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L'entreprise SRB Technologies
26 juin 2008
La Commission canadienne de sûreté nucléaire (CCSN) annonce sa décision de délivrer un permis d’exploitation à SRB Technologies (Canada) Inc.
À la suite d’une audience publique de deux jours, tenue le 3 avril et le 12 juin 2008 à Ottawa (Ontario), la Commission canadienne de sûreté nucléaire (CCSN) a annoncé, aujourd’hui, sa décision de délivrer un permis d’exploitation de deux ans à SRB Technologies (Canada) Inc. (SRBT). Le permis autorisera SRBT à reprendre ses activités de traitement à son installation de catégorie IB située à Pembroke (Ontario). Lisez l’information ici
12 avril 2007
La Commission canadienne de sûreté nucléaire (CCSN) tiendra une audience publique d’un jour afin d’étudier la demande de SRB Technologies (Canada) Inc. (SRBT) visant à modifier son permis de possession pour une installation de traitement des substances nucléaires pour son installation située à Pembroke (Ontario). SRBT a demandé l’autorisation de recevoir des sources lumineuses au tritium pour l’assemblage et la vente d’appareils à rayonnement.
Audience : 12 avril 2007
Lieu : Salle des audiences publiques de la CCSN, 14e étage, 280, rue Slater, Ottawa (Ontario)
Le public est invité à commenter la demande de modification du permis de SRBT par voie de mémoire. Le public n’aura pas l’occasion de faire des présentations orales lors de l’audience; cependant, il est invité à observer l’audience.
Les demandes d’intervention doivent être déposées auprès du secrétaire de la Commission au plus tard le 28 mars 2007.
Consultez l’avis d’audience publique de la CCSN.
Consultez les commentaires de Sentinelle Outaouais addressée à la CCSN à propos de la demande de SRBT, Riverkeeper Letter to CNSC [pdf file: 0.29mb]
Lisez les manchettes parues à propos de ce dossier.
La décision récente de la Commission canadienne de sûreté nucléaire (CCSN) justifie les préoccupations de Sentinelle Outaouais, du groupe de citoyens du comté de Renfrew et de plusieurs autres personnes en ce qui a trait à la contamination continuelle aux installations de l’entreprise SRB. D’ailleurs, la décision de 35 pages de la CCSN fait souvent état de l’intervention de Sentinelle Outaouais.
Le tribunal de la CCSN a pris les mesures qui s’imposaient, mais Sentinelle Outaouais aimerait bien savoir pourquoi la situation en est venue à ce stade. Les problèmes de contamination étaient dans la mire de la CCSN depuis très longtemps et la sécurité publique était à risque malgré le mandat de la CCSN, qui est de protéger la santé et l’environnement. Sentinelle Outaouais ne comprend toujours pas pourquoi les autorités de réglementation ont même songé à étudier le plan de l’entreprise SRB, qui consistait à faire dériver des eaux contaminées au tritium vers l’usine de traitement des eaux usées de la ville de Pembroke.
November 30, 2006: CNSC Announces Interim Decision to Extend SRB Technologies (Canada) Inc.’s Current Operating Licence For A Two-Month PeriodOttawa Riverkeeper spent 11 hours on Monday November 27th at a “public hearing” of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC). The hearing was a judicial review where Commissioners heard evidence as to whether or not SRB Technologies should receive a renewed license to process tritium at its current location in the Town of Pembroke. At present the groundwater contamination at the site is so severe that the company is operating under several restrictions.
Background information about the tritium releases and SRBT’s plan to send contaminated water to the Town of Pembroke’s waste water treatment plant (which dumps into the Ottawa River) can be found on this page if you scroll down.
Ottawa Riverkeeper’s submission to intervene at the hearing with an Oral Presentation can be found here.
The first 5 hours of the hearing consisted of presentations from SRB Technologies and staff of the CNSC. After each presentation the Commission’s Review Panel asks tough questions that SRBT and CNSC staff must answer. There was an abundance of interesting information to note during this question period and what jumped out at me as being important and relevant is:
- SRBT has received an E grade rating for their emission control (largely due to the groundwater contamination issue) and the commission has never before dealt with an E grade rating. To achieve a B grade rating (what most facilities have) means that you have identified the major pollution sources, quantified them and you are monitoring them. You can have a B grade rating even though you are taking no steps to reduce your emissions.
- SRBT’s plan to mix their contaminated water with the Town of Pembroke’s sewage will not trigger an Environmental Assessment. CNSC staff have justified this exemption from CEAA stating that this plan is a “response to an emergency” (section 7.1C) and that it is “in the best interest of public health and safety” (section 7.1A). Ottawa Riverkeeper finds this justification perverse since this statement confirms that the commission has acknowledged an emergency situation where the public health and safety is at risk. Why is there no consideration given to the most obvious option – rescind the operating licence?
- Monitoring: On-site wells are being monitored monthly and off-site wells every 4 months. They will begin to do quarterly sampling in the river. It appears there is an upward trend of tritium discharge into the Ottawa River however the CNSC staff warned that they are operating right at the method detection limit of 6 Bq/L. There is no plan and no requirement to make the monitoring information available to the public.
- There is currently no plan or funding in place for a financial guarantee. A financial guarantee is basically a requirement so that if the company shuts its doors there is money in the bank to clean up the site. If or when SRBT leaves town, guess who will foot the bill to clean up their contaminated mess…you! (Canadian tax payers)
- The Town of Pembroke appears to be placing too much blind faith in SRBT and the CNSC. They will have to make a few exceptions to their municipal bylaws to allow SRBT to carry out their Precipitation Diversion System and they are relying the decision of the CNSC to guide their decision.
- The Ontario Ministry of the Environment was represented by a team of four at the hearings and they shed some light on well use that highlighted errors in assumptions that SRBT and CNSC had made.
- There are no plans or intentions to control emissions at the source, all of the proposed plans are mere “Band-Aid” solutions that will “stir” the tritium up. By this I mean that they may decrease the groundwater contamination but only at the expense of the surface water quality in the Ottawa River.
Although day 2 of the hearings are touted as being for the public, it wasn’t until 2 pm that the Commission began to hear oral presentations from the intervenors. There were 93 interventions on the agenda (a combination of oral and written) and each intervenor is given a mere 10 minutes before the panel. If you are interested in reading submissions from any of the intervenors you can request them from the CNSC.
Interesting intervenors to make note of:
Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County: Dr. Ole Hendrickson has been working tirelessly on this issue for over a decade. He was the only intervenor to be allowed to present on both days of the hearings. He and his lawyer from CELA emphasized the perverse use of the CEAA exemptions as well as the grave consequences of the CNSC staff recommendation to remove important restrictions under which SRB has been operating for the last year. These operating restrictions have reduced emissions over the past year.
Graeme Brown from Port Hope spoke about the massive pile of contaminated sewage sludge that they are now dealing with in Port Hope.
Dr. Rosalie Bertell, an expert in radiation and radionuclides clearly explained that the CNSC’s models for calculating “DOSE” are not health based and underestimate the harm caused by tritium to human health by 20 times.
Charles Caccia gave a fantastic intervention in which he clearly stated that democracy and transparency are essential for good decision-making. He also stated that Canada’s 7,000 Bq/l guideline for tritium in drinking water is in urgent need of revision, given that other jurisdictions such as the European Union use 100 Bq/l and the scientific advisory committee that reviewed the evidence in Ontario in 1994 recommended 20 Bq/l. When Linda made a dismissive statement at the end of his intervention about the public being confused, Mr. Caccia came back with “With all due respect Madam President, the public is NOT confused”.
Pembroke residents gave powerful presentations about the levels of tritium contamination measured in their home grown vegetables. They can no longer have gardens in their own backyards since eating the vegetables will put them at a considerable risk for cancer…a risk they are no longer willing to take.
The entire CNSC procedure is daunting and humiliating to say the least. The Commission’s Review Panel obviously begins to lose focus after 6 or 7 hours and it feels like the public is talking at a brick wall. However, I am constantly reminded by more experienced intervenors and lawyers that it is important to have all evidence or testimony put on the record for future public inquiry.
I try to keep focused on the ecological health issues but I can’t help but asking broader questions. The public and the town of Pembroke take all the risks and SRB Technologies reap all the rewards. There has got to be more to this case… who is the real winner and is there more than glow-in-the-dark signs at stake?
Background
SRB Technologies uses tritium to make signs that glow-in-the-dark. They have been operating in Pembroke long enough to seriously contaminate the soil and groundwater around the plant. Nuclear safety inspectors have found groundwater around the facility contaminated with radioactivity levels up to 80 times higher than what is considered safe.
SRB’s operating licence expires on November 30th and they are applying to the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission to renew their licence. Their plan to address current pollution problems is to collect contaminated rainwater from their roof and discharge it into the Ottawa River through the Pembroke city sewer system – a system not designed to handle radioactive tritium.
In the plan, filed with regulators at the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, the company says its proposal is safe for people and the environment because the radioactivity would be diluted with all the city’s sewage and then have a further “immediate and substantial dilution upon discharge to the environment [the Ottawa River].” According to calculations in the company’s plan, the contaminated water collected must be diluted 300 times in order to meet safe radioactivity levels specified by drinking water guidelines. The CNSC staff issued a report saying they approve of the cleanup idea, but are refusing to comment because the proposal is the subject of a hearing scheduled next week on the renewal of SRB’s operating licence.
Ottawa Riverkeeper believes that SRBT’s plan to pump highly-contaminated stack drippings and groundwater into Pembroke’s sewer system is a bad idea for everyone involved. It puts the municipality of Pembroke at risk as they are liable for the waste that leaves their sewage treatment plant. It puts the Ottawa River at risk and therefore not only the aquatic ecosystem, but also those of us who drink water from the river. It also puts the credibility of the CNSC at risk if they approve such a plan with unknown risk and grant an extended operating licence to a company with such a poor track record with respect to environmental protection.
Ottawa Riverkeeper cannot believe the “solution to pollution is dilution” mentality is still alive and well. It is important to note that it is not the concentration of these radionucleides that we need to be concerned about, but total loading over time. Dilution of the waste will not lessen the environmental or health impact. These wastes are bioaccumulative and they build up over time in organisms.
See the related news items on this topic:Pembroke firm pledges to improve record on handling tritium
Valley awash in pollution fears
SRB hearing continues on Monday
Inspections of sign firm urged
Company plans to dump radioactive waste into Ottawa River
SRB Technologies seeks glow of approval from Nuclear Safety Commission
Firm hoping sewage mix dilutes radioactive water
Dr. Rosalie Bertell on the Dangers of Radioactive Waste
TAKE ACTION
SRBT’s current license expires on November 30th. There is a public hearing planned at the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission on November 27th. At this hearing Commissioners will hear evidence and opinions as to whether or not and if so, for how long, SRBT should receive a license to process tritium at its current location in the City of Pembroke.
This is our chance to voice our opinions and tell the Commissioners what we think. Mostly in the past, the Commission has heard from SRBT, its staff and other vocal supporters like the City of Pembroke. The Commission really needs to hear from others in the community about their concerns. Ottawa Riverkeeper will be presenting a case to the Commission, urging them to address the pollution issue at the SRBT site and forbid the diversion of the contaminated wastewater into Pembroke’s sewage treatment facility.
Please consider intervening at this hearing!Interventions can be in the form of a letter expressing your views, or an oral presentation. Oral presentations are limited to 10 minutes and are usually made in person before the Commission in the public hearing room at the CNSC’s offices in Ottawa on the day of the hearing.
If you wish to make an intervention, whether written or oral, you must submit your request to intervene in writing by November 16th to:
Commission Secretariat
Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission
280 Slater St.
P.O. Box 1046, Station B
Ottawa, ON K1P 5S9
E-mail: interventions@cnsc-ccsn.gc.caFor more information on how to intervene, see the CNSC’s website http://www.nuclearsafety.gc.ca/eng/commission_hearings/participation/
Members of Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County do not believe SRBT should receive a license at this time. Here are their top six reasons why SRBT should not get its license renewed to process tritium at its current location in the City of Pembroke.
1- the company has seriously polluted groundwater in Pembroke with tritium; it is likely that contamination will continue to increase if tritium emissions are allowed to continue (because of tritium’s long half-life, even with no further emissions, it will take over one hundred years for the existing contamination to decrease to background levels)
2- the company does not yet have an approved decommissioning plan and has not posted a financial guarantee for decommissioning, even though as a Class 1 Nuclear facility, it was required to do so under the new Nuclear Safety and Control Act that came into force in 2000
3- SRBT’s proposed plan for dealing with highly-contaminated stack drippings and groundwater is to dump them into Pembroke’s municipal sewer system thereby contaminating the sewer system, the treatment plant, sewage sludge and the Ottawa River.
4- the company and CNSC staff admitted recently that there is no model that can accurately predict the behaviour of SRBT’s tritium emissions within a 200 meter radius of the plant; thus there is no way to control exposures to members of the public who, live, work, play and travel in (or very close to) this circle; the company should not have been located where it is and should be relocated to an alternate location where an appropriate buffer zone exists or can be created
5- tritium is a radioactive form of hydrogen that readily combines with oxygen to make a radioactive form of water; tritiated water goes everywhere that water goes in the environment and in the human body; tritium has a particular affinity for genetic material and, once incorporated into biological molecules such as DNA, can cause birth defects, genetic mutations, cancer and many other health problems; there should be no routine emissions of this persistent radioactive toxin in populated areas
6- although SRBT’s operations have been restricted in the past year by the CNSC and its emissions have been reduced significantly as a result, these emissions are still high by standards in other jurisdictions
Imprimer