Two hundred people gather at Hope Fellowship Church in Southern Ontario Monday to discuss how to rebuild Lake Ontario's largest nuclear power plant. The team at Lake Ontario Waterkeeper have compiled this list of all the things you need to know about the Darlington nuclear refurbishment:
1. Federal regulators are reviewing how the nuclear plant will be rebuilt, but no regulator has ever reviewed if Darlington should be rebuilt.
The licencing hearing puts the proverbial cart before the horse. It's not clear that Ontario should include nuclear power in its future energy strategy. Energy demand is plummeting in Ontario, reports the National Post. There are more affordable, flexible alternatives to nuclear power, energy experts tell the Toronto Star. Energy imports could eliminate Ontario's reliance on nuclear energy, Conservative Opposition Leader Tim Hudak told Windsor-area residents just last week.
"There is no evidence that refurbishing Darlington nuclear is the right choice for Ontario," says Waterkeeper Mark Mattson. "Unfortunately, no one is willing to talk about whether Ontarians really need this project. So on Monday, it is Waterkeeper's job to show up and remind people that the Darlington nuclear plant kills fish. It wastes water. And it doesn't have to be this way."
2. Rebuilding Darlington costs money. Between $6- and $10-billion.
The Ontario Minister of Energy estimates the cost to refurbish the Darlington nuclear plant will cost between $6-10 billion. There is no plan to deal with cost overruns, because OPG is "confident" they will not occur. Financial services company Standard and Poor disagrees. S&P revised its outlook on OPG to "negative" this week, citing amongst other factors the risk of cost overruns at Darlington.
3. Darlington nuclear power plant kills fish. Lots of them.
Internationally-recognized authorities on nuclear power plants agree that the out-dated technology included in the rebuild design is the most environmentally destructive technology on the market. Its impacts include:
4. Darlington nuclear wastes water. Lots of it.
The Darlington nuclear power plant sucks in enormous amounts of water, 24-hours a day, seven days a week. In fact, the plant sucks up enough water to drain an Olympic-sized swimming pool in 15 seconds. The water flows through the plant once and is then dumped, at a higher temperature, back out into Lake Ontario.
5. The federal government agrees that it is possible to save fish and water. They just don't believe it is important enough.
CNSC and Department of Fisheries and Oceans say they agree that using newer, readily-available cooling water technology to "close the loop" of water flowing in and out of the plant would save fish and save water. They just don't think it is important now and, if it ever becomes important in the future, they will "adapt" then.
6. The "hearing" isn't as formal as it sounds.
If you haven't been to a Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission hearing, it sounds like a really big deal. We put on our suits. We sit quietly in our seats. We learn to address the chair and spell our names "for the record." Translators repeat our every word in both official languages, broadcast through wireless ear-pieces. Strip away the physical appearance of the hearing, though, and it's a pretty informal affair. Each presenter only gets to speak for 10 minutes. When you consider that just one organization like Lake Ontario Waterkeeper has 11 months worth of research to cover, prepared by four government-funded independent consultants, it is literally impossible to present even a summary of our most important findings to the Commission. Nothing we say is under oath, and no one who speaks needs to have any training or experience on the topic they cover, so the information the Commission does hear is often littered with spin, platitudes, and political talking points.
7. We can do better!
Decision-making isn't rocket science. The standards for when and how to make decisions are fairly well established. (Hint: Actually making a decision is usually an important first step.) If we take our time, do our research, listen to the public, listen to independent experts, and commit to doing a good job, we can save money, save water, save fish, and save time.
Join the hearing:
Lake Ontario Waterkeeper is for a lake that you can swim, drink, and fish. For more than a decade, Waterkeeper has connected and empowered people in order to stop pollution, protect human health, and restore habitat. Learn more at www.waterkeeper.ca.
http://nukeprofessional.blogspot.com/p/manifesto-why-shut-them-down.html
Energy imports... from where? What source of energy? The most likely source would be the United States, and you know how they produce their energy? Coal and gas.
When new reports and studies come out saying that global warming seems to be worse and faster than we were thinking, saying "it's okay, we don't need nuclear power, we can just get the US to burn more coal and gas to get our electricity from them" is anathema to any kind of regard for the environment. It's the exact opposite we should consider.
It seems to me that the biggest complaint about green energy is that it is only available when the sun is shining or the wind is blowing. That's true. I truly think that storage is the answer. 6-10 Billion (give or take a billion) would buy an awful lot of batteries.
A lot of people complain about the cost of the FIT program. I'm not sure why, it's the only chance the government ever gave you to get a piece of the energy pie. They're going to just build this Nuke plant and send you the bill.
I actually toured the Bruce Generating Station when it was still under construction. Water to cool is taken in and then pumped out at 3 degrees celsius higher. Is this enough to disrupt fish life cycles in Lake Ontario? This author doesn't say.
She justs categorically states that these nukes are bad for fish and you have to read between the lines to see that her only beef is water temperature. Its almost as if she'd have one believe , by omission that these fishies are glowing in the dark from radiation. Pretty insulting to the Japanese who've actually had to go through this , I'd say.
What about global warming? Zebra mussels? Great Lakes water levels and chemical pollution as problems of greater concern for the Lake Ontario ecosystem? Or not? No discussion.
Sorry, but if this article is any indication, then you and your group (whom I've never heard of before for one) are gonna have to come up with some way more solid arguments to get ANY support from me. And I'm an environmentalist.
The linked article does go into detail about the many problems the McGuinty government faces in meeting its renewable energy goals. The difficulties include: connecting these projects to the grid, and compensating for the fact that most renewable energy supplies are neither stable and steady (as nuclear power tends to be), nor can they be turned on and off as needed (as gas plants can be).
If not nuclear, then what? Wind power doesn't provide enough and is unreliable. Solar power? Doesn't suffice in the winter, when energy demands are going to spike in order to provide heat and light for dark, cold houses. The only realistic options are coal - or nuclear. Coal is dirty, dangerous...and limited. Nuclear power can run for decades, if properly maintained, and is much cleaner than coal; it has its dangers, certainly (for one, it's harder to dispose of) but all the infamous accidents are ones where people did things exactly the opposite from how they were supposed to.
And energy imports? Seriously? Energy imports require the person you're importing from to have a surplus - which is not always guaranteed. And why should the province waste money on *buying* energy it can just as readily generate on its own?
Besides, are we not in a carbon emission crisis right now? We have to think long term for Canada's future energy needs that involve the least amount of GHGs.