Unsafe highways and uncertain storage mean far too great a risk to the North, the watershed and the Great Lakes

I am writing to express my strong opposition to the proposed Deep Geological Repository (DGR) for Canada’s used nuclear fuel in Northwestern Ontario. My concerns are rooted in the significant transportation risks associated with moving highly radioactive waste through Northern Ontario, the uncertainty surrounding the long-term integrity of the repository itself, and the unacceptable risk posed to the watershed connected to the Great Lakes. This consultation process has also been inadequate thus far.

One of the most serious issues with this proposal is the transportation of nuclear waste along Highways 11 and 17. These highways are already widely known to be dangerous transportation corridors. Residents of Northern Ontario regularly witness serious accidents involving commercial transport vehicles, including transport trucks leaving the roadway, jackknifing, rollovers, and collisions during poor weather conditions. These highways experience extreme winter conditions for much of the year, including snow, ice, freezing rain, whiteouts, and reduced visibility. In many stretches, the highways remain outdated in design, narrow, poorly maintained, and insufficient for the increasing volume of heavy commercial traffic they now carry.

Northern Ontario communities have repeatedly experienced tragedies on these highways. Concerns about unsafe commercial driving practices, inadequate driver training, fatigue, and inconsistent enforcement are already at a critical level. Adding shipments of highly radioactive nuclear waste to these transportation corridors introduces an unacceptable level of risk. Even if the probability of a severe transportation accident is statistically low, the consequences of such an event could be catastrophic for nearby communities, emergency responders, waterways, and entire ecosystems.

I am also concerned that the long-term safety of the repository itself cannot be guaranteed.  Deep geological storage is billed as a permanent solution, but no human-engineered system can honestly guarantee containment over the extremely long timescales required for radioactive waste. Geological conditions change. Water moves through rock formations. Engineered barriers degrade. Climate conditions shift over centuries and millennia.

This uncertainty is especially troubling because Northwestern Ontario contains an interconnected watershed system that ultimately flows into the Great Lakes, one of the most important freshwater systems in the world. A leak may not become apparent for generations, but the environmental consequences could be permanent. The Great Lakes provide drinking water, ecological habitat, recreation, and economic support for millions of people in Canada and the United States. The risks associated with potential contamination are simply too great.

The burden of transporting and storing Canada’s nuclear waste should not be placed on Northern Ontario communities and watersheds without virtual certainty of safety — and such certainty does not exist. Given the known dangers of Highways 11 and 17, the long-term uncertainties surrounding geological containment, and the vulnerability of the Great Lakes watershed, I urge the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada to reject this proposal.

I also have serious concerns about the consultation and public engagement process itself. I only became aware of this proposal and comment period because a third party paid to place advertisements on social media. A project of this magnitude — involving the long-term storage and transportation of highly radioactive nuclear waste — should involve a highly visible, accessible, and proactive public engagement process. I was shocked to learn that an earlier public comment period had already passed. Many residents who would be directly affected by transportation routes, watershed impacts, or emergency response risks appear to have had little meaningful opportunity to participate. Public confidence cannot exist when awareness of the consultation process itself is so limited. A project with potentially irreversible environmental consequences requires broad, transparent, and well-publicized engagement that actively reaches affected communities rather than relying on citizens to discover the process by chance.