Chalk River nuclear reactor, medical isotope facility

[jdobbin]

Here's a bit more soap for you - hopefully it will wash better after you examine the facts. The Auditor's report was only submitted to the AECL Board in September, 2007. The covering letter, which is included below provides an excellent backdrop as to why Gary Lunn used what has been misconstrued as a heavy-handed approach. Collectively, the Nuclear watchdog and AECL had put not only Canadians, but people around the world - at risk with their bureaucratic negligence and incompetence. By government standards, it seems to me that Mr. Lunn acted pretty darn quickly - and appropriately.

Acted fast? He had the report, kept the report from being public and only released it when the Auditor General embarrassed him into it. There doesn't seem to be any indication of action until the reactor shut down and not even then.

Worse, the prime minister when he ordered a re-start to the reactor said there was absolutely no danger did so on a wing and a prayer.

[Keepitsimple]

Acted fast? He had the report, kept the report from being public and only released it when the Auditor General embarrassed him into it. There doesn't seem to be any indication of action until the reactor shut down and not even then.

Worse, the prime minister when he ordered a re-start to the reactor said there was absolutely no danger did so on a wing and a prayer.

Looks like we agree to disagree. After the Liberals ignored the festering problems for years, you expect the current government to clean things up in a couple of months......but there is ONE good thing that came out of this whole issue....and that's the fact that AECL's problems are out in the open and can finally be addressed. As for your wing and a prayer, it was done with the best expert advice. Your position by default is that the second cooling pump should have been installed before the reactor was restarted. That would have meant a delay of many months and directly or indirectly would have led to the deaths or illnesses of untold thousands of people around the world. Making tough decisions is part of being a leader. As is often the case, these decisions don't please everyone - especially those looking for partisan advantage. Regardless of whether the Liberals allowed the situation to breed and fester, or the Conservatives somehow fumbled the ball, it's really a question of whether the right decision was made with regards to restarting the reactor......and it was.

Edited January 14, 2008 by Keepitsimple

[jdobbin]

Nuclear regulator is fired by the Harper government.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/cbc/canada_keen_firing

The federal government has fired the head of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, days after she publicly accused Natural Resources Minister Gary Lunn of interfering with the independence of the arm's-length watchdog.

Lunn's office announced Linda Keen's firing in a statement issued early Wednesday. Assistant deputy industry minister Michael Binder has been named as her interim replacement.

"The president was aware of the importance of maintaining Canada's and the world's supply of medical isotopes," said the statement from Lunn's office.

"However, given the growing crisis, she did not demonstrate the leadership expected of the president under the existing legislative provisions of the Nuclear Safety and Control Act to put the commission in a position to address the situation in a timely fashion."

Lunn and Keen have been at odds since the 50-year-old Chalk River nuclear reactor was shut down in November, prompting a worldwide shortage of medical isotopes. Parliament passed a measure requiring the facility to reopen in December.

Think this is going to get a lot messier.

[Topaz]

Harper through Lunn has fired the Commissioner, but she will appear today on C-pac before the committee. It seems she had a call to make over safety and she did what she thought was best. The backup safety system had to be installed to prevent the risk of meltdown during a earthquake or other disaster. Perhaps her thinking was there would be more danger to more people than the people who needed the isotopes. I think she was backed into a corner. Harper had said that an earthequake was far off or something like that. Apparently, that areas has has 2 earthquakes since it went back online one being 3.2 enough to give a good shake. I will be watching the committee to hear if anything changes my mind. I really believe that Lunn was slow on this problem and Health minister Clemens kinda gave you the idea Lunn was. www.bourque.org

EDIT:

This post was the opening of the following redundant thread:

Nuclear Saftey Commission is fired

This redundant thread has been merged and all of the posts have been preserved in chronological order.

Edited January 19, 2008 by Charles Anthony
merged redundant thread

[Topaz]

After watching the committee I think the rules should be changed that the "seating" gov't can't chair the meeting or the official opposition just to be fair. The amount of time allowed for questions is too short, especially when you have a minister talking too much to take up time so the questioner can't ask many questions. When the government side asked questions the minister was short and sweet with his answers. I hope the former commissioner will testify so Canadians can hear her side.

[myata]

Me, too have questions:

1. As CBC host pointed out, the objective of commission was (and is) to ensure safety; compliance with its recommendations is the responcibility of the plant (and industry in general). Is government now taking up the role of independendent agencies? Is government going to tell Health Canada which drugs they should approve / not? Food Inspection Agency, which products are safe / not?

2. Timing of the firing. If at issue is the completence of the Chair, I'd expect at least Parliamentary discussion of the matter, where all facts can be presented, and hearsd, before any decision is made. Is Harper's government, again, trying to control all and everything, based on their understanding of "good".

Hope these will be answered in the coming days.

[Wild Bill]

Harper through Lunn has fired the Commissioner, but she will appear today on C-pac before the committee. It seems she had a call to make over safety and she did what she thought was best. The backup safety system had to be installed to prevent the risk of meltdown during a earthquake or other disaster. Perhaps her thinking was there would be more danger to more people than the people who needed the isotopes. I think she was backed into a corner. Harper had said that an earthequake was far off or something like that. Apparently, that areas has has 2 earthquakes since it went back online one being 3.2 enough to give a good shake. I will be watching the committee to hear if anything changes my mind. I really believe that Lunn was slow on this problem and Health minister Clemens kinda gave you the idea Lunn was. www.bourque.org

"...3.2 enough to give a good shake." Really? I don't think so! 3.2 would barely be felt! We've had a few in this range over the years and I've never been able to even tell they happened. A slight rattle of dishes in the cupboard for maybe a quarter of a second is about it.

No, you can't excuse the lady that easily. She erred on the side of caution to a ridiculous extreme, probably because she had no perspective on how low the chances of earthquake damage really were. I mean, do you really think that earthquakes were never a factor in choosing the location of the reactor site? Engineers are legally liable for such mistakes. No engineer in his right mind would ever stick his neck out like that.

Years ago I worked in testing labs and had first hand experience with managers such as this woman. They were extremely annoying because they were rarely technical in their perspective. They would play it safe to unnecessary and expensive extremes. The type of people who would put safety warning decals on eyeshields to excess, so that your vision was so obscured you couldn't operate the equipment!

I've seen this excuse being offered up in newspapers like the Toronto Star. Maybe it would satisfy a poli-sci major from Queens but it doesn't do a thing for me. I've been there!

[Visionseeker]

The Tories have no cause to fire her. Heads of independent, quasi-judicial agencies are appointed to specific terms, not at pleasure so as to explicitly shield them from political interference in their work. Either Lunn knows this and is abusing his authority or doesn't know this and is therefore unqualified to wield it.

It looks like Keen has no intention of taking this lying down. The Tories would be well advised to back-down on this before it gets worse for them.

Meanwhile, one might ask what steps are being taken to sort out the mess that is AECL? Maple 1 or 2 are years behind schedule with no sign of them coming online soon. Could it be that Keen is being targeted to weaken the CNSC so they won't compromise plans to privatize AECL?

Tooting my on horn…

I said: “The Tories would be well advised to back-down on this before it gets worse for them.”

Well, they didn’t back down and now it will get much worse.

Lunn will be sacrificed eventually. But the whole idea of the Conservatives occupying the high ground on accountability is now dead.

Image consultants for Lunn!? Is this not the kind of thing that had Reformers in fits?

Note to Harper: Firing people for doing their jobs doesn’t win votes, it loses them. The difference between Linda Keen and Chuck Guité is that Linda Keen worked for the public interest as mandated by Parliament.

January 29 will be an interesting day in the HOC. Sheila Fraser will say her part, then Keen hers. And soon after the nation will ask: “What law shirking bullies have we put in power? Who will protect us from King Harper and his “signing statement” edicts?”

No Conservative majority will ever be possible with Harper at the controls.

[Visionseeker]

I invite everyone to look at the comments attached to this story. Note how those supportive of Keen have the best understanding of the facts:

Critics blast Lunn for firing head of nuclear watchdog

Firing people for doing their job is..., well..., dumb.

Between Lunn and Harper, I'm struggling to figure out which one is Dumb, and which is Dumber.

Lunn's days are numbered and, I ardently hope, so are Harper's.

[geoffrey]

Firing people for doing their job is..., well..., dumb.

Her job was to put hundreds or thousands of lives at serious risk in order to prove a political point and flex a little muscle?

Wow, your priorities are really screwed up.

Anyone that makes such a ridiculous move, without proper preparation or notification, deserves to be canned on the spot. The folks afterwards said it was safe, just not the best. That's no reason to risk so many people's lives. No reason at all.

She started the political game, and quickly lost.

Good ridance to her.

[Shakeyhands]

Her job was to put hundreds or thousands of lives at serious risk in order to prove a political point and flex a little muscle?

Wow, your priorities are really screwed up.

Anyone that makes such a ridiculous move, without proper preparation or notification, deserves to be canned on the spot. The folks afterwards said it was safe, just not the best. That's no reason to risk so many people's lives. No reason at all.

She started the political game, and quickly lost.

Good ridance to her.

I think notification was given of the lack of the required safety protocol. Seems to me she was doing her job. Imagine if something does happen? Its not like there haven't been castatrophic nuclear accidents elsewhere.

All that aside, the optics on this are horrible for the CPC.

[jdobbin]

Anyone that makes such a ridiculous move, without proper preparation or notification, deserves to be canned on the spot. The folks afterwards said it was safe, just not the best. That's no reason to risk so many people's lives. No reason at all.

Seems to me she gave the government and AECL plenty of notice. So did the Auditor General.

Her job was not ensure there was plenty of isotopes. That was Lunn's job and AECL's. Her job was to make sure that the plant was meeting its safety standards for operations. It wasn't.

I see a lot of claims made about how safe things were but no citations from independent sources. The claim that the regulator did things without notice is patently false.

Who are the going to appoint now: Someone who will cover up problems at the plant because it will interfere with supply of isotopes? One of the reasons Canada has a regulator is because Chalk River was one of the first in history to actually have a nuclear accident.

[Wild Bill]

I think notification was given of the lack of the required safety protocol. Seems to me she was doing her job. Imagine if something does happen? Its not like there haven't been castatrophic nuclear accidents elsewhere.

All that aside, the optics on this are horrible for the CPC.

"castatrophic nuclear accidents elsewhere."??? Where??

Don't mention Chernobyl! That would be like comparing a Lada car to the quality of a Lexus! The Russians built a reactor there that would have been flatly illegal in any other country in the world. To make it worse, the accident happened at the behest of a political manager who overruled ALL of the technical ones!

You know how many people were hurt at Three Mile Island? NONE! Look it up!

Now, do you actually have any idea of how the Chalk River reactor was built? You might have a better chance of winning the lottery ten or twenty times before you could have had a significant accident, especially during the time frame of just the few months necessary to correct the backup issue.

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but NOT their own set of facts!

The lady seemed either blissfully unaware of the problem she created WORLD WIDE by cutting off the supply of those medical isotopes or else she didn't care! She could have brought the problem to a higher level, considering the magnitude of what would happen. She didn't bother. She acted like a typical brainless bureaucrat, following the rule book while the roof was falling down.

It's very likely that some sick people died because of her actions.

Edited January 18, 2008 by Wild Bill

[jdobbin]

"castatrophic nuclear accidents elsewhere."??? Where??

Don't mention Chernobyl! That would be like comparing a Lada car to the quality of a Lexus! The Russians built a reactor there that would have been flatly illegal in any other country in the world. To make it worse, the accident happened at the behest of a political manager who overruled ALL of the technical ones!

You know how many people were hurt at Three Mile Island? NONE! Look it up!

Now, do you actually have any idea of how the Chalk River reactor was built? You might have a better chance of winning the lottery ten or twenty times before you could have had a significant accident, especially during the time frame of just the few months necessary to correct the backup issue.

The lady seemed either blissfully unaware of the problem she created WORLD WIDE by cutting off the supply of those medical isotopes or else she didn't care! She could have brought the problem to a higher level, considering the magnitude of what would happen. She didn't bother. She acted like a typical brainless bureaucrat, following the rule book while the roof was falling down.

It's very likely that some sick people died because of her actions.

The last statement is unsupported by any facts I've seen.

The regulator is not responsible for the supply of isotopes. That is AECL and the minister's responsibility and they received plenty of advance notice.

There have been two significant accidents at Chalk River. No one died at the time but there have been a number of lawsuits thereafter to compensate the clean-up crews.

It is in no one's interest to have a tame regulator.

[Shakeyhands]

...and I will add that a Nuclear accident is a nuclear accident no matter what the other factors around it are. An accident is in no ones best interests including those that require nuclear medicine related tests.

[myata]

Her job was to put hundreds or thousands of lives at serious risk in order to prove a political point and flex a little muscle?

No, you don't get it. Her job was to ensure safety of operation of the plant. To comply with safety regulations, while keeping plant open, is the responsibility of the management of the plant (and up the management hierarchy, to the minister himself, who appoints the board of the crown corporation). You don't seem to understand this subtle nuance? Or Lunn? Or Harper?

I'm quite certain that in the industry mission critical as nuclear, safety isn't based simply on somebody's hunch. There're norms and standards (at least in my field, they are very comprehensive and detailed). It's hard to imagine that they (norms and standards) would not be followed in issuing these safety recommendations. Check this: CTV story. Note in particular, in the words of CNSC director general: "the commission made its decisions based on advice from scientists and engineers."

Read it carefully: important safety feature (emergency cooling pumps) was absent - license has been extended on assurances that it will be added - feature still not added - license revoked.

Sounds like plain and obvious dragging of feet by the plant management - so, blame the regulator, right?

No, it appears to be yet another case where Harper assumes his standard "my way or no way" attitude. All while invoking populistic "we're saving lives here" slogans. OMG. I sincerely hope people here can see through it. One can only imagine what we may get into if these guys are one day in majority.

[Keepitsimple]

An excellent article in The Star this morning - refreshingly non-partisan. The one good thing about all the hubbub is that AECL's long-festering problems are out in the open. What is truly saddening - and maddening - is that long-term neglect and incompetence have taking Canada from being a leader in nuclear technology to a mere shadow of its former brilliance.

Link to full story: http://www.thestar.com/printArticle/295589

Chalk River crisis sired by AECL

TheStar.com - sciencetech - Chalk River crisis sired by AECL

January 19, 2008

Peter Calamai

Science Reporter

The oldest nuclear research reactor in the world is still chugging away at Chalk River, already running three years beyond its scheduled retirement date to meet global demand for medical isotopes.

Yet in a nearby building two new custom-built MAPLE reactors, designed specifically for isotope production, sit idle eight years after they were supposed to replace the 50-year-old, multipurpose National Research Universal reactor.

The new reactors aren't operating because of a series of hard-to-believe blunders by once world-class Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., the Crown corporation responsible for designing and building them.

The blunders include:

An unproven and overly intricate design that strained the competence of AECL engineers and scientists.

Shoddy workmanship and lax quality control, which meant grit particles stopped two sets of safety control rods from shutting down the reactors.

An unexplained miscalculation about changes in reactivity – the reactor's oomph – on which the entire safety scenario is based.

In the view of most nuclear experts and informed observers, these AECL failures are the real cause of last month's crisis in isotope production that culminated this week in the Harper government's unprecedented firing of Linda Keen, president of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.

A contributing factor was the refusal of the Liberal government under Jean Chrétien to commit roughly $500 million to replace the Universal reactor with a super-reactor called the Canadian Neutron Facility dedicated to scientific research, and test new designs for the CANDU power reactor.

Overarching all this was the meagre funding over the past decade by Liberal and Conservative governments for AECL to remedy health, safety, licensing and security shortcomings at the sprawling Chalk River laboratories.

A special 2007 report by the federal auditor general recently made public by AECL estimated that $600 million would be needed for such urgent improvements over the next five years. Yet since 2002 Ottawa has provided just $34 million.

"We should never have got ourselves in this situation," says Bill Garland, a professor of nuclear engineering at McMaster University who worked at AECL and Ontario Hydro's nuclear division.

"Everybody knew that Canada was the chief source of medical isotopes and yet they just stood by and did nothing. Why didn't the U.S. build its own isotope reactor?"

Everyone also should have known that Canada's isotope production hung by the slenderest of threads. The signs were everywhere.

[myata]

Listening to "The House" on CBC this morning, it appears that there's much more to the story, hopefully it will all come out in time for the election. The AECL plant in Chalk river had "some problems" for a while, to say the least, e.g. the reactor at the centre of the issue was supposed to be replaced back in 2000. This project (2008) is still ongoing, granted, with huge cost overruns and, according to Auditor General Sheila Frazer, less than certain future. So here's an alternative (to what Harper and Lunn are claiming) version of events:

1. AECL's reactor upgrade project is in a mess; (and btw when things in this country get into a seriously messed up state, tragedy usually not far behind: tainted blood scandal; newborn pathology scandal; and so on).

2. This responsible and transparent government does nothing to clear the mess (it is ultimately responsible, AECL being a crown corporation).

3. Until the mess comes out into the open, when independent regulator closes the plant due to safety concerns, after giving extentions did not result in any resolution of the safety problem.

4. At which time this responsible and transparent government wakes up and starts looking where to assign the blame (see also p.2). The obvious and proven culprits appear to be: 1) Liberals 2) independent regulator.

5. The lesson of the story appears to be, even if you're independent regulator appointed to guard safety guidelines and practices, you should watch what this government desires (as it always knows better), or else...

I hope this isn't the end of the story and all details (including the reasons for mysterious and untimely firing) will come out. I'll be keeping an eye and post any updates.

[Keepitsimple]

Listening to "The House" on CBC this morning, it appears that there's much more to the story, hopefully it will all come out in time for the election. The AECL plant in Chalk river had "some problems" for a while, to say the least, e.g. the reactor at the centre of the issue was supposed to be replaced back in 2000. This project (2008) is still ongoing, granted, with huge cost overruns and, according to Auditor General Sheila Frazer, less than certain future. So here's an alternative (to what Harper and Lunn are claiming) version of events:

1. AECL's reactor upgrade project is in a mess; (and btw when things in this country get into a seriously messed up state, tragedy usually not far behind: tainted blood scandal; newborn pathology scandal; and so on).

2. This responsible and transparent government does nothing to clear the mess (it is ultimately responsible, AECL being a crown corporation).

3. Until the mess comes out into the open, when independent regulator closes the plant due to safety concerns, after giving extentions did not result in any resolution of the safety problem.

4. At which time this responsible and transparent government wakes up and starts looking where to assign the blame (see also p.2). The obvious and proven culprits appear to be: 1) Liberals 2) independent regulator.

5. The lesson of the story appears to be, even if you're independent regulator appointed to guard safety guidelines and practices, you should watch what this government desires (as it always knows better), or else...

I hope this isn't the end of the story and all details (including the reasons for mysterious and untimely firing) will come out. I'll be keeping an eye and post any updates.

Immediately before your post, I posted an article from today's Star - I think you'll find most of the information you are looking for in there.

Edited January 19, 2008 by Keepitsimple

[jdobbin]

Lunn on CTV today about how didn't know that Chalk River had problems despite Auditor's report.

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/stor...?hub=TopStories

Natural Resources Minister Gary Lunn said Sunday he had no way of anticipating the Chalk River reactor crisis, despite an auditor general report sent to him in the fall that warned of lingering safety issues at the site.

The report was issued in September and Lunn told CTV's Question Period that he was briefed on the audit during the first week of October, about two months before the reactor was shut down.

"It was a great report but it said absolutely nothing about the situation," said Lunn. "It never once raised licensing issues."

The report warned of highlighted "three strategic challenges" Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. faced, including "the replacement of aging facilities at Chalk River Laboratories (CRL)."

Lunn said the auditor general's concerns were focused on MAPLE reactors at Chalk River that had yet to come online.

"There's absolutely nothing, nothing in this auditor general's report that would have allowed me to foresee that we were going to have this problem that we did in early December. It's simply not in the report."

Lunn also said that AECL, a Crown corporation, never alerted him to the fact the Chalk River reactor was operating without a back-up pump in violation of its licence.

"I was never told by the Canadian Safety Commission or AECL that AECL was under a potential licence violation," he said. "It was not something I would have been briefed on immediately. So, again, I would not have known this."

This strains credibility since he also had AECL and the regulator reports as well.

Certainly there is no explanation for why Lunn went into hiding for the last month and had to spend big bucks on an image consultant.

[myata]

One thing I particulartly dislike, no, strongly detest, about "this responsible government" is its unsurpassed ability to treat everybody around them on the intellectual level of a 5 year old (not to say, 5 letter word). Here we go, Lunn talking about parliament's decision to reopen the reactor (CBC story). He's asked about his incompetence causing the parliament to intervene with an emergency legislation. He's turning it as though parliament's intervention, caused by his office's incompetent management in the first place, somehow exonerated him from all responsibility. The truth is coming out though. Minister's office did nothing to ensure that safety work was on schedule. And they chose the independent regulator to take blame for their incompetence.

And now it looks like the economy is next on their agenda.

[Topaz]

It was said in Parliament today that the head of the AECL took responsibility for the shortages isotopes and yet Lunn fired the wrong person, number what 10, they have fired???

[myata]

And now the pumps at the Chalk River are finally online: CTV.

So, there was nothing impossible about having it done, as the regulator has instructed in the first place. Only good management and competence, which are apparently lacking in "this responsible government", if it takes a good public splash to have things done. And who's to blame?

Sure, anybody but "the responsible government".