NUCLEAR EMERGENCY PLANS must…

NUCLEAR EMERGENCY PLANS must address all case scenarios. How does the PNERP protect you and I in the event of a major accident at each or every nuclear generating plant - both in Ontario and the USA - in the area of the Great Lakes? Fukushima was not anticipated and the results are a disaster and a shame on the governments, agencies and companies involved.

In the past decades it has been consistently shown that weak and/or self-regulation fail citizens. Do you want to 'own' a Fukushima-type disaster? In risk management terms, the recognized probability has risen a lot since Fukushima, and clearly the costs for all of us is huge. The price of prevention and adequate mitigation is a public burden, yes, but it is the responsibility of government to face the public squarely and say 'we must prepare responsibly'.

I am concerned that the Ontario plan has not risen to the real challenge as revealed by the Fukushima accident, as have other more responsible jurisdictions, such as Switzerland.

I support recommendations that:

The government should publish modelling on the impacts of a Fukushima-scale accident before it provides final approval for its plan to continue operating Pickering in 2018. The government should develop the capacity to independently model nuclear accidents in order to ensure the ongoing adequacy of offsite plans. The government should require provincial and municipal authorities to inform residents and businesses in the 50 km Secondary Zone of the availability of potassium iodide and the desirability of including it in their home or institutional emergency kit. The government needs to require those authorities to conduct detailed planning to ensure that evacuation can effectively be carried out in the full newly proposed contingency planning zone as well as into the secondary zone, especially for vulnerable communities. The government should study and publish modelling of drinking water source contamination in the areas around the Bruce, Darlington and Pickering nuclear plants in the event of a major accident, examine appropriate response measures, and develop a plan to ensure that contingency drinking water supplies will be available in the case of such an accident. The government should use its drinking water protection jurisdiction to ensure that the Great Lakes and other sources of water are protected by requiring contingency plans including contaminated water storage and isolation. The government needs to study and propose guidelines for land recovery and return before 2018, when the Pickering Nuclear GeneratingStation is due for another federal safety licensing review. The government should ensure all meetings and consultations with industry on nuclear emergency matters can be scrutinized by the public. A revised nuclear emergency plan should make public consultation and pro-active disclosure mandatory on a rigorous and regular schedule, with updated information including population density and land use.

[Original Comment ID: 210419]