Deep Geological Repositories
are best nuclear option
RE: Nuclear Burial Site urged
(
Dear Editor,
As a proud employee in
While overall the article
presented a fair overview of the current situation, the language used to
describe the plan was filled with negative connotations. In particular, the many references to
“mausoleum” and “dump” are not adequate to describe Deep Geological
Repositories.
This terminology creates the
impression that nuclear fuel is simply buried underground in a deep hole. This is most emphatically not the case. The Canadian repository concept was developed
through many decades of study at Atomic Energy of Canada Limited’s
Underground Research Laboratory (URL) in
I also believe that the
nature of the used fuel was slightly misrepresented. It is important to note that the
radioactivity of the fuel begins to decrease the second it is removed from the
reactor. While initially it does have
the potential to be harmful (yet is not due to the technology and safety
measures in place), after 500 years a human could safely work alongside a used
CANDU fuel bundle for an entire day. At
this juncture the danger would be from ingesting portions of the fuel. It is this scenario which a Deep Geological
Repository is designed to prevent.
No other toxic material has
the desirable property of reducing its harmful effects over time. The hundreds of harmful chemicals used in
hundreds of industries every day will be just as dangerous in a million years
as they are today. The difference
between many of these chemicals and nuclear fuel is that they are not nearly as
strictly regulated and many are being dumped into our water and air as a means
of “disposal”.
On a final note I take issue
with the method used to represent the amount of used fuel that exists. As was pointed out, the 40 plus years of
nuclear power in
(Disclaimer: The views expressed in this letter are solely
those of Mr. Daley. They do not
represent the views of his employer or any other Canadian Nuclear Entity.)
Andrew Daley
Nuclear Engineer