Nuclear power plant in Belgium Credit: Frédéric Paulussen / Unsplash Credit: Frédéric Paulussen / Unsplash

In December 2021, Ontario Power Generation (OPG) announced plans to build a small modular nuclear reactor designed by General Electric and Hitachi at the Darlington nuclear site. 

GE Hitachi’s BWRX-300 will be unlike any other nuclear reactors in Canada, and require enriched uranium for fuel, which is not produced domestically. However, like other nuclear proposals, it, too, will be an expensive source of power, posing risks to both the environment and public health.

This is the second time Ontario has eyed a GE Hitachi reactor. In 2008, Ontario’s Energy Ministry invited GE Hitachi and three other vendors to submit proposals to build nuclear reactors in the province. GE Hitachi, however, withdrew its proposal a month later to focus instead on getting its Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor (ESBWR) design licensed for construction. What followed is relevant in evaluating OPG’s recent decision to build the BWRX-300.

The proposal to build nuclear reactors in Ontario died at the altar of economics. When the bids came in, the government cancelled plans claiming the cost was higher than it anticipated – “the cost must be right for the people of Ontario,” said then Energy Minister George Smitherman.

Overrun costs in this industry, though, aren’t anything new. In fact, there’s a long history of estimates of nuclear reactors escalating as projects become more concrete (no pun intended). To take one example – in just the last decade, sticker shock led to the roughly thirty reactors proposed to be constructed in the U.S. were reduced to just four reactors; of which two were later abandoned even after $9 billion was already spent on them. The two remaining Vogtle reactors are running years behind schedule and costs have more than doubled

GE Hitachi submitted the design for the ESBWR to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2005. It was changed nine times and finally approved in 2014. But, the entire exercise was in vain because GE Hitachi couldn’t find a single utility customer. Exelon, the largest U.S. nuclear utility, announced construction plans for the ESBWR, only to drop the idea a year later – reasons cited included power that would be too expensive to sell on electricity markets, and uncertainty about when the design would be ready for construction. 

Both these problems, most likely, will occur in OPG’s latest BWRX-300 project too. The design hasn’t yet been licensed for construction by a safety regulator anywhere, including by the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC). The CNSC actually has no experience evaluating this design, because a reactor of similar nature doesn’t exist in Canada.  While GE Hitachi has submitted documents for CNSC’s pre-licensing vendor design review, the CNSC itself says that the pre-licensing vendor design review process “does not certify a reactor design… [and the] conclusions of a design review do not bind or otherwise influence decisions made by the Commission.” Considering the nine years it took the ESBWR to be approved, we should expect – if the CNSC does its due diligence – that the BWRX-300 won’t be licensed for construction before the end of this decade, at the very least.

There are also problems with the proposed site. Darlington is located in the rapidly urbanizing Greater Toronto Area (GTA), and it has not been adequately evaluated for suitability. The province needs to consider how it will respond to emergencies and the potential impacts if a multi-reactor accident were to occur. 

The BWRX-300 will be even less economical than the ESBWR. When the power output of the reactor decreases, it generates less revenue for the owning utility, but the cost of constructing the reactor doesn’t proportionately decrease. This makes electricity from small reactors more expensive –many built in the United States shut down early for financial reasons. This is why Canada’s nuclear reactors went from 22 MWe (Nuclear Power Demonstration Reactor) to 200 MWe (Douglas Point) to roughly 900 MWe (Darlington reactors).

The BWRX-300 also faces a different power market. Renewable energy sources like solar and wind have declined by 70 to 90 per cent between 2009 (when Ontario dropped the idea to build new reactors) and 2021.

What has remained constant  though, is the fact that all nuclear reactors will produce long-lived radioactive waste, for which demonstrated solutions currently do not exist.  for which solutions are yet to be demonstrated, and pose the risk of devastating accidents. 

The urgency of the climate crisis needs solutions that are economical and quick to deploy, and small Modular Nuclear Reactors don’t meet either criterion.

Kerrie Blaise

Kerrie Blaise is an environmental lawyer based in Northern Ontario whose practice includes energy and nuclear law; she is also a member of the Canadian and International Nuclear Law Associations.

M. V. Ramana

M.V. Ramana is the Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security and Director of the Liu Institute for Global Issues at the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs, University of British Columbia,...