Nuclear industry in Canada
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Nuclear industry in Canada is an active business and research sector, producing about 15% of its electricity in nuclear power plants of domestic design. Canada is the world's largest exporter of
uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...
, and has the world's second largest proven reserves. Canada also exports nuclear technology within the terms of the
Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, commonly known as the Non-Proliferation Treaty or NPT, is an international treaty whose objective is to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons technology, to promote cooperation ...
, to which it is a signatory, and is the world's largest producer of radioactive medical isotopes.


History


Nuclear technology

The Nuclear industry (as distinct from the uranium industry) in Canada dates back to 1942 when a joint British-Canadian laboratory was set up in
Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple ...
,
Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
, under the administration of the
National Research Council of Canada The National Research Council Canada (NRC; french: Conseil national de recherches Canada) is the primary national agency of the Government of Canada dedicated to science and technology research & development. It is the largest federal research ...
, to develop a design for a heavy-water nuclear reactor. This reactor was called National Research Experimental and would be the most powerful
research reactor Research reactors are nuclear fission-based nuclear reactors that serve primarily as a neutron source. They are also called non-power reactors, in contrast to power reactors that are used for electricity production, heat generation, or marit ...
in the world when completed. In the meantime, in 1944, approval was given to proceed with the construction of the smaller
ZEEP The ZEEP (Zero Energy Experimental Pile) reactor was a nuclear reactor built at the Chalk River Laboratories near Chalk River, Ontario, Canada (which superseded the Montreal Laboratory for nuclear research in Canada). ZEEP first went critical a ...
(Zero Energy Experimental Pile) test reactor at
Chalk River Chalk River (2016 population: 1029) is a small rural village, part of the Laurentian Hills municipality in Renfrew County, Ontario, Canada. It is located in the Upper Ottawa Valley along Highway 17 (Trans-Canada Highway), inland (west) from ...
,
Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...
and on September 5, 1945 at 3:45 p.m., the 10 Watt ZEEP successfully achieved the first self-sustained nuclear reaction outside the United States. ZEEP operated for 25 years as a key research facility. The
Teck Cominco smelter The Teck Cominco smelter, also known as the Teck Cominco Lead-Zinc Smelter, Cominco Smelter, and Trail smelter located in Trail, British Columbia, Canada, is the largest integrated lead-zinc smelter of its kind in the world. It is situated approxi ...
in
Trail, British Columbia Trail is a city in the West Kootenay region of the Interior of British Columbia, Canada. It was named after the Dewdney Trail, which passed through the area. The town was first called Trail Creek or Trail Creek Landing, and the name was shorte ...
produced heavy water for the American
Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project w ...
from 1942 to 1956. In 1946, Montreal Laboratory was closed, and the work continued at
Chalk River Nuclear Laboratories Chalk River Laboratories (french: Laboratoires de Chalk River; also known as CRL, Chalk River Labs and formerly Chalk River Nuclear Laboratories, CRNL) is a Canadian nuclear research facility in Deep River, about north-west of Ottawa. CRL is a ...
. Building partly on the experimental data obtained from ZEEP, the National Research Experimental (NRX)—a natural uranium, heavy water moderated research reactor—started up on July 22, 1947. It operated for 43 years, producing
radioisotope A radionuclide (radioactive nuclide, radioisotope or radioactive isotope) is a nuclide that has excess nuclear energy, making it unstable. This excess energy can be used in one of three ways: emitted from the nucleus as gamma radiation; transferr ...
s, undertaking fuels and materials development work for CANDU reactors, and providing
neutron The neutron is a subatomic particle, symbol or , which has a neutral (not positive or negative) charge, and a mass slightly greater than that of a proton. Protons and neutrons constitute the nuclei of atoms. Since protons and neutrons beh ...
s for physics experiments. It was eventually joined in 1957 by the larger 200 megawatt (MW)
National Research Universal reactor The National Research Universal (NRU) reactor was a 135 MW nuclear research reactor built in the Chalk River Laboratories, Ontario, one of Canada’s national science facilities. It was a multipurpose science facility that served three main roles. ...
(NRU). In 1952, the Canadian Government formed AECL, a Crown corporation with the mandate to develop peaceful uses of nuclear energy. A partnership was formed between AECL,
Ontario Hydro Ontario Hydro, established in 1906 as the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario, was a publicly owned electricity utility in the Province of Ontario. It was formed to build transmission lines to supply municipal utilities with electricity g ...
and Canadian General Electric to build Canada's first nuclear power plant, called NPD for Nuclear Power Demonstration. The 20 MWe
Nuclear Power Demonstration Nuclear Power Demonstration (or NPD) was the first Canadian nuclear power reactor, and the prototype for the CANDU reactor design. Built by Canadian General Electric (now GE Canada), in partnership with Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL), O ...
(NPD) started operation in 1962 and successfully demonstrated the unique concepts of on-power refuelling using natural uranium fuel, and heavy water moderator and coolant. These defining features formed the basis of a successful fleet of CANDU power reactors (CANDU is an acronym for CANada Deuterium Uranium) built and operated in Canada and elsewhere. In the late 1960s (1967–1970), Canada also developed an experimental ''miniature'' nuclear reactor named
SLOWPOKE Slowpoke or Slow Poke may refer to: * "Slow Poke", a 1951 American country music hit song * "Slowpoke", a song by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young * ''Slowpoke'' (comic strip), weekly comic strip by Jen Sorensen * Slowpoke (Pokémon), a fictional s ...
(acronym for Safe Low-Power Kritical Experiment). The first prototype was built at Chalk River and many SLOWPOKEs were subsequently built, mainly for research. This reactor design is extremely safe and requires almost no maintenance (it is even licensed to ''operate unattended overnight''); it can run for more than 20 years before the nuclear fuel needs replacement. There was an attempt at commercializing the reactor, as it could be used in remote areas or vehicles (research stations, electric-diesel submarines). Then, China entered the market with its SLOWPOKE-like reactor and thus, the project lost its commercial potential. Many SLOWPOKEs are still in use in Canada; there is one running at
École Polytechnique de Montréal École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education Secondary education or post-primary education covers two phases on the International Standard Classification of Education scal ...
, for instance.


Radioisotopes

The existence of Canada's early nuclear program, and in particular the powerful NRX research reactor, nurtured a medical isotope and nuclear medicine R&D community at several locations across the country. Canada pioneered the
cobalt-60 Cobalt-60 (60Co) is a synthetic radioactive isotope of cobalt with a half-life of 5.2713 years. It is produced artificially in nuclear reactors. Deliberate industrial production depends on neutron activation of bulk samples of the monoisot ...
cancer therapy technology that became standard medical practice throughout the world (the first cobalt-60 cancer therapy was administered at the Royal Victoria Hospital in London, Ontario on October 27, 1951), and has also been involved in the development of accelerator-based cancer therapy technology.


Framework

Natural Resources Canada Natural Resources Canada (NRCan; french: Ressources naturelles Canada; french: RNCan, label=none)Natural Resources Canada is the applied title under the Federal Identity Program; the legal title is Department of Natural Resources (). is the dep ...
oversees nuclear power R&D and regulation in Canada, with responsibility for the crown corporation
Atomic Energy of Canada Limited Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) is a Canadian federal Crown corporation and Canada's largest nuclear science and technology laboratory. AECL developed the CANDU reactor technology starting in the 1950s, and in October 2011 licensed this ...
(AECL) and the regulatory agency, the
Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC; french: Commission Canadienne de sûreté nucléaire) is the federal regulator of nuclear power and materials in Canada. Mandate and history Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission was established under t ...
(CNSC). AECL’s commercial operations include reactor development, design and construction of CANDU nuclear reactors, and provision of reactor services and technical support to CANDU reactors worldwide.


Power generation

The province of
Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...
dominates Canada's nuclear power industry, containing most of the country's nuclear power generating capacity. Ontario has 16 operating reactors providing about 50% of the province’s electricity, plus two reactors undergoing refurbishment.
New Brunswick New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...
also has one reactor. Overall, nuclear power provides about 15% of Canada's electricity. The industry employs about 21,000 people directly and 10,000 indirectly. There has been renewed interest in nuclear energy, spurred by increasing demand (particularly within Ontario), and the desire to comply with Canada’s Kyoto Agreement obligations, although Canada withdrew from the Kyoto Protocol in December 2012. (Canada was committed to cutting its greenhouse emissions to 6% below 1990 levels by 2012, but in 2009 emissions were 17% higher than in 1990. The Harper government prioritized oil sands development in Alberta, and deprioritized improving the environment.) []. The Government of Ontario proposed plans in 2004 to build several new nuclear reactors in the province. The leading candidate is AECL's Advanced CANDU Reactor. Environmental assessments are currently underway for one site next to
Bruce Power Bruce Power Limited Partnership is a Canadian business partnership composed of several corporations. It exists (as of 2015) as a partnership between TC Energy (31.6%), BPC Generation Infrastructure Trust (61.4%), the Power Workers Union (4%) and ...
's
Bruce Nuclear Generating Station Bruce Nuclear Generating Station is a nuclear power station located on the eastern shore of Lake Huron in Ontario, Canada. It occupies 932 ha (2300 acres) of land. The facility derives its name from Bruce Township, the local municipality when ...
in Tiverton and another next to
Ontario Power Generation Ontario Power Generation Inc. (OPG) is a Crown corporation and "government business enterprise" that is responsible for approximately half of the electricity generation in the province of Ontario, Canada. It is wholly owned by the governmen ...
's
Darlington Nuclear Generating Station Darlington Nuclear Generating Station is a Canadian nuclear power station located on the north shore of Lake Ontario in Clarington, Ontario. It is a large nuclear facility comprising four CANDU nuclear reactors with a total output of 3,512  ...
. Bruce Power has applied for a license to generate nuclear power at
Cardinal Lake Lac Cardinal is a lake in northwestern Alberta, Canada. It is located at the southern limit of Mackenzie Highway, near Grimshaw, Alberta, Grimshaw. Lac Cardinal has a total area of 50 km2. Its waters are drained through the ''Whitemud Rive ...
in the province of Alberta.


Medical radioisotopes

About 85% of the world's medical and industrial
cobalt-60 Cobalt-60 (60Co) is a synthetic radioactive isotope of cobalt with a half-life of 5.2713 years. It is produced artificially in nuclear reactors. Deliberate industrial production depends on neutron activation of bulk samples of the monoisot ...
is produced in Canada. The medical-use cobalt-60 is produced in the NRU research reactor at AECL's Chalk River Laboratories, while industrial-use cobalt-60 is produced in selected CANDU power reactors (in these units some adjuster rods are made of cobalt-59 for this purpose). Furthermore, over half the cobalt-60 therapy machines and medical sterilizers in the world were built in Canada, treating over half a million patients yearly. In addition to cobalt-60, MDS Nordion also produces radioisotopes that are essential in diagnostic therapy. Some can be mixed chemically with other substances and injected into the body to allow physicians to “see” into the body, even the brain, lungs and organs that hitherto were inaccessible. Not only have these diagnostic techniques eliminated the need for much exploratory surgery, they have provided physicians with diagnostic capabilities that would otherwise have been impossible. Mild irradiation is also used to sterilize many medical supplies and some pharmaceuticals. Canada was also a pioneer in the production of medical isotopes, and today is the world's biggest supplier of Molybdenum-99, the "workhorse" and most commonly used isotope in nuclear medicine. This isotope is generated in the NRU reactor; this is then shipped to MDS Nordion, a global supplier of radiopharmaceuticals based in Kanata, Ontario (near Ottawa). There are more than 4000 Mo-99 treatments daily in Canada, and 40,000 daily in the US. Canada produces about 30-40% of the global supply of
molybdenum-99 Molybdenum (42Mo) has 33 known isotopes, ranging in atomic mass from 83 to 115, as well as four metastable nuclear isomers. Seven isotopes occur naturally, with atomic masses of 92, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, and 100. All unstable isotopes of molybdenum ...
.


Uranium production

Canada is the world’s largest producer of uranium with about one third of world production coming from
Saskatchewan Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a province in western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on the south by the U.S. states of Montana and North Dak ...
mines. There are two major players in the
uranium mining Uranium mining is the process of extraction of uranium ore from the ground. Over 50 thousand tons of uranium were produced in 2019. Kazakhstan, Canada, and Australia were the top three uranium producers, respectively, and together account f ...
sector.
Cameco Cameco Corporation (formerly Canadian Mining and Energy Corporation) is the world's largest publicly traded uranium company, based in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. In 2015, it was the world's second largest uranium producer, accounting for 18 ...
operates the McArthur River mine, which started production at the end of 1999. Its ore is milled at
Key Lake The Key Lake mine is a former uranium mine in Saskatchewan, Canada. It is north of Saskatoon by air on the southern rim of the uranium-rich Athabasca Basin. Key Lake was initially developed to open-pit mine two nearby uranium ore deposits: the ...
, which once contributed 15% of world uranium production but is now mined out. Its other former mainstay is
Rabbit Lake mine Rabbit Lake is the second largest uranium milling facility in the western world, and is the longest operating uranium production facility in Saskatchewan. The facility is located approximately 800 km north of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, on the n ...
, which still has some reserves at Eagle Point mine, where mining resumed in mid-2002 after a three-year break. An underground reserve replacement program is adding to reserves faster than they are being mined. Areva Resources Canada operates the
McClean Lake mine The McClean Lake mine is a uranium mine and milling operation located west of Wollaston Lake, about 700 kilometres north of Saskatoon, in the Athabasca Basin region of Saskatchewan, Canada. The McClean ore body was discovered in 1979, followed by t ...
, which started production in mid-1999. Its Cluff Lake mine has now closed, and is being decommissioned. In December 2004, the Cigar Lake Joint Venture (AREVA Resources Canada 37.1%, Cameco Corporation 50.025%, Idemitsu Uranium Exploration Canada Ltd. 7.875%, and TEPCO Resources 5%) partners agreed to proceed with development of the Cigar Lake uranium mine -the second largest known high-grade uranium deposit in the world, after McArthur River. With federal and provincial approvals in place, full construction began in January 2005. All of Canada's uranium production now comes from the high-grade unconformity-type uranium deposits of the
Athabasca Basin The Athabasca Basin is a region in the Canadian Shield of northern Saskatchewan and Alberta, Canada. It is best known as the world's leading source of high-grade uranium and currently supplies about 20% of the world's uranium. The basin i ...
of northern Saskatchewan, such as Rabbit Lake, McClean Lake, McArthur River, and Cigar Lake. The uranium industry invested at least CDN $3.5 billion during the 20th century, with capital investment in mines of CDN $2.5 billion, and exploration and predevelopment expenditures exceeding CDN $1 billion. Adjusting for inflation, there have been three investment booms. The first small one came with the initial developments in the Beaverlodge area in the 1950s. The second and largest boom was in the 1970s, with the opening of the Cluff and Rabbit lake mines, and the third was in the 1990s with the development of the higher grade ores on the east side.


Nuclear waste management

Radioactive waste in Canada can be grouped into three broad categories: nuclear fuel waste, low-level radioactive waste, and uranium mill tailings. The most recent inventory of these wastes is provided in the LLRWMO 2004 report. At the end of 2003, the total amount of nuclear fuel waste was 6,800 m3. Canada’s
used nuclear fuel Spent nuclear fuel, occasionally called used nuclear fuel, is nuclear fuel that has been irradiated in a nuclear reactor (usually at a nuclear power plant). It is no longer useful in sustaining a nuclear reaction in an ordinary thermal reactor and ...
is now safely stored at licensed facilities at the reactor sites. On site storage options are expected to perform well over the near term; however, existing reactor sites were not chosen for their suitability as permanent storage sites. Furthermore, the communities hosting the nuclear reactors have a reasonable expectation that used nuclear fuel will eventually be moved. In 2002 the Government of Canada passed the Nuclear Fuel Waste Act, requiring the owners of used nuclear fuel to create the Canada's Nuclear Waste Management Organisation (NWMO). This Act required that the NWMO engage citizens, specialists, stakeholders and the Aboriginal peoples in research and dialogue to assess the options for long-term management of this material. In 2005, the NWMO recommended "Adaptive Phased Management" as the foundation for managing the risks and uncertainties that are inherent in the very long time frames over which used nuclear fuel must be managed. In 2007, the Government of Canada approved this approach, and authorized NWMO to begin implementation.Natural Resources Canada News Room - News Release 2007-06-14
In summary the program commits Canada to the first steps to manage the used nuclear fuel it has created. It espouses sequential and collaborative decision-making to provide flexibility to adapt to experience and technical change. It aims to provide a viable, safe and secure long-term storage solution, with the potential of retrieving used fuel until and if and when a decision is made to seal the facility permanently. It is meant to provide the capacity to transfer responsibility from one generation to the next. The key technical element of the approach is the ultimate centralized containment and isolation of the used fuel and other high level waste in a
deep geological repository A deep geological repository is a way of storing hazardous or radioactive waste within a stable geologic environment (typically 200–1000 m deep). It entails a combination of waste form, waste package, engineered seals and geology that is suite ...
in a suitable rock formation, such as the crystalline rock of the Canadian Shield or
Ordovician The Ordovician ( ) is a geologic period and system, the second of six periods of the Paleozoic Era. The Ordovician spans 41.6 million years from the end of the Cambrian Period million years ago (Mya) to the start of the Silurian Period Mya. T ...
sedimentary rock.


See also

*
List of Canadian nuclear facilities Nuclear power in Canada is provided by 19 commercial reactors with a net capacity of 13.5 gigawatt (GW), producing a total of 95.6 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity, which accounted for 16.6% of the country's total electric energy generation i ...
*
Canadian Nuclear Association The Canadian Nuclear Association (CNA), founded in 1960, is the trade association for the nuclear industry in Canada. The CNA undertakes several advocacy tasks related to nuclear technology in Canada, such as participating in relevant regulatory a ...
*
Atomic Energy of Canada Limited Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) is a Canadian federal Crown corporation and Canada's largest nuclear science and technology laboratory. AECL developed the CANDU reactor technology starting in the 1950s, and in October 2011 licensed this ...
*
Canada and weapons of mass destruction Canada has not officially maintained and possessed weapons of mass destruction since 1984 and, as of 1998, has signed treaties repudiating possession of them. Canada ratified the Geneva Protocol in 1930 and the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty ...
*
Energy Alberta Corporation Energy Alberta Corporation was created in 2005 with a concept to provide nuclear power to the energy-intensive development of the oil sands resources in northern Alberta, Canada. The company was founded by Hank Swartout, CEO of Precision Drilling ...
*
Pembina Institute The Pembina Institute is a Canadian think tank and registered charity focused on energy. Founded in 1985, the institute has offices in Calgary, Edmonton, Toronto, Ottawa, and Vancouver. The institute's mission is to "advance a prosperous clean en ...
*
Anti-nuclear movement in Canada Canada has an active anti-nuclear movement, which includes major campaigning organisations like Greenpeace and the Sierra Club. Over 300 public interest groups across Canada have endorsed the mandate of the Campaign for Nuclear Phaseout (CNP). Som ...
*
Science and technology in Canada Science and technology in Canada consists of three distinct but closely related phenomena: * the diffusion of technology in Canada * scientific research in Canada * innovation, invention and industrial research in Canada In 2019, Canada spent ...


References


Further reading

* * *


External links


The Canadian Nuclear FAQ

The Canadian Nuclear Society

The Society for the Preservation of Canada's Nuclear Heritage, Inc.

Summary of the Nuclear Waste Management's Organizations findings on dealing with Canada's nuclear waste

"Entering the Nuclear Age" (Legion Magazine, Sept/Oct 2003)

"Economic Impact of the Nuclear Industry in Canada" (Canadian Energy Research Institute, 2003)

"Nuclear Power in Canada: An Examination of Risks, Impacts and Sustainability" (Pembina Institute, 2006)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nuclear Industry In Canada Nuclear technology in Canada Industry in Canada