Thank you, and thank you for this invitation to appear before you.
As you said, I'm a professor of physics and president of the Canadian Institute for Neutron Scattering. This is an organization that represents researchers and students from universities and industries who need access to neutron beams to support their research programs. There are currently more than 500 individual members and 15 fee-paying institutional members from the universities. Our goal is to promote the use of neutron beam methods from materials research and to represent the interests of neutron beam use in communities. The government has announced that we're getting out of the isotope business once the national research universal reactor at Chalk River reaches the end of its operating life, probably around 2016. We've been asked to provide some input on this decision and on what should happen next.
The first part is relatively simple. It is clear the government has a role to play in providing infrastructure for science and industry, but it is not clear that the Government of Canada should be in the business of manufacturing medical isotopes for delivery below cost to a worldwide commercial enterprise, thus effectively subsidizing nuclear medicine around the world. As we understand it, it is this form of the isotope business that the government is trying to get out of--and who would argue with that?
The second part is far more complex and has much wider implications for Canada, for Canadians, and for Canadian science and industry. The NRU is far more than the world's largest single supplier of medical isotopes. It is a critical piece of infrastructure that supports stewardship and innovation in the nuclear power industry through experimental facilities located inside the core of the reactor. Neutron beams emitted from the core support research and development by Canadian industry, and the unique knowledge obtained by neutron beams helps companies to develop more competitive products that are safer, more reliable, and less expensive to manufacture.
The NRC's Canadian Neutron Beam Centre has established Canada as a worldwide leader in providing access to industry for key sectors--nuclear, aerospace, automotive, and manufacturing. The CNBC also provides competitive facilities to support fundamental and applied research in many important areas--physics, chemistry, material science, green energy technologies, communications, and materials for life sciences.
Rather than focusing on what the government should not be doing, perhaps we should ask what the government should be doing. For guidance, we can look back over NRU's 50-year history and see what the Government of Canada has already achieved through its support to the NRU facility at Chalk River. Medical isotope production at NRU has supported the health and well-being of Canadian citizens for both diagnosis and treatment of heart disease, bone disease, and cancer. Engineering research at NRU has supported Canadian industry, both nuclear and non-nuclear, improving competitiveness--