Nuclear Energy is Not a Solution to Climate Change
Nuclear energy is not a feasible solution for a number of reasons:
its high cost relative to renewables
the inability to replace fossil fuels in time to mitigate the crisis
pollution is created during all stages of the nuclear cycle
the problem of nuclear waste management and links to nuclear weapons proliferation.
Nuclear is quite simply the slowest, dirtiest and most expensive response to the climate crisis.
Nuclear is expensive
Nuclear energy is one of the most costly methods of generating electricity and relies heavily on government investment (World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2024, 369-371).
Worldwide, the nuclear industry has historically been plagued by massive cost overruns for new builds and plant operations (WNISR 2024, 58-64).
Here in Canada, Ontario taxpayers have been saddled with the debt retirement of the last big nuclear investment, resulting in significantly higher electricity rates than neighbouring Manitoba and Quebec that don’t use nuclear energy.
The Ontario Clean Air Alliance shows that renewable sources like wind and solar power are far less expensive (options2024-april.pdf).
Nuclear is slow
Nuclear plants take years or sometimes decades to be licensed and built.
They can not be brought online soon enough to meet our critical greenhouse gas reduction targets required by 2030.
In contrast, solar panels and wind turbines are ready-to-go technologies, taking weeks or months to deploy.
In tandem with energy efficiency measures, storage and smart grid technology, renewable sources of energy are the smart and timely investment.
In contrast to industry claims, nuclear energy is not clean, nor is it emissions free. Nuclear energy requires uranium as a fuel – its mining, processing and transportation all create carbon emissions and pollution.
At all stages of the nuclear fuel chain even during routine operations, toxic and carcinogenic elements are emitted into air and water.
Nuclear power produces radioactive waste that requires complex containment in perpetuity.
See an October 2024 joint application to the Competition Bureau for more information.
Catastrophic accidents, such as at Fukushima or Chernobyl, render huge swaths of land uninhabitable.
Radioactive waste is a dangerous legacy
Since the 1940s, nuclear waste has been temporarily stored close to reactor sites. It must be shielded and isolated from the environment forever. The industry’s favoured proposed solution, which is still untested, is to bury the waste deep in bedrock, back-fill the excavation, monitor for a period, then effectively abandon it.
One proposed site is between Ignace and Dryden in NW Ontario, on watersheds that drain into Lake of the Woods and Lake Winnipeg.
When the waste containers inevitably break down and release radioactive isotopes into the groundwater, it’s only a matter of time before the connected surface water becomes contaminated.
A transportation accident, or a spill at the surface of the proposed site will hasten the contamination risk.
With 132,000 thousand tonnes currently in storage, new nuclear will only add to this toxic legacy.
SMRs (or new generation reactors) are being heavily promoted by some governments and industry as a solution to climate change, especially for remote communities and heavy industry.
To date, they are concepts, and not in commercial use anywhere.
SMRs will be costlier than large reactors per unit of energy generated, and many of the models being proposed would use new fuels and create novel forms of nuclear waste.
No strategies are in place for management of these wastes, yet they are being touted as an export possibility for Canada.
There are direct links to nuclear weapons proliferation
Civilian nuclear power was developed as an offshoot of the weapons production that started in WW2. Civilian and military applications worldwide are still widely interconnected through supply chains, investment and infrastructure.
Nuclear weapons require fissile material, such as the plutonium created by CANDU nuclear reactors and highly enriched uranium.
Until recently, Canada has implicitly frowned on plutonium separation technology as a weapons proliferation risk. With some SMR designs calling for nuclear fuel reprocessing to separate plutonium, and others requiring enrichment of uranium, these risks are seriously increased.
