During the project and the regular updates that we were getting from AECL since we renegotiated our agreement with AECL in 2006, there had never been any indications that they wouldn't be able to complete the project. In the regular updates that AECL gave us, we felt confident that they would complete the project. When in 2008 the government and AECL made the decision to cancel the project, it might also have been based upon some assumptions, frankly, that might today prove to be dramatically different.
Just as Dr. Waddington has said, we also are looking for the best option at the lowest risk. The original strategy to replace NRU always was to have the MAPLE project, and I don't think that strategy has changed. The issue is on the execution of the strategy and the ability of AECL to execute.
Clearly, we don't have all the answers. Clearly, AECL doesn't have the answers. But we think there are experts who can resolve it. There are differences of opinion, but if I could, I'll quote to you something from the National Academy of Sciences, which visited Chalk River and looked at the MAPLE project, and which is a fairly august body of people with a lot of experts. I'm going to quote the report that was released in January of this year. The report states that “AECL could probably contract with another organization to fix the MAPLE reactors if it does not have the necessary in-house technical expertise or resources to do the work itself.”
From that report, I'd like to also provide another quote from the committee: “The committee assumes that the worst-case scenario for fixing the MAPLE reactors involves the replacement of the reactor cores. The cost of such replacements would likely be small...in comparison to the cost of building a new reactor....”