:
Good afternoon, everyone.
We're here today to continue our study, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), of the Atomic Energy of Canada Limited facility at Chalk River and the status of the production of medical isotopes.
We have two groups of witnesses today. The first will go from 3:30 to about 4:20. We'll shorten the period. The second will go from 4:20 to 5:15. That will leave 15 minutes for us to discuss committee business, because we have to know who we want to invite or what business we want to deal with Tuesday and Thursday of next week and beyond that. If everyone can be thinking about that so we can do that in 15 minutes and at least get next Tuesday's witnesses finalized, that would be very helpful.
We'll get right to it. From Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, we have with us today Hugh MacDiarmid, president and chief executive officer, and with him is Bill Pilkington, senior vice-president and chief nuclear officer.
Thank you very much, gentlemen, for coming today. You know well what we're here to discuss today. If you have a presentation of up to ten minutes, go ahead and make the presentation.
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
[Translation]
I'd like to introduce to you Mr. Bill Pilkington, Chief Nuclear Officer for AECL.
[English]
Bill will be taking us through a presentation regarding the NRU at Chalk River and the manner in which AECL intends to identify and then implement a solution for the safe return to service of that reactor.
Since our time is limited, let me just say that AECL and its people will approach the current situation at Chalk River with attention to several principles that will guide our actions.
First and foremost, we will never operate an unsafe reactor. This is our highest commitment to our employees, our communities, and all Canadians.
Second, we view the production of medical isotopes as part of our core mission for Canada, and indeed for the world. As such, we have a duty to resume production as soon as it is safe and practical to do so. We will return the NRU to service as soon as possible, with lasting repairs and every assurance of safe operation. In returning the reactor to service, we will draw on all available expertise, both internal and external, so that we apply the best minds to this issue. We will work seven days a week, 24 hours a day, where practical, until we finish the job. A professional project management approach will, as always, guide our actions.
We will act in lockstep with the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, our regulator, with which we continue to have an extremely constructive relationship.
Finally, we will conduct ourselves with the utmost transparency before Canadians, the medical community, our shareholder, and indeed, as requested, this committee and Parliament. Ladies and gentlemen, to that last point, let me extend an invitation to members of the committee to visit Chalk River to see for yourselves the work that is under way.
Thank you, and I would like to now turn it over to Mr. Pilkington.
:
Mr. Chairman, NRU shut down automatically on May 14 due to a loss of off-site power. A decision was made not to restart due to evidence of a heavy-water leak. The small heavy-water leak, which was the cause of the extended shutdown, continues at about four to five kilograms an hour.
I refer you to slide two in the material you were given, which shows the general layout of the NRU reactor and how we manage the heavy-water leakage. All of the heavy water from the leak is being collected and stored in specially designed drums. About 20% of the heavy water evaporates and results in a monitored airborne release from the Chalk River site. As a result of the leak, tritium emissions are just above the specified action level at which AECL reports to the CNSC and to our local stakeholders and posts to the AECL website. However, these emissions are at approximately one one-thousandth of the regulatory limit.
The leak location was identified four days after shutdown, using remote camera inspection due to the extreme difficulty in accessing the location from the top of the reactor, nine metres above.
I refer you to slide three, which shows the leak location, nine metres below the access points at the top of the reactor, and shows a detailed view of the configuration of the leak location. The leak was caused by corrosion starting on the outside wall of the vessel at the base. Specifically, nitric acid formed from radiation effects on the nitrogen in air and water at the base of the vessel. Full video inspection of the base of the reactor vessel indicates one other area similar to the leak location and half a dozen other areas of concern.
I refer you to slide four, which shows the leak location on the circumference of the vessel and the five additional black dots indicating the other areas of concern. Preliminary assessment of the extent of the corrosion and available nuclear repair technologies confirms there is no immediate or simple solution. This judgment is reflected in our recent guidance of at least a three-month outage.
Slide four has three photos: number one, when the vessel was new; number two, representing the general condition at the base of the vessel; and number three, showing an area of concern. Inspection and repair activities are complex due to limited access to the leak and corrosion location and by the surface condition on the vessel walls.
We are currently removing the fuel from the reactor. We will then drain the heavy water and do non-destructive examination on the inside wall at the base of the vessel. We will select the most appropriate cleaning and repair technique, and all work must be done remotely, due to access from the top of the reactor and high radiation fields. Only when we know the extent of repair and the technique can we produce a detailed plan and schedule for the work.
In parallel with the repair and inspection, we will complete an assessment to confirm that the vessel is fit for service. We are keeping the CNSC inspectors directly involved at the Chalk River site and officials in Ottawa fully informed of all our activities. Our repairs will be sound and our fitness for service assessments will be complete and accurate in order to facilitate a CNSC decision that it is safe for the NRU reactor to return to service.
AECL is fully committed to transparency with you, the CNSC, and our stakeholders. Returning the NRU to safe, reliable operation to support medical isotope production is our primary objective.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
:
Thank you very much for the question.
The first action I took, unfortunately, was not one that headed directly to that goal. We had to take the very difficult decision to terminate the MAPLE reactor program. At the time I arrived, the plan was to move forward with the deployment of those reactors. It became evident that would not be a successful program, after a number of tests were done and a lot of analysis was done.
The first action was indeed to terminate the MAPLE program. I felt it was necessary to take that difficult decision as expeditiously as we could, because it forced us to contemplate other actions, because we were heading down a path that did not have success in sight.
Since that time we have clearly been devoting our attention to ensuring that the NRU reactor can serve as a suitable, reliable production environment for isotopes for the foreseeable future. Indeed, the very strong focus of our organization has been on developing, first of all, a protocol in conjunction with the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission to understand exactly what would be required to obtain a licence extension for the NRU. We've been working very closely with the officials and are indeed progressing along that path.
We have also worked with government officials to estimate the activities required to fulfill those licensing requirements to extend the useful life of the NRU. Documents are in process, the fiscal 2009-2010 corporate plan of AECL and the budgetary requirements for AECL reflected, as has been reported, in the order of $70 million for isotopes, of which $47 million this year is dedicated to what we're terming the isotope supply reliability program. That is designed to ensure that the NRU is able to perform reliably throughout the next licence period beyond 2011.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[Translation]
I am happy to be here to discuss with you the role of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, especially with regard to Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, since the recent shutdown of the National Research Universal reactor.
[English]
This is the third opportunity I have had to appear before this committee in less than a year, the most recent previous occasion being on February 24, 2009, to discuss a heavy-water leak from the NRU in December 2008.
I am sure that by now members of the committee are quite familiar with the CNSC, but I would like to take this opportunity to remind members of a few key points.
The CNSC is Canada's only nuclear regulator, and nuclear regulation is exclusively a federal jurisdiction. The CNSC is an effective and independent regulator. It is a quasi-judicial administrative tribunal that operates under the Nuclear Safety Control Act. Its mandate is very clear: it regulates for the protection of health, safety, and security of Canadians and the environment, and as well it respects Canada's international commitments on the peaceful use of nuclear energy.
The commission's decisions are final and binding. They are subject to review only by the Federal Court, and not by the government. When making its decisions, members of the commission take into account all relevant factors without compromising safety.
The CNSC's regulatory scope stretches from nuclear power reactors to uranium mines and mills, from fuel fabrication facilities and waste management to nuclear substances and radiation devices, and to many other facilities and activities in between.
How good Canada's nuclear regulatory framework is and how well we are doing as a nuclear regulator is currently being assessed by a team of 20 international experts from 13 countries, under the auspices of the International Atomic Energy Agency. These experts arrived in Canada last Sunday and will wrap up their activities on June 12. They will be visiting many sites across Canada during their stay. They will release a publicly available, comprehensive report sometime in the fall.
Let me turn to the ongoing outage of the NRU. To quote Mr. Richard Meserve, the chairman of the International Nuclear Safety Group and the former chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, “Guarding against the rare but possibly catastrophic accident requires eternal vigilance and a never-ending fight against complacency”. This is what the CNSC does.
CNSC staff are located and work on-site at Chalk River Laboratories and oversee all licensed activities that AECL conducts with respect to the NRU. These activities include the import of nuclear material to CRL, which is irradiated in the NRU, then removed and processed to extract molybdenum-99. The CNSC also oversees the transport of the moly-99 from CRL to MDS Nordion in Kanata, Ontario.
With respect to medical radioisotopes, the CNSC issues licences for the production, processing, transport, import, export, and possession of medical isotopes.
Health Canada regulates the use of biologics, which include radioisotopes and radiopharmaceuticals. CNSC staff is ready to consider and respond quickly to requests from licensees for licence amendments to possess increased quantities of alternative radioisotopes, such as thallium-201.
It is important to understand that CNSC is not responsible for making sure that there is a sufficient supply of isotopes. The CNSC is, however, responsible for making sure that, whatever isotope is being produced, it is done in a safe way.
Following the tripping of the reactor on Thursday, May 14, 2009, the CNSC was informed by AECL on May 15 of signs of a heavy-water leak from the NRU. AECL decided to keep the reactor shut down, and CNSC agreed with this decision.
Later in the day, AECL reported to the CNSC and posted a bulletin on its public website regarding the presence of a small heavy-water leak, indicating that the reactor was safely shut down and that the leak posed no threat to workers, the public, the environment, or nuclear safety.
AECL also noted that the heavy-water leak rate was approximately five kilograms per hour and that virtually all heavy water was being captured and stored in drums. However, a small amount of that heavy water has evaporated and continues to evaporate, resulting in releases of tritium to the environment through the NRU ventilation system. These releases have been and remain well below CNSC regulatory limits and do not pose a risk to the health or safety of the public or our environment.
I would like to note that AECL demonstrated an adherence to good safety culture practices by keeping the NRU safely shut down until the source of the leak was identified. As AECL determines the course of future action regarding the leak, the CNSC will exercise our mandate and oversee AECL's activities, in the interest of protecting health, safety, and security of the public and our environment.
Turning toward the future of the NRU, CNSC and AECL have a formal protocol for the 2011 licensing of the NRU that defines the regulatory requirements, including a schedule of submissions. The first major submission from AECL will be an integrated safety review intended to identify the necessary improvements to the NRU to support an application for a further possible ten years of operation. This submission, planned for March 2010, will include a complete assessment of safety-related equipment and components in the NRU, including the reactor vessel. AECL will then submit an overall safety case for the re-licensing of the NRU in January 2011, and the commission will hold public hearings in the second half of the year to consider such an application.
In our previous appearance before you, both CNSC and AECL promised to review and improve the release of public information. This was demonstrated by the proactive information disclosure by both organizations about this current event.
AECL has continued to keep the CNSC, the government, and the public informed, throughout the investigation process and now as it prepares to respond. The CNSC has made available on our website all relevant information on the NRU going back to November 2007. Let me assure you, our interest is clear: making accurate information available as broadly as possible and as quickly as possible.
As per our regulations, this leak is a significant event, and as such it must be reported to the commission. Further, AECL is scheduled to appear before the commission on June 11, 2009, at a regularly scheduled public hearing. CNSC staff and AECL will present a significant development report to the commission at that time, including the most recent information on the NRU. That meeting will be broadcast on our public website. If members of this committee aren't able to make it to 280 Slater Street to attend the meeting in person, I encourage you to take it in virtually.
To conclude, the shortage of medical radioisotopes is obviously of great concern to Canadians. As far as the CNSC is concerned, the self-imposed safe shutdown and continued outage of NRU by AECL as a result of a heavy-water leak represents a strong adherence to good safety culture. CNSC is ready and able to consider any proposal for the safe return of operations of the NRU or any other isotope-producing facility.
Thank you.