The nuclear industry is aggressively targeting northern communities to become a dump for high level radioactive wastes. These wastes are a bi-product of nuclear power reactors located in other provinces and potentially other countries.
Radioactive wastes created by nuclear power plants are among the most toxic and long-lived on the planet, and the transportation and centralized, deep geological storage of these wastes is not ecologically-safe.
The risks and costs for us and future generations that would arise from a nuclear waste dump in the north are unacceptable.
Nuclear wastes should be managed in the jurisdictions that create them. The waste should be kept in upgraded, hardened, secure storage, on-site or near reactors. Northern communities that face economic hardships should not be bribed to accept a nuclear dump in their watersheds, boreal ecosystems or treaty areas. All the people of Saskatchewan have the democratic right to determine whether or not Saskatchewan becomes a nuclear dump.
Transporting high-level nuclear waste for thousands of miles through our communities and farmland can endanger people, wildlife and farm products along the route. Rather than allowing the industry’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO) to continue with its one-sided, high-priced, behind-the-scene promotions, our province should follow the lead of Manitoba and legislate a nuclear waste ban.