First Nations urge Environment Minister not to green light Chalk River nuclear waste dump.

MARIE WOOLF, OTTAWA, Globe and Mail, 15 Feb 24

Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault was urged by First Nations chiefs Wednesday not to issue a permit to allow a nuclear waste dump on a forested site northwest of Ottawa where a variety of wildlife, including “at risk” wolves, live.

Ten chiefs and members of First Nations in Quebec and Ontario travelled to Parliament to urge the federal government to halt the Chalk River Near Surface Disposal Facility (NSDF), which the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission approved for construction last month.

First Nations, supported by environmentalists and Bloc Québécois and Green MPs, said the site of the Canadian Nuclear Laboratories’ planned nuclear waste dump is too near the Ottawa River, which supplies drinking water to the country’s capital. They fear it could be polluted with a radioactive substance running off the site.

Kebaowek First Nation last week filed a Federal Court application for a judicial review of the Jan. 9 decision by the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, alleging the government breached its duty to consult Indigenous people.

At a press conference, preceding a rally with First Nations on Parliament Hill, Kebaowek Chief Lance Haymond urged the Prime Minister to intervene and halt the project saying First Nations had not been properly consulted.

Chief Dylan Whiteduck of Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg First Nation told The Globe and Mail that an inadequate assessment of the impact on plants and mammals – including black bears hibernating in dens on the site – was conducted before approval was given.

First Nations spent several months surveying the site and found it rich with wildlife, but he said they were not given long enough, and a more extensive survey is needed.

Mr. Haymond said if Mr. Guilbeault were to issue a permit under the Species at Risk Act (SARA) it would pre-empt an assessment his department is carrying out on upgrading to a threatened species eastern wolves that roam on the site………………………………………………………………

In 2015, the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada reassessed the status of the eastern wolf as threatened.

If the wolves are classed as threatened, their habitat would need to be protected, which could put on hold plans to build the waste dump on territory where they roam.

The eastern wolf, also known as the Algonquin wolf, numbers between an estimated 236 and 1,000 adults, and is confined to forests in Central Ontario and Southwestern Quebec. It is currently listed as a species of special concern.

The federal government published the proposed uplisting of the eastern wolf to a threatened species in November last year, carrying out a month-long consultation. It has until August to make a decision.

The proposed order amends Schedule 1 to the Species at Risk Act “to support the survival and recovery of the eastern wolf in Canada by uplisting it from a species of special concern to threatened.”……………………… https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-first-nations-urge-environment-minister-not-to-green-light-chalk-river/