Blind River Uranium Refinery Hearing Underway (& Live webcast)
Courtesy Northwatch
At the Port Hope conversion facility UF6 in a cylinder is loaded for shipping to an enrichment plant where it is transformed into the fuel used in most conventional nuclear reactors. In 2002, both Port Hope and Blind River facilities were awarded five-year operating licences from the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. These are the longest licences ever awarded to a Canadian uranium processing facility. Photo courtesy Cameco Corp.
Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission Reviews Cameco’s Application for Ten Year License
2011 CNSC Hearing regarding relocation and long-term management of low-level radioactive waste from the shore of Lake Ontario. Photo courtesy PHAI.ca
PORT HOPE, ON – Cameco Corporation is asking the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission to double the license period and allow a one-third increase in production at its uranium refinery in Blind River during a one day license hearing underway in Port Hope today. Public interveners are arguing that the Commission should reduce the license term from its current five year period and refuse the increase in production due to concerns about the contamination from the facility. The operation is the largest uranium refinery in the world, and includes a facility that refines uranium yellowcake into uranium trioxide and burns uranium contaminated waste and oil from Cameco’s facilities in Blind River and Port Hope in the on-site incinerator.
In the application by Cameco Corporation (Cameco) to renew its Fuel Facility Operating Licence, Cameco has requested a 10-year licence term. The current licence authorizes Cameco to produce up to 18,000 tonnes of uranium as UO3 powder during any calendar year. Cameco is requesting that the licence be amended to include an annual production increase of 6,000 tonnes of UO3 powder.
Northwatch, the International Institute of Concern for Public Health and Serpent River First Nation are scheduled to present in the early afternoon, following representations by staff from the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission and Cameco Corporation beginning at 11 a.m. All presentations will be broadcast on the internet.
Northwatch and the Serpent River First Nation have each retained technical experts to assist in their review of Cameco’s application, and have provided the Commission with several reports which will be summarized during their presentations. Northwatch also had a number of soil samples collected and analyzed from the near vicinity of the refinery.
“Our concern is that environmental impacts and the risk to human health are on the increase with the Blind River refinery, and a ten year license and increased production will only exacerbate the situation”, explained Brennain Lloyd, project coordinator with Northwatch.
“During the last license period Cameco was allowed to start burning radioactive waste from the Port Hope uranium conversion plant in Blind River, and they added uranium contaminated oil to the wastes they were already burning from the refinery. During the same period, we’ve seen an increase in the uranium concentrations in the soil in the vicinity of the plant, which indicates that pollution levels are on the increase, at least when it comes to uranium. Given that uranium is both a toxicological and radiological hazard, that’s a concern”.
During license hearings for Cameco’s uranium fuel conversion and fuel manufacturing operations in Port Hope on Tuesday and Wednesday it was disclosed that Cameco has a preliminary plan to send the decommissioning wastes from Port Hope to to a “hypothetical” facility in Blind River, and is considering sending stockpiled wastes from its recently purchased fuel manufacturing facility to Blind River for incineration.
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MORE INFO
- Learn more about Northwatch
- Learn more about Serpent River First Nation
- Learn more about Cameco Corporation
CAMECO URANIUM REFINERY Blind River, Ontario
- world’s largest commercial uranium refinery
- 100% owned by Cameco
- includes a uranium trioxide (UO3) processing plant, water treatment plant, power plant, nitric acid recovery system and analytical lab services
- refinery produces UO3, a high-purity intermediate product, shipped to Cameco’s Port Hope conversion facility for further processing
- licensed production capacity of 18,000 tonnes of uranium per year
- receives drums of uranium ore concentrates from mines around the world including in Canada, Australia and the United States
- achieved International Standards Organization (ISO) 14001 certification for environmental management systems in 2002
- shipping UO3 to Springfields, UK for toll conversion to UF6 – utilizing unused production capacity
