Environment committee  Certainly. The transportation of the used fuel must move from the existing facilities where the used fuel is stored today, so the operating facilities in New Brunswick, Quebec and Ontario. We have been working on a transportation program and framework where we're going out to Canadians to understand what's of interest to them with respect to that transportation program.

Environment committee  For clarity, the CNSC actually reports to Parliament and does not report to the Minister of Natural Resources, so I don't see a need for a change.

Environment committee  Yes. The money is prefunded—

Environment committee  —for the existing fuel bundles. It's sitting in trust funds that are held for the NWMO to access when we have our construction licence, and those funds continue. We look at these funds every five years to re-estimate what the costs could be. Of course, we look for cost savings because we recognize there could be a cost push, so we are always looking for efficiencies and better ways of doing it.

Environment committee  I'm not sure I understood the question. We are required on the APM to take in all small modular reactor waste, and it is part of our study for the integrated radioactive waste strategy.

Environment committee  Again, we don't import waste from other jurisdictions. The waste that we are responsible for is Canadian waste—

Environment committee  I cannot comment on a bill—

Environment committee  There are a few things in your comments. First of all, facilities for low- and intermediate-level waste worldwide are operating and have been in service for some time. Certainly they vary in terms of depth and that type of thing, but essentially we will be using the same concept and the same process for used fuel that we would use for low- and intermediate-level waste, particularly intermediate-level waste.

Environment committee  I can't speak specifically to those numbers off the top of my head. Radioactive waste, by its very nature, decays over time. As it decays, it becomes less radioactive, if you will. During that process...So some of these wastes, that we have in our inventory today, have been with us for many, many years.

Environment committee  Well, it depends on when you go about doing that study. The waste may be sitting in storage for over 20-25 years or more. If you don't look at it every day to see what the radioactive content is, when you go back to do that study, you would find that it has reduced in its radioactive content.

Environment committee  Yes. Thank you very much for giving me the time to answer this important question. The NWMO has nothing to hide in terms of the work that we're doing. In fact, the whole point of engagement with Canadians is to be open and transparent, to share information and to seek input to the process that we have under way.

Environment committee  Perhaps I can start with that. It's a very important concept as we consider implementing a project that's for such a long period of time. Part of our work is to consider the differences that will come through climate change over multiple decades and generations. For instance, right now when we consider deployment of a deep geological repository, we consider that there is likely to be glaciation during the period of time when that facility would be in service.

Environment committee  While we are funded by the nuclear energy companies and the owners of the waste, we have an obligation to meet the requirements of the Nuclear Fuel Waste Act. We also are required to report to government on the progress of our work. Our work in the early days was proposed to the federal minister, who approved the plan, and we are moving forward with that.

Environment committee  You started this with Mr. Gorman around the cost of electricity generation with nuclear. I think one thing that's fundamentally important for the nuclear sector is that the generation of electricity from nuclear is full life cycle. It includes the disposal cost as well as the generating cost as well as the construction cost, so it's all in.

Environment committee  With respect to our project, we will be in operation for a number of years. For about 30 years after operation we will be in a monitoring phase to understand what is happening with our project. We'll monitor and understand the environmental impacts, and eventually we will close our project.