Canada may be a leader in uranium etc. production but nuclear energy will not (as most people believe and even some eco-heads suggest) play a significant part of the solution to climate change, and the simple reasons are that:

first – the supply will run out before the global demand will
second – its just too damn expensive (proven by just about every single nuclear project that has ever taken place)
third – it doesn’t address the problem! it just creates a different one, I’m sorry but I have a huge problem with the fact that the largest nuclear facility in Canada is within kilometers of the largest city in Canada…t.o.

Agreed lets deal with facts. But that works both ways.
So don’t take issue with “misinformation” in May’s blog and at the same time condone the misinformation and deception by some in the nuclear industry.

The Ontario government is now looking at off-shore wind in the great lakes.

Wind farm efficiencies will double.
The government won’t be having to subsidize wind farms with tax payer dollars.
Electricity prices won’t go thru the roof. Our factories won’t have to move to China.
We will be burning half the natural gas to back up the on-shore wind farms.

Based on: External Costs-Research results on socio-environmental damages due to electricity and transport – EUROPEAN COMMISSION 2003
http://www.externe.info/externpr.pdf

…a number cracking exercise says that the environmental costs off-shore wind backed-up by gas are lower than the environmental costs of nuclear units backed up with gas or US coal power when the nuclear units are out of service.

Someone else can now crack the financial cost numbers for wind/gas vs. nuclear/gas-coal.

Our Green friends may well be onto something.

However, too bad Ontario Greens don’t have consideration for families being made sick on account of noise pollution from wind farms. You don’t shut down nuclear by driving families from their homes.

But offshore wind would solve that problem too.
And no more 18 year covered-up tritium leaks.

As I previously mentioned, you are obviously an opponent to nuclear energy – hence your willingness to bring in all sorts of issues dating back many, many years. I think it makes your view of recent events very biased.

I was dealing with the issue at hand, and the misinformation put forward in the E May e-mail/blog. We’d all be better off if we dealt with facts.

That is why I endorsed an inquiry into this whole affair – there are longstanding problems in many areas. However, I will not prejudge the outcome or apportion blame until we know the whole story.

I’ll leave that to others. But I do know spin and misinformation when I see it.

No supporter of the nuke industry can condone the performance of old Ontario Hydro and AECL today. You’re not helping the industry if you do. Don’t blame it on lack of funding.

Nuclear has been mismanaged in Ontario. The France’s EDF didn’t have to sell off reactors at 10 cents on the $dollar. The OH debacle has cost Ontario $13 billion. That is not chump change. Then there were the secret back door dealings getting OH ready for privatization. One would think that Ontario is some 3rd world banana republic that has been targeted by corporate robbers. The NDP, Liberals and Conservatives are all complicit.

Does this AECL affair not demonstrate the need to change the way the major parties carry on and how government performs? I said up front the public have been cheated by OPG over the nuclear waste dump that is being proposed along the shores of Lake Huron. If you support the industry you can not condone this behaviour.

I may not agree with the Greens on energy policy. I do welcome the Greens furthering the discussion especially if it strengthens the democratic process. That is my overriding concern. So if I am forced to make a choice on account of intransigence by the nuke industry, it will be an easy choice to make.

I know you want to debate nuclear energy, and obviously are against it, hence your references, twice, to “dinosaurs”. But, let’s deal with the real issues – how to strengthen AECL and the CNSC.

So, let’s be honest first. No matter how you may feel, nuclear energy will coninue to be a big part of Canada’s energy mix. Both the recently re-elected McGuinty gov’t in Ontario as well as the PC opposition are pro-nuke (the latter even more so). New Brunswick is looking to expand their nuclear program, and there is a good chance Alberta will go this way as well.

Now, as far as Alberta is concerned, it is not, as Elizabeth May improperly claims (once again) “to speed up exploitation of the tar sands….” It is to reduce GHG’s and offer an economic alternative to the other options (gas and coal). In fact, if you tied your oilsands (or tar sands) development to a nuclear plant, you would in fact delay development of your plant as the development cycle of a nuke is much longer than an oilsands plant.

Now, for years and years, anti-nuke NGOs (led btw by E May at the Sierra Club) have complained about the “subsidies” paid to AECL by the Feds. They have prepared, through CNP, very questionable economic analysis, by an anti-nuke activis,t pointing out the “subsidies” since 1952 (without of course including the economic benefits – heck that would provide a balanced picture). And the anti-nuke NGOs have employed the “spin and echo chamber” techniques to get the message out amongst the less knowledgeable and the anti-nuke activists.

They have also used this to pressure various governments to stop funding AECL (as head of Sierra and recently as head of the GPC Ms. May has referred to both Jean Chretien and Gary Lunn respectively as “whores” for promoting CANDU reactors in Canada and around the world).

So, when Paul Martin ( a good friend of E May) was undertaking his austerity programs in the 90′s, it was not politically difficult to cut funding to AECL.

Today’s problems, as the TorStar article point out, is due to a chronic case of underfunding to AECL over the past many years – which, in my opinion, can be attributed to a great degree to the anti-nuke movement. When you don’t have the funding, you defer maintenace, morale drops etc. and the industry does not attract the qualified individuals it needs for renewal.

To me it’s like the NASA space program. In the early 70′s they went to the moon. Today, there is talk about returning maybe by 2020 – the key knowledge and expertise no longer resides there.

Despite all of the witch hunting and finger pointing that the GPC and other anti-nukes want to undertake (and IMO an investigation would be a good thing to identify the problems) , the question should boil down to this:

Either properly fund AECL, or privatize it (I’m for the latter). Don’t continue to own it and underfund it.

There are many alternatives to the CANDU reactor, and while the focus of late by the anti-nukes has been AECL, there’s a good chance its competitors will be soon building their versions in Canada.

(P.S. go read Hansard, Dec 11th debates to get a full appreciation of the real issues over the shutdown – not the fairy tale E May version)

***As well, top AECL management was repeatedly hauled on the carpet before the Nuclear Safety Commission and its predecessor, the Atomic Energy Control Board, to explain poor operating practices at the Universal reactor, including foot-dragging on implementing safety upgrades ordered by the federal regulator.

In June 2005, staff at the safety commission said in a written report that the AECL staff running the aging Universal reactor were prone to “overconfidence,” “complacency” and “deficiencies in management oversight and safety culture.”******

Tell us Dot…was that reference to the Maple or the NRU?

And while were at it….let’s break some more ground…..

A few years back AECL was caught dumping radioactive waste in ditches at Chalk River. AECL downplays dumping. It was only low level waste after all. A CNSC investigation concludes that waste dumping hadn’t created a public health or safety hazard. Meanwhile the dumping had been going on for years and CNSC had lost track of the problem for the last seven years because of staff turnover and poor record keeping.

Good little worker do-bees don’t break the rules intentionally. The comand structure goes to the very top. There are supervisors and mangers with iron rings in the chain of command.

How many more investigations will it take to ferret the dinosaurs out? It’s time for the opposition parties to call for a full blown inquiry into this sordid affair?

And by the way. I’m not an anti-nuke.

Take the Toronto Star article he selectively quotes from. What words proceed the first *******? These ones:

Yet in a nearby building two new custom-built MAPLE reactors, designed specifically for isotope production, sit idle eight years after they were supposed to replace the 50-year-old, multipurpose National Research Universal reactor.

The blunders include:

How convenient. The article is talking about the Maple reactors, NOT the Chalk River reactor that was the subject of the controversial shut-down.

Typical misrepresentations, or just plain ignorance.

Today’s TO Star:

*********An unproven and overly intricate design that strained the competence of AECL engineers and scientists.
Shoddy workmanship and lax quality control, which meant grit particles stopped two sets of safety control rods from shutting down the reactors.

An unexplained miscalculation about changes in reactivity – the reactor’s oomph – on which the entire safety scenario is based.
In the view of most nuclear experts and informed observers, these AECL failures are the real cause of last month’s crisis in isotope production that culminated this week in the Harper government’s unprecedented firing of Linda Keen.

As well, top AECL management was repeatedly hauled on the carpet before the Nuclear Safety Commission and its predecessor, the Atomic Energy Control Board, to explain poor operating practices at the Universal reactor, including foot-dragging on implementing safety upgrades ordered by the federal regulator.

In June 2005, staff at the safety commission said in a written report that the AECL staff running the aging Universal reactor were prone to “overconfidence,” “complacency” and “deficiencies in management oversight and safety culture.”**********
http://www.thestar.com/sciencetech/article/295589

Per previous post-it’s 10 years later-SSDD. Time for the dinosaurs to move along.