Canada’s Nuclear Cesspool and its Academic Whores

[Oscar]

Canada’s Nuclear Cesspool and its Academic Whores

by Pat McNamara September 2013

The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) is holding hearings in northern Saskatchewan this week on uranium mines which have grossly contaminated so many watersheds and people in the province for the past 65 years. The nuclear industry and the CNSC will trot out their “experts” to assure us the mines will cause no harm to people or the environment and CNSC President/Commissioner Michael Binder will do everything he can to prevent residents from having their questions answered. The only change I’ve seen over the years is that the Commissioners don’t even make a pretense of impartiality any more. Integrity left the commission along with Commissioner Barnes. The hearings are but a charade as the decisions have already been made.

Before proceeding, I’d like to thank Prime Minister Harper for appointing Michael Binder to a second term as president of the CNSC. Before you think I’ve flipped my lid, consider that when Mr. Binder took the helm of the CNSC, the nuclear renaissance was at its peak with plans to build 13 reactors in Canada and to expand into all parts of the nuclear fuel chain, including reprocessing. Under his leadership, all of the reactor plans were shelved, the Quebec government shut down its only reactor, all talk of reprocessing stopped and opposition to uranium mining spread across the country. Michael Binder’s dishonesty, incompetence and/or corrupt behavior have been a blessing to the anti-nuclear movement.

NUCLEAR COMPANIES BREAKING THE LAW

Mr. Binder can’t be given all the credit for the decline of the industry during his presidency. The nuclear industry has been its own worst enemy due to their illegal activities which the Canadian public is starting to find out about. The owners of Candu reactors, our crown nuclear corporation and the largest supplier of uranium have been investigated and charged with tax evasion, fraud, bid-rigging and bribery.

Cameco has been investigated by Canada Revenue Agency since 2008 for avoiding paying more than $800 million in taxes to the federal government. In addition to the lost tax revenue, taxpayers are on the hook for the cost of investigating and pursuing this matter. Now we know how Cameco could afford to be so “generous” in Saskatchewan and Port Hope. The money for their donations was coming out of taxpayer pockets. It should be mentioned that Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall has been fully supportive of Cameco and its way of doing business. Premier Wall was quoted during his speech at the premier’s dinner on March 21 in St. Albert saying “You know, the best program for First Nations and Metis people in Saskatchewan is not a program at all – it’s Cameco.”

It will be no surprise to anyone that Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) has been caught breaking the law again. In this case, it’s former employees of the crown corporation who are blowing the whistle on senior managers for bid-rigging. The whole thing was being covered up until the CBC “learned that an extensive, months-long investigation into procurement at the nuclear agency by auditing firm Deloitte has been kept quiet for nearly five years.” AECL and Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver refuse to comment on the matter citing the fact that AECL is facing an $18.5 million lawsuit by CanForge for not following proper tendering processes.

The final paragraph of the CBC report on AECL bid-rigging segues into the next corporate lawbreaker: “The procurement department that was investigated is no longer a government entity. The federal government sold AECL's Candu reactor business to Montreal-based engineering giant SNC-Lavalin in June 2011 for $15 million.” [http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/aecl-sold-for-15m-to-snc-lavalin-1.985786 ]

I’ll just touch on some of SNC Lavalin’s illegal activities in point form as there’s too much to cover here.

- SNC Lavalin was implicated in the Charbonneau Commission Inquiry as part of a bid-rigging scam involving construction projects in Montreal and Longueuil Quebec.

- SNC Lavalin senior vice-president Kevin Wallace has been charged with being part of a bribery scheme on a three billion dollar project in Bangladesh

- SNC Lavalin employees Mohammad Ismail and Ramesh Shah were charged by police in 2012, with conspiring to pay bribes to win contracts on the Padma Bridge project.

- The World Bank announced in April 2013, that it had uncovered evidence that SNC ‘conspired to bribe public officials in Cambodia’.

- Senior SNC Lavalin executives have been charged in a plot to illegally remove Saadi Gadhafi and his family from Lybia.

- Former SNC Lavalin Chief Executive Pierre Duhaime was charged with fraud on $22.5 million to secure contracts on a Montreal hospital.

- SNC Lavalin paid $160 million in bribes to Muammar Gadhafi’s son to secure contracts in Lybia

- The World Bank has barred SNC Lavalin from bidding on any of its global projects for the next ten years because of a litany of corruption and fraud in a number of countries. Of the 250 companies on the World Bank blacklist, 119 are from Canada. Of these, 115 are direct affiliates of SNC Lavalin, the owner of Candu reactors.

- Despite being blacklisted by the World Bank, SNC Lavalin was the only contractor put forward by the Canadian Government to build the Penal Hospital in Trinidad & Tobago. Trinidad &Tobago recently notified the Canadian government that they will cancel the agreement unless another contractor is used.

This is far from a complete list of the transgressions committed by these companies. However, even this abbreviated compilation illustrates the moral bankruptcy endemic to the nuclear industry in Canada. These aren’t peripheral companies. They are the three largest players.

ACADEMIC WHORES

The best-known examples of academic whores were the scientists and medical professionals who worked for the tobacco companies. They assured the public that there was no risk to a person’s health from smoking tobacco. They dismissed all claims that smoking could cause lung cancer. They used their academic credentials and the faith the public had in them, to lie on behalf of immoral companies who were killing people.

Fifty years later, we face the same problem with the nuclear industry. The CNSC’s Patsy Thompson and Rachel Lane are the epitome of academic whores.

- At the April 29, 2009, CNSC meeting in Ottawa on the Synthesis Report on Port Hope, Ms. Thompson claimed to be unaware of any studies that have ever shown health effects of low-level radiation. As FARE (Families Against Radiation Exposure) pointed out two weeks later in a letter to President Binder, “It has been known for over half a century that a single X-ray given to a pregnant woman (a dose of about 10 millisieverts) can cause leukaemia in the baby that was exposed as a fetus in the womb (Stewart et al., 1956: Stewart et al., 1958).” FARE listed five other studies that contradict Ms. Thompson’s assertion. Considering her position as the Director of Radiation Protection at the CNSC, it’s unacceptable that she didn’t know about these studies. The only other explanation is that she was lying.

- The Health Canada studies listed 13 cancers and diseases that had statistically significant elevated levels in Port Hope. When Commissioner McDill asked why this data was not accounted for in the Synthesis Report, Ms. Thompson responded “that there are elevated diseases but we also make the comment that these diseases are not associated with radiation doses at those levels of uranium or other contaminants.” As FARE pointed out in their letter to Binder “This list contains repeated mention of numerous cancers. For anyone even peripherally in contact with the issue it is well known, or should be, that radioactivity is causative of cancer. It is unacceptable for a senior CNSC official to brush aside these data with the off-hand comment that we say "these diseases are not associated with radiation.”

- Ms. Thompson and CNSC epidemiologist Rachel Lane (more on her later) claimed the Synthesis Report was peer reviewed. A peer review means the reviewers are chosen by a third party, without the input of the authors. Commissioners Barnes and McDill pointed out that the Synthesis Report was nothing more than an external review and by collaborating colleagues at that. Despite being corrected by the commissioners, Ms. Thompson and Ms. Lane falsely maintained the report was peer reviewed.

- The CNSC commissioned distinguished professor of epidemiology Dr. Eric Mintz to review the Health Canada studies on Port Hope. Though he concluded that there were major health problems in Port Hope, his findings were excluded from the Synthesis report. Rachel Lane’s explanation for this omission was that “the CNSC does not agree with Dr. Mintz.” As with so many issues over the years, if the CNSC doesn’t agree with the results, they exclude them from consideration.

- During the April 29, 2009 meeting, Ms. Lane was observed reading verbatim answers to questions posed by President Binder and Commissioner McDill on Dr. Mintz’s report and on peer review respectively. How can this be considered an open public meeting when the questions and answers are prepared in advance?

Other academic whores of note in previous nuclear discussions:

- Four professors from the University of Alberta prepared a nuclear report titled “Nuclear Energy in Alberta –What You Need to Know” and presented it at a forum at the university on January 31, 2010. The lead author of the report, Dr. Debra Davidson jettisoned any measure of credibility when she told the audience that a 4000 megawatt nuclear plant would only require a couple of acres of land when in reality, the proposed site in northern Alberta covered 3200 acres or 12.95 square kilometres.

- Dr. Davidson’s colleague, Dr. Ujjayant Chakravorty spoke to the cost of building nuclear reactors, as he did in the report. He estimated it would cost $9.4 billion to build four 1000MW reactors. I pointed out to Dr. Chakravorty that his numbers made little sense as Atomic Energy of Canada Limited quoted the Ontario government $13 billion for each reactor only six months earlier.

- The most ridiculous comments at the forum were uttered by Dr. Silverstone, a psychiatrist who spoke to the health effects resulting from Chernobyl. He told the audience that Chernobyl only caused a few extra cases of thyroid cancer but no other cancers were found to be elevated. Dr. Silverstone should be investigated by his medical association for such irresponsible and false comments. A meta-analysis of more than 5000 radiological surveys and scientific reports from countries surrounding Chernobyl was published by the New York Academy of Sciences showing 985,000 people died as the result of Chernobyl between 1986 and 2004.

- Dr. Silverstone authored a book in 2009 titled: “How Albertans Can Get Rich Saving The Planet” in which he advocates building 100 reactors throughout Alberta including Medicine Hat, Red Deer and Grande Prairie. This is sheer idiocy as there’s not enough available water in all of Alberta to operate 100 nuclear reactors nor is there any body of water south of Edmonton capable of supplying a single reactor, let alone a “cluster” of them as Dr. Silverstone claims. Dr. Silverstone could not provide an answer when questioned about this at the forum.

- In the summary for his book, Dr. Silverstone states: "There are many detailed plans about how to safely store and bury nuclear waste, and that produced in the proposed nuclear power plants will not be of the most dangerous types." The truth is that no country in the world has disposed of any high-level waste by burying it deep in the ground and the waste produced inside the reactor IS the most dangerous type of waste.

- To her credit, Dr. Davidson apologized in her closing remarks for her off-handed and ill-informed statement on the footprint of nuclear reactors. Dr. Silverstone on the other hand, displayed no such grasp of ethics or integrity.

There are many others who could be placed on this list, but space does not allow it. It’s disturbing to know that so many of the brightest minds in the country could be corrupted by a princely income and the prestige of an exalted position.

CNSC HEARINGS

The transcript of the October 24, 2012 CNSC Hearing on radioactive waste in Port Hope is another example of the level of corruption and/or incompetence endemic to the nuclear industry and its regulator in Canada. Glen Case and Christine Fahey from Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) and CNSC Director General Peter Elder blatantly lied to the CNSC Commissioners about the radioactive waste under Dr. Powers School during their testimony. The CNSC enabled this corrupt behaviour by preventing concerned citizens from speaking at the hearing.

All three of them testified that there had never been radon problems at Dr. Powers School nor had the radon levels exceeded the clean-up criteria under the Federal Provincial Task Force on Radioactivity. Both of these statements are outright lies as evidenced by the contents of the federal documents on the matter that I submitted to the Commissioners. I copied the documents from the radiological file on Dr. Powers School at the AECL office in Port Hope in April 2004.

The first document was the test results conducted by James McLaren in July and August 1978 for the Atomic Energy Control Board (AECB). The August 9, 1978 letter from R. Beal to E.J. Chart of James MacLaren and Rod Hendrickson at AECB states: “Samples at S-4 (sub-slab) and in store rooms (A-1 & A-2) would appear to indicate the presence of source material beneath the slab”. The S-4 sample is the ‘borehole’ President Binder will be speaking of in a moment. It was located in the service room between the gymnasium and kindergarten.

The second document is a letter Glen Case (he worked for James McLaren at the time) wrote to the AECB file in Port Hope and Toronto on February 6, 1979 stating “The latest set of data for 64 Ward St. is attached. Based on this winter set of samples, it would appear there is not a radon problem. Unless otherwise instructed, we will not be taking any more samples in this structure”.

The third document is a letter from Ted Chart to Glen Case on Feb. 14, 1979 which states “I’ve reviewed your preliminary report on this location. It appears the gym does not satisfy the “RASMO Criteria” (RAdiation Survey MOnitoring). I think it would be worthwhile to further sample that location if Rod (Hendrickson) hasn’t sent them (School Board) a letter”.

Rod Hendrickson (AECB) wrote a note to file on November 8, 1979 saying the final letter had been sent to the property owner and that the file was now closed. There was no copy in the file of the letter that was sent to the property owner (School Board). On January 29, 1980, Rod Hendrickson wrote to Mr. Little, the Dr. Powers Principal. Mr. Hendrikson stated: “All readings are within the criteria established by the Federal Provincial Task Force on Radioactivity”. This was the start of the lies and conspiracy to cover up the waste under Dr. Powers School.

THE COMMISSIONERS

Commissioner McDill began the discussion on the Dr. Powers intervention by John Miller with the following comment. “I started this one, yes. I'll just keep on going, because the interveners are not here, so it's incumbent on us to direct the questions to some extent.” She proceeded to ask an innocuous question about a monitoring committee that hadn’t even been set up yet.

Commissioner Velshi asked AECL to expound on the situation at Dr. Powers. As stated earlier, Ms. Fahey and Mr. Case gave false information throughout their testimony on this matter.

When my intervention came up for questions, Commissioner McDill’s only input was to offer AECL an opportunity to comment on my intervention. More lies came from Ms. Fahey.

President Binder asked the next question. “The one thing that they keep repeating is the fact that there was an independent –- you know, somebody drilled boreholes and there was some data and then Mr. Case sort of closed the file. That's always been the argument. And I was wondering if Mr. Case would like to reply or respond to that.”

Instead of Mr. Case responding, Ms. Fahey jumped in and said “Yes, I'll ask Mr. Case. But also, the remediation engineer who ordered the boreholes and analyzed the results is here with us today and can also speak to what is or is not under the ground and at the Dr. Powers School.

The boreholes Ms. Fahey referred to were ordered and drilled in 2010. She made no reference at all to the boreholes from 1978 that Commissioner Binder asked Mr. Case to comment on and that I spoke of in my intervention. Mr. Case made no comment at all on any borehole. No one answered Mr. Binder’s question on the 1978 boreholes and he didn’t pursue the matter at all. Mr. Binder is either really dumb or very corrupt. He went on to ask CNSC staff for a comment, at which point Peter Elder got up and lied through his teeth.

The behavior of the Commissioners at this hearing was disgusting. Commissioners Tolgyesi and Harvey did not utter a single word during the discussion on Dr. Powers School which took up 17 pages in the transcript. Commissioner Velshi did ask a question about the school, though it was generic and not specific to any point that was raised. Her second question (So, are the results of your phase 2 survey on your [AECL] website?) betrayed her lack of understanding of the clean-up process as phase two of the project hasn’t started yet.

The conduct of Commissioner McDill was the biggest letdown as we’ve come to expect more from her over the years. Though she admitted that it was incumbent on the Commissioners to direct questions in the absence of the intervenors, she sat silent after her opening comment except to offer Mr. Case a chance to rebut my intervention.

None of the Commissioners commented or asked questions on the government documents I referenced which contradicted the statements made by Fahey, Case and Elder on Dr. Powers School. None of them commented or asked questions on the radioactive waste present under Burnham school in Cobourg which was also spoken of in the documents.

IN CLOSING

I’ve refrained from criticizing the Commissioners over the years because of the integrity demonstrated by Commissioner Barnes and to a slightly lesser extent by Commissioner McDill. However, that is about to change given the contents of the transcript of this hearing. I am preparing a petition to the Auditor General on this hearing and will be doing the same on the hearing on uranium mines in Saskatchewan that is currently underway if it is warranted.

This hearing was a sad commentary on the CNSC, AECL and the Commissioners, especially Michael Binder. If you are going to continue to put our children, our friends and our families at risk, then your reputations will suffer accordingly. Glen Case needlessly exposed my children to radioactive waste to protect the hideous behavior of the federal government. If he thinks this is going to fade away, then he’s as stupid as he is corrupt.

Pat McNamara
September 2013