Government suppressing dissent on nuclear energy

Government suppressing dissent on nuclear energy

Postby Oscar » Mon Nov 02, 2020 8:29 pm

Government suppressing dissent on nuclear energy

[ http://www.ccnr.org/Hill_Times_2020-11-02.pdf ]

Samuel Arnold & Susan O’Donnell, Opinion, The Hill Times, November 2, 2020, page 17

Seamus O’Regan has claimed, without evidence, that nuclear energy is necessary to reach net-zero emissions targets. He should present to the public his plan to reach net-zero emissions with SMRs.

FREDERICTON—Innovation Minister Navdeep Bains and Natural Resources Minister Seamus O’Regan recently announced a $20-million grant for an Ontario company to develop a prototype “small modular nuclear reactor” (SMR). The move aligns with NRCan’s SMR Action Plan scheduled to be published in November. During the announcement, O’Regan stated that SMRs “have the potential to play a critical role in fighting climate change.”

Within days of the announcement, more than 20 public interest groups across Canada issued a media release with a dissenting view: SMRs are “dirty, dangerous distractions” from tackling the climate crisis. Greenpeace Canada, the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment, Canadian Environmental Law Association, Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, Environmental Defence, Mining Watch Canada, Friends of the Earth, and the Sierra Club Canada Foundation, among others, charged that “the federal government is trying to save the nuclear industry rather than saving the environment and protecting health.”

The government seems unable to engage with political dissent. The SMR action plan includes civil society engagement but the department has blocked groups from registering their concerns unless they first agree “to support the development and deployment of various SMR technologies in Canada.” Any group opposed to SMRs cannot participate honestly in the action plan process.

Groups opposed to SMR development have been trying unsuccessfully for many months to meet with O’Regan. On the other hand, a search of the lobbyist registry shows that the Canadian Nuclear Association, the main lobbyist for the nuclear industry, met with senior officials in Natural Resources Canada an average of once a month this year, including CEO John Gorman’s meeting with O’Regan on Feb. 27 about “energy, climate.”

Anyone opposed to the proposed SMRs will also be unable to record their concerns in the public record of an environmental impact assessment (EIA). When available, the EIA mechanism allows public input on a proposed project with potential health, social, and economic effects related to the environment.

However, the new Impact Assessment Act (IAA), passed by the Trudeau government as part of Bill C-69 in June 2019, exempts SMRs below a certain thermal capacity or sited near an existing nuclear power reactor. This provision means that the two SMRs proposed to be built in New Brunswick next to the Lepreau reactor on the Bay of Fundy, one of the world’s richest marine ecosystems, will not be required to undergo an environmental assessment.

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Oscar
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