Environmentalists and municipalities vow to keep fighting against radioactive steam generator shipment on the Great Lakes

A shipment between the downtowns of Detroit, Michigan and Windsor, Ontario, showing how narrow the Detroit River is.The Windsor Star reports that Citizens Environment Alliance of Southwestern Ontario, for one, will keep on resisting the shipment of radioactive waste on the Great Lakes, despite the Canadian Nuclear Safety (sic) Commission's rubberstamp last Friday of plans by Bruce Power to transport 16 school bus sized radioactive steam generators, each weighing 100 tons, on a single boat from Lake Huron, through the St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair, the Detroit River, Lake Erie, the Welland Canal, Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence River, and the Atlantic Ocean to Sweden for so-called "recycling." The Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River Cities Initiative has determined that -- under Canadian federal law -- a sinking of the shipment, and breaching of just a small number of plutonium-contaminated steam generators, particularly in a river, could release enough radioactivity to necessitate radiological emergency measures, such as shut down of adjacent drinking water intakes. As shown by the photo at the left (provided by Citizens Environment Alliance), the Detroit River between Detroit and Windsor is not only narrow (Detroit's name comes from the French word détroit, meaning strait, after all!), it is also shallow. A radioactive release in such a location would not be much diluted by the small volume of water in the river, increasing the accident's risks to people and the environment. The Cities Initiative has made this point repeatedly to CNSC, which has duly ignored it.

"CNSC, Bruce Power called to the carpet over nuke shipment"

Canadian MP Nathan Cullen (NDP)The Toronoto Sun reports that a Canadian federal parliamentary committee will grill representatives of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) and nuclear utility Bruce Power over Friday's CNSC approval of a Bruce proposal to ship 16 radioactive steam generators on the Great Lakes to Sweden for "recycling." Nathan Cullen (pictured at left), a New Democratic Party (social democratic) opposition member of the House of Commons natural resources committee, has confirmed that "public concern has been pouring in." At the end of September, 2010, Cullen also spoke out at the Canadian Parliamentary Press Gallery just after the environmental coalition -- including Kevin Kamps from Beyond Nuclear -- opposing the shipment, as CNSC hearings were to begin that day on the issue. 

Environmentalists condemn decision allowing shipment of radioactive waste on the Great Lakes

Detroit News graphic showing shipment route from Bruce nuclear power plant, Canada to Studsvik, Sweden radioactive waste "recycling" center.Taking advantage of the weekend to get a jump on public alarm and media coverage, at 4:41 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 4 the federal Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission approved a highly controversial proposal to ship 16 radioactively contaminated steam generators from Ontario to Sweden via the waters of the Great Lakes. The shipment would originate at the Bruce Nuclear Power Plant, the largest in the western hemisphere, and one of the largest in the world, with 9 reactors on one site. The shipment would originate on Lake Huron, and then pass through the St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair, the Detroit River, Lake Erie, the Welland Canal, Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence River, and the Atlantic Ocean. It would be bound for "recycling" at Studsvik, Sweden. An environmental coalition has been raising the alarm bell about the shipment and radioactive "recycling" plan since last spring, long delaying it. Before the shipment can enter U.S. territorial waters on the Great Lakes, it must receive a permit from the U.S. Department of Transportation's Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA). The coalition is calling on PHMSA to undertake a full Environmental Impact Statement under the National Environmental Policy Act. The coalition issued a media release condemning CNSC's approval of the controversial and risky shipment. For more background information and history on this issue, go to Beyond Nuclear's Canada website section. The Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative, on behalf of 70 municipalities, has also expressed disappointment in the CNSC decision, as has the Council of Canadians. The Environment News Service has reported on these developments, as has the CBC and the Toronto Star. The Sierra Club of Canada summed up the decision: "justice for the environment -- denied."

Honor the memory of an anti-nuclear matriarch by urging Congress to do its job agaisnt radioactive risks

Mary Sinclair, a Michigan-based reactor slayer, radioactive waste dump stopper, and defender of the Great Lakes against radioactive reactor and waste risks, passed away on Jan. 14th at the age of 92, after devoting decades of her life to anti-nuclear activism. Beyond Nuclear has posted a memorial statement on its website. Please help honor the memory of this respected and beloved anti-nuclear leader by doing what she did so well, by challenging the out-of-control nuclear power industry by courageously speaking truth to power. Contact your two U.S. Senators and your U.S. Representative as they return to work for the new congressional session. Call their offices via the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121. Urge that they do their job to protect the lives, health, safety, security, environment, and taxpayer dollars of their constituents, as by blocking any additional federal loan guarantees for new reactors or uranium enrichment facilities. While they're at it, they should strenuously exercise their congressional oversight on the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and rein in the rogue nuclear power industry before it causes a BP Gulf of Mexico scale disaster, only this time with a radioactive twist.

PHMSA pledges to comply with NEPA in letter to U.S. Senators

The U.S. Department of Transportation's Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) has pledged to seven U.S. Senators that it intends to fully comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) before approving a Canadian radioactive steam generator shipment through U.S. territorial waters on the Great Lakes. PHMSA's Administrator, Cynthia L. Quarterman, wrote to U.S. Senator Russ Feingold on November 8, 2010. Feingold led the effort, that included six other Democratic Senators from Great Lakes states (Durbin from IL, Levin and Stabenow from MI, Casey from PA, and Schumer and Gillibrand from NY), to question and express concerns about the proposed shipment of 16 radioactive steam generators from the Bruce nuclear power plant on the Lake Huron shoreline of Ontario, via Lakes Huron, St. Clair, Erie, and Ontario and the rivers and waterways that connect them, across the Atlantic Ocean, to Sweden for "recycling" into consumer products. While PHMSA's pledge to comply with NEPA is welcome, the broad international environmental coalition opposing this shipment and the "recycling" of radioactive waste continues to call for a careful and comprehensive Environmental Impact Statement to be performed, rather than a lesser Environmental Assessment and "Finding of No Significant Impact" (FONSI) rubberstamp. In addition, the PHMSA letter to Sen. Feingold listed 17 instances of "[radioactive] nuclear power plant large components [having] been transported in U.S. waters" -- although some of these shipments were previously known to the public, some of them were not, including a 2001 radioactive steam generator shipment on Lake Michigan from Kewaunee nuclear power plant in northern Wisconsin to Memphis, TN.