity safely and affordably. While waiting to find out if SMR designs will work, Canada is wasting time that must be spent urgently on genuine climate action.

“The nuclear industry, led by US and UK corporations and start-ups, has been lobbying and advertising heavily in Canada to convince us that new, smaller reactor designs will somehow address the climate crisis and overcome the exorbitant cost, toxic radioactive waste and nuclear accidents that have plagued the nuclear industry for decades,” said Dr. Susan O’Donnell, a professor and spokesperson for the Coalition for Responsible Energy Development in New Brunswick.

“In New Brunswick, Ontario, Saskatchewan and Alberta, communities are concerned about the push to develop SMRs that could be abandoned in place, ultimately transforming their communities into radioactively contaminated sites and nuclear waste dumps,” O’Donnell added.

Ginette Charbonneau, a physicist from the Ralliement contre la pollution radioactive in Quebec, said that civil society groups are calling on Canada to halt plans to extract plutonium from irradiated nuclear fuel. She added that non-proliferation experts warn that Canada’s support for this risky technology undermines efforts to prevent more countries from developing nuclear weapons.

“This idea is being sold as ‘recycling’, but in fact it will make plutonium more available while creating even more problematic radioactive waste streams that will need to be kept out of the environment for millions of years,” said Charbonneau.

Civil society groups are calling for the government to ban plutonium reprocessing and to stop funding SMRs. They say Parliamentary and independent oversight is needed, including full federal impact assessments for all experimental new reactors.

Billed as Not-The-Nuclear-Lobby Week, these groups will be meeting in Ottawa with MPs, think-tanks and NGOs and holding public events to tell the other side of the nuclear energy story – the problems and risks that industry lobbyists will not speak about.

Since the SMR Roadmap was published in 2018, the Canadian government has thrown its support behind SMRs and related initiatives through:

● nearly $100 million in grants to nuclear companies from the US and UK to develop their nuclear experiments in Canada with no evidence of prior independent scientific review

● a $970 million low-interest loan to Ontario Power Generation to develop an American reactor design

● exempting most SMRs from the Impact Assessment Act, thereby severely limiting input from Indigenous communities and civil society

● supporting experimental processes for plutonium extraction from nuclear waste stored at the Bay of Fundy

● a billion-dollar-per-year contract to SNC-Lavalin and two US corporations to run Chalk River Laboratories and other federal nuclear facilities with virtually no oversight and free rein to conduct nuclear waste and SMR experiments.

Not-The-Nuclear-Lobby Week is organized by groups including the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, Sierra Club Canada Foundation, Coalition for Responsible Energy Development in New Brunswick, Northwatch, Ontario Clean Air Alliance, Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County and Area, Inter-Church Uranium Committee Educational Co-operative, Coalition for a Clean Green Saskatchewan, Concerned Citizens of Manitoba and the Ralliement contre la pollution radioactive.

The week will continue with a debate this evening at the University of Ottawa, where Dr. Gordon Edwards, President of the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility and an expert on nuclear issues for almost 50 years, will face off against Dr. Chris Keefer, President of Canadians for Nuclear Energy, on the topic: Do We Need to Scale up Nuclear Power to Combat Climate Change?

QUOTES

“Claims that Canada needs new nuclear to avoid climate breakdown are simply false. The so-called ‘Small Modular Reactors’ are untested, hugely expensive and run the risk of increasing nuclear weapons proliferation. The truth is that the massive lobbying power of SNC-Lavalin that tried to avoid the legal case of bribery and corruption in Libya is at work to grease the wheels on SNC-Lavalin’s nuclear enterprises.”
– Elizabeth May, Leader of Green Party of Canada, MP for Saanich-Gulf Islands

“It is an aberration to consider small modular reactors as a clean energy source to decarbonize the economy. These reactors are not cost-effective, and the price of their development is significantly higher than that of renewable energies. Power from small reactors would cost almost 10 times more than solar and wind. Knowing that in its 2023 budget the government provides $36.8 billion over 10 years for the energy sector, we can only be worried! The government must step back from the nuclear chimera and focus its efforts on real green projects.”
– Mario Simard, MP for Jonquière (Bloc Québécois)

“To ensure a sustainable future, I believe that we must focus on improving our energy efficiency while investing in technologies that are operational today. Radioactive waste management is an unsolved concern, and the risks are ultimately unmanageable. The industry is projecting a mirage that they are indispensable while in fact, it is a distraction to effective, safe, and long-term solutions.”
– Jenica Atwin, MP for Fredericton (Liberal)

“Nuclear energy is not a ‘miracle’ solution to the climate crisis. There are cleaner and less expensive forms of energy, and the government must invest in those. Eliminating greenhouse gases should not come at the expense of the environment by creating waste that’s even more dangerous.”
– Alexandre Boulerice, MP for Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie – NDP

“Small modular reactors are a dirty, dangerous distraction from fighting climate change, not a solution to it. We must stop chasing nuclear pipe dreams and stick to affordable, fast and proven technologies.”
– Dr. Gordon Edwards, President, Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility

– 30 –

Des groupes de la société civile et des députés rejettent le battage médiatique de l’industrie concernant un avenir nucléaire « radieux » au Canada

OTTAWA, le 25 avril 2023 — La chef du Parti vert, Elizabeth May, la députée libérale Jenica Atwin, le député du Bloc Québécois Mario Simard et le député néo-démocrate Alexandre Boulerice se joignent aujourd’hui à des représentants de la société civile pour exprimer leurs graves préoccupations au sujet de l’expansion de l’énergie nucléaire et du développement de petits réacteurs nucléaires modulaires (PRM).

Lors d’une conférence de presse non partisane à l’Amphithéâtre national de la presse, les quatre parlementaires demandent à Ottawa de faire une pause dans le financement fédéral pour développer des PRM expérimentaux jusqu’à ce que le Parlement et des experts scientifiques indépendants aient examiné ces plans de manière critique.

Des représentants de la société civile affirment que les PRM ne s’avèrent pas une option climatique rentable et intelligente. Le nouveau nucléaire est déjà beaucoup plus coûteux que les sources d’énergie renouvelables éprouvées comme l’éolien et le solaire, et il n’y a aucune garantie que ces expériences nucléaires produiront de l’électricité en toute sécurité et à un prix abordable. En attendant de savoir si la conception des PRM sera réussie, le Canada perd du temps qui devrait être consacré de toute urgence à une véritable action climatique.

« L’industrie nucléaire, dirigée par des sociétés et des entreprises américaines et britanniques en démarrage, exerce des pressions et fait de la publicité au Canada pour nous convaincre que les nouvelles conceptions de plus petits réacteurs résoudront d’une manière ou d’une autre la crise climatique et surmonteront les problèmes de coût exorbitant, de déchets radioactifs toxiques et d’accidents nucléaires qui affligent l’industrie nucléaire depuis des décennies », a déclaré Susan O’Donnell (Ph. D.), professeur et porte-parole de la Coalition pour un développement énergétique responsable au Nouveau-Brunswick.

« Au Nouveau-Brunswick, en Ontario, en Saskatchewan et en Alberta, les collectivités sont préoccupées par la pression exercée pour développer des réacteurs nucléaires qui pourraient éventuellement être abandonnés sur place, les transformant en sites contaminés par la radioactivité et en dépotoirs de déchets radioactifs », a ajouté Mme O’Donnell.

Ginette Charbonneau, physicienne qui est membre du Ralliement contre la pollution radioactive au Québec, a déclaré que des groupes de la société civile au Canada réclament de cesser les plans d’extraction du plutonium à partir du combustible nucléaire irradié. Elle ajoute que des experts en non-prolifération croient que le soutien du Canada à cette technologie risquée pourrait miner les efforts pour empêcher d’autres pays de développer des armes nucléaires.

« Cette idée est vendue comme étant un « recyclage » des déchets radioactifs, mais en pratique elle créera plus de plutonium et de nouveaux flux de déchets radioactifs extrêmement problématiques qui devront être tenus à l’écart de l’environnement pendant des millions d’années », a déclaré Mme Charbonneau.

Des groupes de la société civile demandent au gouvernement d’interdire le retraitement du plutonium et de cesser de financer les PRM. Ils disent qu’une surveillance parlementaire et indépendante accrue est nécessaire, y compris des évaluations d’impact fédérales complètes pour tous les nouveaux réacteurs expérimentaux.

Annoncée comme la Semaine « Non pas encore le lobby nucléaire! », ces groupes rencontreront à Ottawa des députés, des groupes de réflexion et des ONG et ils tiendront des événements publics pour divulguer l’autre facette de l’histoire de l’énergie nucléaire – notamment les problèmes et les risques dont les lobbyistes de l’industrie ne parlent pas.

Depuis la publication de la « Feuille de route des PRM » en 2018, le gouvernement canadien a apporté son soutien aux PRM et à des initiatives connexes par les moyens suivants :

• environ 100 millions de dollars en subventions à des entreprises nucléaires des États-Unis et du Royaume-Uni pour développer leurs expériences nucléaires au Canada sans preuve indépendante d’un examen scientifique préalable

• un prêt à faible taux d’intérêt de 970 millions de dollars à Ontario Power Generation pour développer la conception d’un réacteur américain

• exemption de la plupart des PRM de l’application de la Loi sur l’évaluation d’impact, limitant ainsi considérablement la surveillance par les communautés des Premières Nations et de la société civile

• soutien des procédés expérimentaux d’extraction du plutonium à partir des déchets radioactifs stockés dans la baie de Fundy

• un contrat d’un milliard de dollars par année à SNC-Lavalin et à deux sociétés américaines pour exploiter les Laboratoires de Chalk River et d’autres installations fédérales (avec pratiquement carte blanche pour mener des expériences sur les déchets radioactifs et les PRM)

La Semaine « Non pas encore le lobby nucléaire! » est organisée par des groupes tels que le Regroupement pour la surveillance du nucléaire, la Fondation Sierra Club Canada, la Coalition pour un développement énergétique responsable au Nouveau-Brunswick, Northwatch, Ontario Clean Air Alliance, Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County and Area, l’Inter-Church Uranium Committee Educational Co-operative, la Coalition for a Clean Green Saskatchewan, Concerned Citizens of Manitoba et le Ralliement contre la pollution radioactive.

La semaine se poursuivra avec un débat le soir du 25 avril à l’Université d’Ottawa où Gordon Edwards, président du Regroupement pour la surveillance du nucléaire et expert des questions nucléaires depuis près de 50 ans, affrontera Chris Keefer, président de l’association Canadiens pour l’énergie nucléaire, sur le thème : Faut-il développer l’énergie nucléaire pour lutter contre le changement climatique?

CITATIONS

« Les prétentions selon lesquelles le Canada a besoin de nouveaux projets nucléaires pour contrer la dégradation du climat sont simplement fausses. Les soi-disant « petits réacteurs modulaires » ne sont pas éprouvés; ils sont extrêmement coûteux et suscitent des risques accrus de prolifération des armes nucléaires. En vérité, l’énorme pouvoir de lobbyisme de SNC-Lavalin (qui a tenté d’éviter un procès de pots-de-vin et de corruption en Libye) est à l’œuvre pour enrichir grassement ses entreprises nucléaires. »
– Elizabeth May, chef du Parti vert du Canada et députée de Saanich-Gulf Islands

« C’est une aberration de considérer les petits réacteurs modulaires comme une source d’énergie propre permettant de décarboner l’économie. Ces réacteurs ne sont pas rentables et le prix de leur développement est nettement supérieur à celui des énergies renouvelables. L’énergie des petits réacteurs coûterait presque 10 fois plus cher que le solaire et l’éolien. Sachant que dans son budget de 2023 le gouvernement prévoit 36,8 milliards sur 10 ans pour la filière énergétique, on ne peut qu’être inquiet! Le gouvernement doit se retirer de la chimère nucléaire et concentrer ses efforts sur de vrais projets verts. »
– Mario Simard, député de Jonquière (Bloc Québécois)

« Pour assurer un avenir durable, j’estime que nous devons nous concentrer sur l’amélioration de notre efficacité énergétique tout en investissant dans des technologies qui sont actuellement opérationnelles. La gestion des déchets radioactifs est un problème non résolu et les risques sont ultimement ingérables. L’industrie projette le mirage qu’elle est indispensable alors qu’en fait, elle détourne l’attention qui devrait être portée à des solutions efficaces, sûres et à long terme. »
– Jenica Atwin, députée de Fredericton (Parti libéral)

« L’énergie nucléaire ne peut pas être la solution miracle à la crise climatique. Il existe des énergies plus propres et moins coûteuses, c’est dans celles-ci que le gouvernement doit investir. L’élimination des gaz à effet de serre ne doit pas se faire au détriment de l’environnement en créant des déchets encore plus dangereux. »
– Alexandre Boulerice, député de Rosemont-La Petite-Patrie – NPD

« Les petits réacteurs modulaires sont une distraction sale et dangereuse de la lutte contre le changement climatique, et non pas une solution. Nous devons cesser de poursuivre des chimères nucléaires et continuer avec des technologies éprouvées déjà disponibles et abordables. »
– Gordon Edwards, président du Regroupement pour la surveillance du nucléaire.