Natural Resources Committee on Nov. 4th, 2009

[Roger Alexander]

Yes, definitely.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

So it's a possibility. It just depends on the numbers.

[Roger Alexander]

It's definitely possible, and yes, typically there is a significant number of jobs. I think we have 5,000 people working at our La Hague facility.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

I need to speed up my questions here.

Turning to regulatory reform, the duty to consult is very important for mining companies. While we're not interested in taking away anything from safety or anything, does anyone have any comments on how we could streamline regulation in the industry without having any safety implications?

[Dr. Richard Florizone]

I can offer one overall thought and it's something out of the UDP report. It's quite general, so I don't know if it's specifically what you're looking for, Mr. Trost.

One of the things that's clear, and one of the things that was an interesting lesson for me as I went through the Uranium Development Partnership process, is that in the global nuclear industry, the people I spoke to were very supportive of a strong and independent regulatory framework. One of the reasons that was quoted to me by the people in the industry was that they rely on public trust, and public trust is rooted in a strong and effective regulator that is at arm's length from government. So the industry is quite committed to strong and efficient regulation. That was a lot of what I heard.

At the same time, with regard to mining, we did hear concerns about how people wanted regulation to be strong and effective, but also efficient. There was a sense that in some mine openings people felt that there were very many ministries that were involved when it came to regulatory issues in the nuclear environment, so you'd have multiple ministries.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

So there could be various consolidations, particularly in the mining sector.

[Dr. Richard Florizone]

That was the one recommendation—

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

I'm seeing agreement from AREVA, so we'll put that in the transcripts.

[Dr. Richard Florizone]

Again, that was one that was public in the UDP report, asking for more coordination—

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

I'm sorry, Richard. I don't want to cut you off, but I have just one last quick question about the NRO. AREVA's not the only company that's been stymied in investing in Canada. I was looking at something from JCU, Japan-Canada Uranium, and there are Korean firms and so forth.

Do you have any idea how much investment has been blocked from Canada, or how much more there could be if we repealed the NRO and went to more of a free trade, open...treated it the same as we would copper, gold, or anything of that nature?

[Roger Alexander]

It's clear that we have developments slated in future years in Nunavut and Quebec that are in the multi-billions of dollars. These are on the books. We've costed the developments for future development activities over the next 15 to 20 years and it's also clear that unless we retain ownership of those developments, we won't do them.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

You forgot to mention Saskatchewan. Do you have any properties in Saskatchewan?

[Roger Alexander]

Yes, of course. I'm sorry.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Thank you, Mr. Trost.

We'll go now to the second round, a five-minute round, starting with the official opposition.

Mr. Tonks, go ahead, please.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thanks to the witnesses for their testimony.

Dr. Florizone, with respect to the future of the medical isotope part of the nuclear sector, Mr. Alexander captured my sense of the presence of medical isotopes when he said that the isotope is just a matter of time.... I can't read my own writing--

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

--but in any case, the future of medical isotopes is just a matter of time. Now, the Dutch and the Americans are investing highly in second-generation medical isotope production and so on.

Also, I understand that the University of Saskatchewan, where you're from, has a reactor that is capable of producing isotopes. How do those decisions affect the business plan with respect to the university's reactor?

[Dr. Richard Florizone]

Is the question about the different technologies?

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

No. It's just about the market and whether this affects the continuation of that.

[Dr. Richard Florizone]

So it's whether the market affects the picture.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Yes.

[Dr. Richard Florizone]

That's an excellent question.

Again, I want to be clear and we've been clear with our proposal up front. The way the global isotope market works right now, the establishment of these types of facilities is not a money-making proposition. The way the medical isotope business has evolved is that there's a series of research reactors around the globe, basically government-sponsored, that provide the raw material to the industry. The revenue that's realized from those doesn't fully occupy the cost.

So what our business case was predicated on was producing approximately four times the Canadian market: so producing enough for the Canadian domestic market and producing for export. With that, we believed it would cover about 15% of our operating cost of the facility. In other words, the facility, even with that plan, would still require 85% of its funding to come from the public purse.

So on your question, then, if you have these other sources and they impact share, then it would reduce that 15% accordingly. Again, I think that it would come back somewhat to public policy objectives, and I think this is a valid question for that expert panel to include: does Canada want to purchase its medical isotopes on the open market, rely on others, and see that science go outside the country? Does Canada just want to basically procure that in the market? I think that's an important public policy question.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Okay. I appreciate that and I'd like to follow up, but I think the committee should give Mr. Nash an opportunity to respond.

With respect to the recycling and to what has been referred to by Mr. Alexander as the process, the committee is attempting to come to grips with the overall sector and the whole issue of storage. You indicated that there are several football fields full of storage at this particular time.

There must be an ultimate solution,and Mr. Alexander seems to be very positive, but from your perspective, what is the policy tangent that perhaps the committee could be appraised of?

[Kenneth Nash]

Thank you.

In Canada's policy on long-term used fuel management, the end point is to store that used fuel in an unreprocessed form in a deep geologic repository where it could be retrieved if necessary.

The majority of other countries with nuclear power plants are not reprocessing. Historically they were. For instance, Sweden, Germany, Spain, and the United Kingdom all utilized reprocessing. Since then, they've pulled out of that, mainly because the cost is prohibitive.

However, France is still reprocessing, for a number of reasons. Some would say they are economic, while others would say they're for security of supply reasons. Nevertheless, they are reprocessing. They require a deep geologic repository. It's in their national policy to (a) reprocess and (b) store the vitrified high-level waste, which is one of the products of reprocessing, in a deep geologic repository.

I have to reiterate my remark that in using existing technology on reprocessing there is no significant--in our viewpoint--waste management benefit alone from reprocessing. It really is an economic security of supply issue that has proliferation issues connected to it with existing technology.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

I see.

Thank you.