Whatever civilization exists in North America a million years from now, it will still be dealing with Dalton McGuinty’s most long-lasting legacy – radioactive waste. 

No matter what members of the McGuinty government or nuclear lobbyists say, they cannot guarantee that their toxic legacy won’t harm future generations.  They’ve created a mess and are leaving it for future generations to manage.

In the United States the government has hired anthropologists to help them deal with the problem.  Their task?  Design symbols able to warn people a million years from now to stay away.  It sounds like science fiction, but its not.

David B. Givens, an anthropologist who has worked on developing such symbols explains the problem this way: “No culture has ever tried, self-consciously and scientifically, to design a symbol that would last 10,000 years and still be intelligible.  And even if we succeed, would the message be believed?”

A pretty significant (intractable?) problem, but Energy Minister George Smitherman thinks we can deal with it later – after we build more nuclear plants.

On Sunday the Canadian Press reported that the scientific support for Ontario Power Generation’s proposal to bury radioactive waste under Lake Huron at the Bruce site “is full of holes.”  That is, there’s not guarantee these wastes won’t leak out and harm the environment or people.

In response to the story, NDP leader asked George Smitherman whether he’d hold off on building new reactors until he can tell Ontarians what he’ll do with the waste.

Minister Smitherman responded saying: “We continue to work deligently on a long-term solution.”  Otherwise put, not my problem.  Let another generation deal with it.

While Dalton McGuinty and Smitherman like to consider themselves as green leaders, their nuclear policies are unethical and irresponsible.  They should be ashamed.

You can watch Smitherman’s response to Howard Hampton below.

McGuinty and Smitherman’s Legacy - Radioactive Waste

Categories: Nuclear

Share this post

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed

Leave a comment or post a trackback.