LETTER

Clarifying some mis-statements 

Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL) has recently placed an ad in the Pontiac Journal (sister paper of the Bulletin d’Aylmer) claiming that it has “conducted remarkable work over the past 60 years, including the production of lifesaving medical isotopes, and the development of CANDU reactors…”  But in fact, CNL has existed only five years and played virtually no role in this work.  The Harper government created CNL in May 2014 as a subsidiary of the federal crown corporation Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL).  In September 2015 it gave a group of Canadian and foreign corporations all CNL shares, along with a 10-year contract to run Chalk River and other federal nuclear sites.  Two U.S. corporations, Fluor and Jacobs, and one Canadian corporation, SNC Lavalin, now own CNL.  

During its 62-year history between 1952 and 2014, AECL carried out research in nuclear physics, accelerator physics and materials science, developed nuclear reactors, produced plutonium for U.S. nuclear weapons, and produced medical isotopes.  Today AECL is only a 40-person shell that funnels roughly a billion dollars of federal tax money each year to CNL and the corporations that own it.

We would also like to point out that the “low level waste” that CNL wants to pile up in a giant mound beside the Ottawa River is not “low hazard”. It includes many long-lived radionuclides such as plutonium that can be deadly if inhaled or ingested and non radioactive hazardous substances such as PCBs, asbestos and arsenic. For more detail on what the term “low level waste” means, please see the fact sheet “Quick Facts about Low Level Waste” at www.concernedcitizens.net.

Lynn Jones

Concerned Citizens of 

Renfrew County and Area

Johanna Echlin

Old Fort William 

Cottagers’ Association (Pontiac)