Alberta Affordability Minister Nathan Neudorf is jetting off today for a nice 10-day holiday in the United Kingdom … mostly at his own expense.
Not entirely at his own expense, though, since Alberta taxpayers will presumably be picking up the tab for his airfare in his other cabinet role as minister of utilities (with the exception, this being Alberta, of utilities that generate electricity of the renewable sort) which got him a nice invite to the World Nuclear Symposium in London and a corking “Canada-U.K. Nuclear Day” party on Sept. 3 at Canada House.
If you’re thinking you probably couldn’t afford a vacation like that, it’s nice to know the minister of making sure you can afford stuff (how’s than going, anyway?) will have the opportunity to “explore nuclear energy in London,” as the Alberta Government’s news release put it yesterday, with well-heeled nuclear industry lobbyists, CEOs, and the like from all over the world.
In all, the MLA for Lethbridge-East (and perhaps soon to be the MLA for the new riding of Lethbridge-Gerrymander), will get to spend 15 days in Blighty, at least five of them in a very nice hotel, I’m sure. (I’m sure, but I’ll never really know, because that information is henceforth redacted for, you know, security reasons.)
“Alberta’s government is working hard to secure an affordable, reliable and sustainable energy future and nuclear can play a key role,” Mr. Neudorf said in the inevitable canned quote in the government’s news release yesterday. “Gatherings like this one are an excellent opportunity to connect with international partners and I look forward to learning more about the potential of this technology and how it can fit into Alberta’s energy mix.”
I’ll bet. As has been said in this space before, there’s nothing cheap about nuclear power. Even the so-called “small modular reactors” that the UCP is so enamoured of are multi-billion-dollar megaprojects, and they never come in on budget. Indeed, SMRs may be nuclear reactors, but they’re not small and they’re not really modular. The term is a marketing gimmick.
“Nuclear projects are almost always subject to time and cost overruns,” explained the Calgary-based Pembina Institute in a news release published the day before yesterday, “with some being delayed by up to a decade and costing double the original projected amount.”
If you want cheap and reliable energy, as the Pembina news release rather plaintively pointed out, wind, solar and battery storage would be just the ticket. Those are things that Mr. Neudorf and the United Conservative Party aren’t about to consider, though, probably because of the turbines that spoiled the view at Donald Trump’s golf course in Scotland.
Nevertheless, tout le monde nuclear energy will be in London – even a senior official of Rosatom, the Russian state atomic energy corporation! (That said, you have to dig a bit to suss out the Rosatom connection.)
Meanwhile, the Alberta government wants to hear what you think about nuclear power – presumably as long as it’s the same as what they think. Otherwise, get lost!
At any rate, Premier Danielle Smith has struck a yet another panel, this one to sell Albertans on the idea adopting nuclear power … pardon me, “to join the conversation on nuclear energy in the province.”
There’s even a survey – and I can tell you it’s not quite as obviously biased as the “Alberta Next” surveys, although I’d say it’s been designed to help suss out voter concerns so that talking points can be drafted quickly to tell you to have no fear for atomic energy.
Like most UCP panels since the days of Jason Kenney – including the one that was trying to gin up support for Alberta separatism in Fort McMurray last night and the Expert Panel on Post-Secondary Institution Funding and Alberta’s Competitiveness that’s supposed to report this fall, the idea is to deliver the recommendations that the government has already decided to implement.
Yes, Deron Bilous, a cabinet minister in Rachel Notley’s NDP Government and now the VP of an Edmonton-based lobbying firm, is a member of the Nuclear Energy Engagement and Advisory Panel. One ought not to conclude from that, though, that the panel will produce anything but what the UCP government wants.
Well, if you worry about this stuff, nothing’s going to happen any time soon except more lobbying and conferences in interesting locales for UCP ministers to attend.
A small modular reactor project has never been successfully completed outside of China and Russia. Indeed, some say Rosatom’s Akademik Lomonosov, dubbed by some the “floating Chernobyl,” may be the world’s only working small modular reactor.
Mr. Neudorf will return to Alberta on Sept. 11. Pip-pip!
I find it a bit odd that Smith and the UCP who are generally against anything not fossil fuel are so pro nuclear. Alberta doesn’t even produce much, if any, uranium I believe.
I sense the UCP really wants to nuke the oilsands and are hoping it may be less expensive than using natural gas to heat and extract the bitumin. It may be, but nuclear energy does not have a great reputation since Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, Fukushima … and so on.
In one way Smith is a sort of conservative as she tends to embrace many lost causes and bad ideas like her predecessor Kenney. Although she does tend to dabble in them more and I sometimes sense less conviction.
Last week was separatism, this week charging for COVID vaccines, so perhaps next week could be nuclear reactors. I suppose as she goes from one idea to another without much to show for it, they will at least provide her some distraction from her past bad ideas.
However the risk for Smith is that Albertans may eventually figure out we are not really making any progress despite her giving the appearance of frenetic activity.
“I find it a bit odd that Smith and the UCP who are generally against anything not fossil fuel are so pro nuclear.”
Think of it like the Carbon Capture and Storage program. Something with great promises made and lots of oppourtunity to spend money that might otherwise be wasted on vaccines and healthcare, with a long development time-line and ever moving target for completion, that can be used to make promises and prevent the evils of solar and wind energy from intruding on the oilsands.
“Alberta’s government is working hard to secure an affordable, reliable and sustainable energy future and nuclear can play a key role …” Someday, for sure.
(And, I should note, I have long advocated for the adoption of nuclear energy, especially Thorium-LFTR technology, while recognizing it would take decades to create and build even if it was a serious program. Meanwhile our state of the art 10 years ago Maple Leaf reactors remain mothballed because harper cut the funding to fix a minor design flaw, then sold the program to SNC-Lavalin, including all the cutting edge research Canada did on the Slowpoke II SMRs back in the early 1970s. The original Slowpoke reactor was a miniature designed for school research and worked quite well at that task (did you know there was one on the U of A Campus), and the Slowpoke II was designed to install in municipal locations to supply local power. So we could have had small reactors in place 40 years ago, but choked.)
Thanks, Paul. Yes, I did know about the Slowpoke at the U of A. There was one on the U of T campus near my apartment in Toronto years ago as well. As for the UCP interest in nuclear power even though it’s not carbon based, I suspect the main appeal is that it’s generally not thought of as “woke.” Not as good as burning stuff, but still huge and as expensive as shit. In addition, it makes a lot of people they despise for being too woke unhappy, and, as they say, the cruelty is often the point with conservative parties. Finally, while nuclear planst are rarely profitable, they’re too big too fail and hence can afford the kind of expense it takes to put on a great conference in an expensive place like London, England. It’s gotta be more fun there than in Lethbridge. DJC
Lol…then she can set up dogsled tours to watch the progress. So, south, up the Mackenzie, across Slave Lake, then one for the Peace plus one for the Athabasca, bonus.
Is that why she is pushing for infrastructure to the north?
Double bonus, it’ll put a spoke in Skippy’s wheel for bill C-5.
I know, don’t give her ideas, but if she uses them for propaganda, I’m claiming plagiarism…
Paul– had just looked up the information to refresh my memory. 2 articles….
https://www.westmountmag.ca April 16th 2025
The day CANDU became “NO CAN DO” was June 29th 2011 when the Harper government sold the CANDU division of the Atomic Energy Canada to SNC Lavalin for $15* million.
CBC news June 29th 2011
— AECL sold for $15 million to SNC Lavalin.
……ending a process that had been in the works since 2009
…..the union** for AECL condemned the sale,saying the deal with ‘hollow out the company ‘ and might cost thousands more jobs among the corporations suppliers.
(** Harper killing union jobs, didn’t hear Skippy standing up for them)
…..We are shocked and angry that the Harper government conducted this sale behind closed doors ***without any input from the Canadian public or Parliament, Ivanco said.
(*** Mr Harper seems to have had a record of deals behind closed doors, here, in Vladivostok and how many more that the majority of Canadians don’t know about.
—————-
* I find it a bit odd the number of times Harper/SNC Lavalin has come to the forefront, especially considering how much flack JT was getting over the ‘so called SNC affair’, which played such a big part in the Harper government’s dealings. Hmmm?
Paul: I was at the U of A at the time when that reactor was in they Physics Building. The whole project was abandoned because of the excessive clean up and liability costs and the fact, still true today, that the net-pollution from conventional natural gas is less than from the cumulative nuclear fuel cycle. Now that solar is available along with grid scale batteries, there is almost a zero case for nuclear unless you plan on expanding your bomb making abilities. Ontario has almost 60 years of highly reactive radioactive waste stored in large water pools next to Toronto and tritium pollution in the great lakes as well. The First Nations are no longer gullible enough to store the waste. Enter the UCP in London.
It’s for the tar sands. It takes a LLLOOOOOOOOTTTT of energy to convert sand to bitumen and even then they can still barely pump it through the pipeline without adding a bunch of nasty stuff.
Additionally; massive infrastructure projects always present an opportunity for grift.
Honestly I think this is a problem the Chinese will solve, but more for structural reasons than anything, I’ll give you an example.
For all the maga outrage about China dominating the rare earths market few people realize that it’s because of the refining process to get those “rare” and unique minerals. Mostly that it costs massive up front investment into the billions of dollars before you see a single mineral. This is why even though the US (and Canada and Greenland) have comparable deposits of rare earths, they have no ability to process them, if they are extracted they are shipped to China for processing.
So what am I getting at ? The WEST Will never crack the problem of small modular reactors or cold fusion or any of these pipe dreams because no one is going to invest in what is a money losing proposition. Only a state can afford those kind of plays and the west is obsessed with profitability, private public partnerships and draining the public purse into private accounts.
So yeah, Canada has one of the most significant deposits of uranium that is known to exist, but we sure as shit aren’t going to be the ones to utilize it safely.
Bird: To borrow a phrase from Chairman Xi, we would benefit from socialism with Canadian characteristics. DJC
For Marlaina and Neudorf, it’s all ‘pipe dreams’. She’s talking about something that would take about 10 yrs(? If I remember from the article ) to build, if they started tomorrow. So is she pulling another d’rump and planning on staying in for another 2 1/2 terms? Good luck with that. When she had all the wind & solar proposals already lined up and ready to get started but no: the putrecent orange was going to kibosh the whale and bird killers and Marlaina wanted to be prepared to hand in her homework before anyone else so she could get her little gold star.
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Going by the short clip I watched from the Fort Mac panel; she persevered through being told the videos were just propaganda (bravo) but again the photo op of the front rows raising their hands for the APP.
Those seniors imho, have no idea what they are saying yes to, but have obviously bought into the nonsense that she is spewing.
Buyers remorse isn’t going to help them if it happened. Though I imagine that then they’d be clamoring for the government to ” help us, do something”….when you don’t read the fine print of article 54b on page 89 of the 2nd subtext………
I suppose having suppressed the renewables industry in Alberta Smith may be making way for going nuclear and lest we forget more old fashioned coal too. She can’t have wind farms or solar too close to the mountains, but no problem with coal, apparently.
At least we will probably not need to pay for the coal mines, but the environmental damage and clean up will cost us. Although by that time Dani may be long gone off to Florida or something.
And how will we pay for those expensive nuclear reactors? They may start small, but I suspect that may end up being a bait and switch. Well, I suppose that is where the APP and the Heritage Fund comes in. Alrhough first comes the manufacturing consent part which seems to be well underway right now.
Wind and solar aren’t dispatchable so aren’t direct replacements for thermal generation. Nuclear is the only option.
Nuclear power is extremely dense. The amount of rehired uranium is very small so the fact that it would be sourced out of province is irrelevant.
“A small modular reactor project has never been successfully completed outside of China and Russia.” That’s an odd sentence. What you’re saying is China and Russia are the only countries who can successfully build small modular reactors? That is true – we are actually the gas station masquerading as a country.
Mickey: That was precisely my point. I do not know enough to speculate confidently about why that might be, although I do have some thoughts, one of which is that Canada is perilously close to being a gas station masquerading as a country and that Alberta, were it ever to separate from Canada, would certainly fit that description. DJC
China is nearly complete building the Linglong 1 nuclear reactor, which is the worlds first land based “small modular reactor” fwiw I believe the “small” bit comes from the size of the pressurized core, the tiny heart of a massive plant. They completed the installation of the core and containment modules on august 10th.
https://www.caea.gov.cn/english/n6759361/n6759362/c10087720/content.html
Just think of where they will be in another five years. Five years ago they were barely making cars, now they’re swiftly gobbling up shares of the global market because they can make one better and cheaper than literally anyone else. Not only that but imagine what will happen when they start building them in other countries as part of the belt and road.
China has already won. Now all that’s left is the weeping and the gnashing of teeth.
Bird: Moments ago I read that BYD has developed a charger that can charge a car battery to 80% in five minutes, enough to go 400 kilometres. Not available in North America. Never available in Alberta, probably. DJC
@Yes, they’ve developed sodium batteries.
Let that sink in.
When you provide cheap education to thousands upon thousands of scientists and engineers that graduate each year–this is the outcome. A lot of smart, creative young people with the education to turn ideas into reality.
In Elons wildest dreams he has that technology, but you can only use it if you pay a subscription. They want a subscription for everything. Volkswagen just announced one for their electric vehicle to reach its top speed.
China just figured out how to make the damn cars work really well. They’re going to do the same thing with AI and their F-35 killer. Imagine what the west could do if our industries and governments weren’t run through with graft, incompetence and hubris.
There is nothing these UCP grifters do better than enjoy vacations on the taxpayer’s dime.
There you have it: multi-billions for pie-in-the-sky projects that will never come to fruition, but Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah for lifesaving vaccines for ordinary Albertans who don’t matter one bit to the UCP. Priorities, eh!
Enjoy your five-star hotel in London, Nathan Neudorf. And remember, you can never get caught up in a $16 orange juice scandal or be critiqued for staying at the swanky Savoy hotel, where rooms surely cost more than $665 per night now. Why? Because “security”. Surely you will be long gone from London by the time you file an expense report, so that excuse doesn’t wash. (Are expense reports even required these days? By the way, why not add hotel laundry to the tab, because this all feels dirty and besides, no one will know?)
Anyways, rest assured that people will die because of your caucus decision to prioritize fancy trips and first class everything for the Lethbridge political elite while depriving the citoyens of basic health care, like vaccines for a disease that killed more than 400 Albertans in the past year, or 6,613 cumulatively from the start of the pandemic to September 2024 (https://health-infobase.canada.ca/covid-19/current-situation.html?map=pt&measure=deaths_total&stat=num&). C’est la vie!
Enjoy your privileged status, sir, and remember to pack a few London hotel patisseries to toss at the peasants in Lethbridge. Let them eat cake!
9-11. Righto. Seems like an auspicious day to travel.
Well, having someone from Rusatom makes sense. They actually build and operate nuclear reactors. In fact they are building one in Turkey right now.
BTW, “Rosatom’s Akademik Lomonosov, dubbed by some the “floating Chernobyl,”. probably could also be described as a “Floating Three-Mile Island”. Both names are equally silly.
From the little I have read about it, I think it is not so much a “small modular reactor” and more likely adaptation of a “navel nuclear power plant” on a barge but I am no nuclear engineer. Rosatom, I think, has been building these probably since the icebreaker Lenin which was launched in 1957. Currently they seem to be operating 8 nuclear-powered icebreakers.
One, Yamal, even does summer tourist excursions to the North Pole. I have not seen a cruise price but the Alberta taxpayer may be lucky Mr. Neudorf is only going to the UK.
jrkrideau: I think the Chernobyl dig is fair – it appears to most of us non-experts to have been a more serious nuclear accident than 3MI, and it was a Russian (Soviet) disaster. I agree with your assessment at the vessel is an adapted naval reactor. Lots of them on an under the Seven Seas. As for it making sense that Rosatom is there, of course it does in the way you describe, but what about all those Sanctions from Hell? DJC
Chernobyl is in Ukraine, it’s in the Kiev Oblast; Anatoly Dyatlov, the chief scientist who was in charge of the safety test was a Soviet Ukrainian citizen. The Russian Federation doesn’t really even resemble the USSR, to hear some people tell it Chernobyl was intentionally destroyed on orders from Moscow, the truth is more complicated.
So why does it not seem far fetched to find out that Marlaina and Neudorf end up putting a couple of the “floating Chernobyls” on what? The Athabasca River?
Is Pigeon Lake deep enough?
My first reaction to the thought was don’t be silly, then I had to correct myself when I remembered whom we are dealing with. Sigh!
Randi-lee: Floating them over from Russia might be interesting. DJC
They could come over disguised as BC Ferries.
So was this her end game all along? Killing all environmentally friendly energy projects, in favour of nuclear. I suppose she weighed all the options, including the envelope. How is Alberta going to be able to afford this, let alone a sovereign Alberta. Maybe, she’ll start sucking up to the feds, to help foot the bill before sovereignty and she demands her crown.
No. Just no.
1 Accidents.
Chalk River, Idaho Falls, Windscale, Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, Fukushima … ascending magnitude of radiation release. Some with immediate fatalities. Long term cancer risk from the 2 worst. All with long term environmental damage. Honorable mention to the Soviet satellite Kosmos-954 that crashed in the NWT.
2 Waste.
There is not a geologic safe storage site anywhere on the planet yet. All those reactors are storing waste on site, in containers that are not rated for 10’s to 100’s of thousand years. Some of the waste (plutonium isotopes especially) needs 6 digit years worth of containment. It’s that dangerous. And then you need to transport from reactor site to long term site … more accident potential.
3 Cost.
Reactor containment buildings are not cheap. Passive cooling designs are even more less than cheap. That’s why none have ever been built. Three Mile Island and Fukashima were loss of cooling incidents. God forbid one the French liquid sodium breeder reactors ever breach.
Gerald: Only Man can forbid that, unfortunately. DJC
When it is understood who really runs this Province, who the Government acting as corporate lobbyist/PR firm actually serves, and who it is that ultimately benefits, it all makes perfect sense, if you are a disciple of neoliberal style corporate cronyism and corporate capture. See for example, “Outrage as Plug Pulled on Coal Mine Public Hearing”
https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2025/08/27/Outrage-Plug-Pulled-Coal-Mine-Public-Hearing/
The SMR PR campaign is simply more of the same corporate marketing techniques designed to persuade an ever gullible public that lining the pockets of the promoters is in everyone’s best interests:
“Everywhere you look, the nuclear industry’s hype machine is in overdrive. Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy urges a “warp speed” nuclear revival. Goldman Sachs, Microsoft, and the United Kingdom government all tout small modular reactors as the silver bullet for climate change and energy security. Tech billionaires are hiring nuclear veterans. Wall Street is whispering about “round-the-clock power” for artificial intelligence data centres. The UK is betting billions on “mini-nukes” to fill its looming energy gap. (But) With SMRs, you get all the risk and complexity, but at even higher costs per unit of energy, due to the loss of economies of scale. That is why nuclear power has never been financially viable. Every plant built in the U.S. required public subsidies, and every attempt to reduce unit costs by increasing reactor size, designing the plant in factory modules, or eliminating safety features has ended in disaster or disappointment.”
https://www.theenergymix.com/the-nuclear-mirage-why-small-modular-reactors-wont-save-nuclear-power/
What they’re saying is it’s not as PROFITABLE as oil and gas is. “Economic viability = profitable” China doesn’t give a damn what it costs, they just want the energy. The technology works, it’s capitalism that is broken (fundamentally flawed and doomed to failure)
On our Quixotic journey from the bowels of UCP northern Alberta to Lethbridge we saw no windmills turning and no construction. Just on observation.
Lethbridge, at it is currently delineated, had long lines to sign the Pro-Canada petition, more evidence that where higher learning is rooted, more worldly the citizens. A small candle in the Alberta darkness. This must rattle Smith’s brain.
Smith’s UCP, like Trump’s America, seems entrenched in their position to spend on indulgence but invoke suffering on the poor and AISH recipients. The voices of many advocates for the poor, against the claw back, and rent increases (remember the notorious ex-cabinet minister who has plenty of slums to rent) continue unheeded.
Gratitude, as always for the insights into what is happening in Alberta David.
There was a nuclear incident that was much closer to home when in 1952 Jimmy Carter (then a US Lieutenant and later President) saved the Chalk River facility from a melt down. It was the first such incident.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/chalk-river-nuclear-accident-1.6293574 DJC
She wants a public forum on nuclear energy. i.e. another rigged distractor. Holding public forums to discuss the health care scandal, taking money from the handicapped, a record breaking measles outbreak and the enforced obstacles in accessing Covid vaccines would be more relevant than another meaningless waste of taxpayer money – even with Neudorf’s presence on stage with carefully authored notes at the ready.
Research from Stanford and the University of British Columbia indicates that small nuclear reactors generate more highly reactive nuclear waste than conventional reactors. Any plans for that Danni? Maybe just dump it in the Athabasca region’s tailing ponds when no one is looking. There’s no need for red tape here in freedumb country.
Is this just another attempt by the leader of the United Chernobyl Party to provide distractions that keep our attention away from the AHS, Tylenot scandals, separatism and vaccinations? I’d like to say so but she’s so unpredictably wacko that it wouldn’t be unreasonable to think otherwise.
I suspect all politicians, and especially Con politicians, suffer from “Shiny! I want one” syndrome. This tendency is exacerbated by the inevitable and incessant lobbying of whatever industry shills have caught their attention—for the moment.
Nuclear energy is another, larger than usual pitch that pushes all the hot buttons. It’s big, it’s expensive, and it’s long-term. Therefore, no repercussions for the politicos pushing it today; it’ll fail 10 or more years from now. It’s like the global oil industry that way, only more so. As one example, from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis:
https://ieefa.org/resources/oil-producers-face-profit-squeeze-amid-shifting-policy-landscape
SMRs have their built-in problems, too:
https://ieefa.org/resources/small-modular-reactors-still-too-expensive-too-slow-and-too-risky
There’s lots more on the IEEFA website, on renewable energy, fossil fuels, carbon capture and more.
As for Mr. Neudorf: hopefully, he will learn something about the UK’s experience building full-size reactors (slow and extremely expensive), and about disposal of nuclear waste and storage (difficult, very expensive and VERY unpopular wherever you try to do it). But I doubt it. He’ll be too busy schmoozing and talking up subsidies for nuclear energy stations. Gotta power them subsidized AI computer thingies somehow, right?!
According to the UCP’s own website, “After working as a journeyman carpenter, business owner and project manager for nearly 30 years, Nathan Neudorf was first elected as the MLA for Lethbridge-East on April 16, 2019.”
Well, that should certainly entitle him to be able to make informed decisions on nuclear power thereby ensuring that his jaunt to the U.K. in Business Class would be well worth the expense to the oppressed Albertan taxpayer.
My late father was a Power Plant Engineer and interested in all sorts of ways to create electricity. He wasn’t surprised that when the Klein Government looked at using Nuclear Power they proved that Alberta didn’t have the necessary large bodies of water to make it work so it was abandoned.
Alan– but,but the tap; you just have to turn on the big tap and that way it won’t be wasted going straight to the ocean.
And if the aquifers are drying up, water being siphoned off for all the Bitcoin mining, plus her plans to build the world’s largest AI centre with Kevin O’Leary– there goes a whole bunch more water in an already drought stricken area.
One could get the idea that Marlaina like Skippy have absolutely no idea of how anything actually works. Maybe she believes Skippy when he says the electricians collect the power from the lightning. If there’s one thing that has become literally evident, is you do not have to be qualified for anything to become a candidate for the CON/Reform party.
Speaking of, I’m sure the people of BR-C will be glad to know that their MP is working hard for them: cos playing a carpenter out in the Halifax area, making false accusations against the PM and getting called out for it by the German Chancellor.
Keep up the good work PP, I’m sure your constituents are happy with your hard work.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palo_Verde_Nuclear_Generating_Station?wprov=sfla1
You are correct, there’s only handful of societies that have ever remained intact for as long as nuclear waste will need to be stored. China, Iran, you could make the case for Russia going back to when Catherine the great established Odessa but not a lot. That doesn’t mean it’s an unsolvable problem though, we have many materials that didn’t exist when Chernobyl happened, scientific studies have advanced many many orders of magnitude over what was understood then.
What it would require is something that makes the Manhattan project look small, and that’s why we will Never See It Here.
However, if we were able to build “green” energy at the sale we need to to replace digging up shit and lighting it on fire, It’s extremely unlikely China would be investing in domestic nuclear power at this point, which they are to an extremely high level.
We have a choice, the certain (death) of fossil fuels, or an uncertain future that embrace all possible options to replace fossil fuels. Clock is ticking.
I prefer song birds to UCP predators.
It only took a day for the Alberta government to announce that another minister was about to enjoy a pointless visit to a foreign land at taxpayers’ expense. “Alberta’s government will lead a strategic tourism mission to strengthen Alberta’s presence in Tokyo and Seoul. Minister Boitchenko and representatives from Travel Alberta will meet with travel, trade and media partners in key Asian markets to promote Alberta’s new air gateways and world-class visitor experiences.” https://www.alberta.ca/release.cfm?xID=93821381FEBB7-D37F-CB63-80C9EE337EF74262
Hello DJC and fellow commenters,
My response to the idea of nuclear reactors is Sellafield in England. It is a nuclear reprocessing and decommissioning site of about 265 hectares and is expected to finally close in about 2120. The total cost is expected to be $121 Billion according to wikipedia. It deals with a lot of military nuclear waste, quite a bit of it British, but I think it also reprocesses nuclear waste from other countries. I believe that much of the nuclear waste is being vitrified – placed in a glass-like substance for storage. Wikipedia has a good entry on Sellafield.
No one wants to store nuclear waste. As far as I know, that is a problem in Canada where the waste is Not being stored in permanent containers. Russia has apparently dumped nuclear waste into the sea and in illegal dump sites. Some countries have allowed water contaminated with nuclear waste into the sea, and claim that it is diluted by the sea, although I think that is no longer permitted under an international convention.
From what I recall, the U S has built a large and expensive underground storage site in one of the states, maybe Utah?, but I’m not certain which state. No nuclear waste has been deposited there because of public resistance. Although much of the nuclear waste is from military use, disposal of nuclear waste from non-military sources is still an important issue. I am not in favour of nuclear power, small modular (nuclear) reactors or otherwise because of waste disposal issues and also the potential for various disasters.
I believe you are thinking of Fukushima. The Soviet Union built a massive containment dome for the Chernobyl disaster, and there was recently an additional dome completed over that dome. They estimate clean up will be finished in 2150 or something crazy like that. Fukushima was leaking directly into the ocean for many years. I’m not sure if they ever figured it out tbh. Yes, the waste has to be stored for longer than our society has existed, it’s not a trivial point.
However. We are short on both time and options to avert total global catastrophe w/r/r climate change, and this is the only technology that is scalable enough to replace fossil fuels entirely. That’s why China is doing it and you better believe they will build them elsewhere. It’s not up to us. We do not have a seat at that table.
Christina— The US does not have a great record with nuclear imo. As far as disasters go, the one that is just a matter of time, is ‘Runit Island’ ironically named, part of the Marshall Islands. Scientists say the “Cactus Dome” or locally the Tomb is being affected by the rise of the oceans and how the salt water is deteriorating the concrete encasement. I don’t remember the name of the show that covered it ,but it was enough to put me off anything nuclear.
Given the recent recall of “radioactive shrimp ” in the US, all the major weather catastrophes, you know that the there is bound to be problems, especially with the current lack of intelligence in the administration.
Which brings us back to the UCP’s record for protecting Albertans from the O&G industry’s dereliction of duty.
If Marlaina can’t do anything about their actions, how could anyone expect to trust her with nuclear energy. She can’t be, because she/they don’t care, as long as the shareholders are raking in their profits, our future is not of their concern.
It just hasn’t sunk into their worm-adled brains, or what takes up the space between their ears, is that maggots do not discriminate between rich and poor.
Sorry, I need some nature therapy to give me strength.
FWIW, in case anyone missed it, there’s supposed to be a Convoy 2025 headed to Ottawa Sept 15th, with another bizarre list of demands. No words left.
Don’t forget the massive energy requirements of Big Data centres who profit when these facilities are built on the public’s dime and the energy companies who then download those costs onto the consumers so Meta etc don’t have to pay their fair share for the infrastructure or their energy usage.
Useless Cons Pretending………
This may be completely off the wall but…
Three things that I expect a Provincial Government to deliver, and deliver well are health care, eductation, and public safety (police, fire, etc.)
Over the last few years I have come to the conclusion that Danielle Smith’s UCP Government is singularly incapable of achieving, even improving these basics.
So why on earth should I have any confidence whatsoever in their collective ability to successfully deliver anything over and above this?
There was a proposal some 10 or 15 years ago by Bruce Power out of Ontario to build a nuclear power plant near Lac Cardinal, in northwestern Alberta not far from the Town of Peace River. That project was shelved after a public outcry.
More recently, there’s a different proposal now before the federal Impact Assessment Agency of Canada, from a company that calls itself “Energy Alberta” to build a 2-reactor plant about 20 km north of Peace River: https://iaac-aeic.gc.ca/050/evaluations/proj/89430. The plan is for 2 CANDU reactors, not SMRs.