In Canada, I think we need a broad consultation at the federal, provincial, and municipal levels on what we should be doing with the toxic radioactive waste, a consultation on whether we should be allowing it to be exported, imported, or transported over our precious lakes and rivers.
Also, the classification of the waste is ridiculous. Low-level waste is simply anything that isn't high-level waste, and high-level waste is simply irradiated fuel. Anything that isn't irradiated fuel is automatically low-level waste. That's ridiculous. It doesn't have any reality to it.
For example, with respect to the steam generators, we've heard the comparison with isotopes. Medical isotopes have a half-life of 66 hours, which means that in a matter of weeks, if there were an accident, the stuff would be gone. Plutonium has a half-life of 24,000 years. There's the comparison.
We have to classify our nuclear waste. The Americans have done this. When the Americans have plutonium-contaminated waste, they do not call it low-level waste; they call it TRU waste, transuranic waste, and it's treated just like high-level waste. It's treated very, very carefully; it's not treated casually. They have another category called Greater-Than-Class-C waste, which also can cover some of these toxic materials.
We have a very inadequate system of regulation of waste--even classification of waste--in this country. Unless the government, the elected officials, insist upon a review and a careful look at this, we're going to find ourselves in a difficult situation in a few years, because the danger mounts.