The controversial nuclear waste landfill project at Chalk River Laboratories, on the banks of the Ottawa River, will be able to move forward despite opposition from the cities of Gatineau and Montreal, environmental groups and Nations indigenous.
The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission announced Tuesday its decision to allow the modification of the site’s operating license in order to build a “near surface waste management facility (NWGF)”, which will receive low-level radioactive materials. activity for at least 50 years.
The Commission, an independent federal agency that regulates nuclear activities in the country, concluded that the project “is not likely to cause significant environmental effects” if its instigator, the Canadian Nuclear Laboratories, puts in place “all measures proposed mitigation and monitoring,” she said in a statement.
One of the commissioners responsible for ruling on the project is a former employee of the Chalk River Laboratories, a dozen Algonquin communities opposing the project denounced last fall, seeing it as a conflict of interest.
The project, which had been under study since 2016, also attracted criticism from the cities of Gatineau and the Metropolitan Community of Montreal, concerned about the risk it represents for the source of drinking water for millions of people living along the Ottawa River and the St. Lawrence River, downstream from the Chalk River site.
Many environmental organizations were also opposed to it, including the Canadian Environmental Law Association, which considered the proposed level of protection too low, likely to allow radioactive materials to escape into the environment, particularly in the event of an event. extreme weather.
The Commission concluded, however, that the project design is “sufficient to withstand severe weather events, seismic activity and the effects of climate change.”