07/02/2026
An important read on the federal government's latest moves - by Mark Winfield.
ARTICLE: Canada’s dangerous nuclear gamble
--The federal government’s new nuclear strategy promises energy security, but will deliver high costs and new vulnerabilities
by Mark Winfield / July 1, 2026
The past week was punctuated by a series of major announcements from Ottawa that appear to commit Canada to an overwhelmingly nuclear power-based pathway for its electricity future. The federal government tabled a Nuclear Energy Strategy for Canada, committing, among other things, to 10 new large reactor projects. It also announced its intention to designate a high-level nuclear waste repository as a “project of national interest” (PONI) for accelerated approvals under the provisions of Bill C-5, the Building Canada Act. Ontario, for its part, joined the federal government in financing a $700 million investment by the Williams Treaties First Nations in a small modular reactor (SMR) project at Ontario Power Generation’s Darlington Nuclear Generating Station.
Although presented as a definitive pathway toward making Canada an “energy superpower,” the announcements raise at least as many technical, economic, security, and environmental questions as they claim to answer. The key areas of concern include the following.
Technical and economic viability
At its core, the federal plan proposes to pursue the construction of up to 10 new large-scale reactors in Canada, with two under construction by 2035, and five more planned or under development by 2040—including one deployment “outside of Ontario.”
Questions around this strategy arise immediately. The plan identifies no specific locations for these projects, nor reactor technologies that are to be employed. Indeed, it makes clear that even under the most optimistic scenarios no modern cost-competitive Canadian reactor design (likely the 1,000 MW CANDU MONARK derivative of earlier CANDU designs) will be available before the end of the decade.
Among other things, this implies the need for Canada’s nuclear strategy to rely on non-Canadian reactor designs. Despite being aggressively promoted to potential international customers, the MONARK design remains incomplete. The situation has already led the proponent of a project in Alberta to switch their proposal to favour the AP1000 design by Westinghouse Electric, which is based in the United States.
The 300 MW SMR currently under construction at Darlington—which is the lone example of an SMR currently under construction in the OECD—is the US- and Japanese-designed GE Vernova Hitachi BWRX-300. Although the federal plan references currently non-existent “micro reactors,” it is remarkably silent on the future role of SMRs, the previous centrepiece of federal and provincial nuclear strategies. This could be an acknowledgement of the ongoing concerns over the economic and technical viability of the technology.
The larger US-designed Westinghouse AP1000 is apparently under consideration for the expansion of the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station on Lake Huron, a proposed 10,000 MW Ontario Power Generation plant at Wesleyville on Lake Ontario, and a large reactor project under consideration in New Brunswick.
Beyond its implicit reliance on non-Canadian-designed (and manufactured) reactors, the federal strategy is noticeably silent on the likely costs of its heavily nuclear dependent electricity pathway, or how those expenses might be financed.
This is unsurprising, as costs remain a central challenge for nuclear power projects. The price tag for two 1,100 MW AP1000 reactors, completed in 2024 at the Vogtle nuclear power plant in Georgia, came in at US$36 billion (or about CAD$51 billion). The facility has been described as “the most expensive power plant ever built on Earth.”
Prime Minister Mark Carney and Ontario Premier Doug Ford at the announcement of a federal-provincial investment in Ontario Power Generation’s Darlington small modular reactor project. Photo courtesy Doug Ford/X.
The still incomplete CANDU MONARK design is reportedly being pitched by the Government of Canada to Poland, at an estimated cost of $45 to $50 billion for a three-reactor plant, or about $15 billion per unit.
In Ontario, there is rising alarm over the province’s $400 billion nuclear expansion plans and the likely implications of these costs for competitiveness, affordability, and decarbonization through electrification. The province is already spending upwards of $7 billion per year on electricity rate subsidies, in part to hide the costs of its nuclear program from ratepayers. These costs now account for more than half of the provincial deficit, exceeding Ontario’s annual capital expenditures on education and health care by wide margins.
In light of these enormous risks, and the long history of major cost overruns and delays on nuclear projects, private capital has been reluctant to engage, even when offered generous subsidies and liability protection for accidents, waste management, and decommissioning costs. The Williams Treaties First Nations investment announced on June 23 remains the only independent financial commitment to the Darlington SMR project. Even there, the underlying funds are being provided by Ottawa and Queen’s Park.
For the smaller provinces that have been reported to be considering the possibility of large nuclear projects—like New Brunswick and Saskatchewan—such pathways would involve enormous financial risks. Single large reactors in a relatively small electricity system would repeat and magnify key problems associated with the original Point Lepreau project in New Brunswick—putting a very high portion of a province’s electricity supply eggs in a single, very expensive and high-risk basket. The costs of the original construction and later refurbishment of the Lepreau project make up more than half ($3.6 billion) of New Brunswick Power’s crippling $6 billion debt, and, along with the reactor’s poor operating record, continue to drive electricity rates upwards.
Uranium enrichment, energy security, and nuclear weapons proliferation
A second crucial element of the Carney government’s openness to non-Canadian reactor designs is the fact that, unlike the original CANDU design, reactors like the AP1000 and BWRX-300 rely on enriched uranium nuclear fuel, which Canada does not currently produce. Enrichment increases the concentration of specific types of uranium in the fuel. The ability of CANDU reactors to use unenriched fuel was intended to enable an all-Canadian fuel supply chain while avoiding direct engagement with uranium enrichment, a process intimately connected with nuclear weapons development. The dual use nature of nuclear fuel enrichment processes was the core rationale for the recent US-Israeli war against Iran. Moreover, the adoption of reactor designs reliant on enriched uranium could introduce a dependency on non-Canadian fuel sources—most likely from the US.
The federal plan’s response to this concern is to casually reverse a foundational principle of the Canadian nuclear program—its reliance on natural, unenriched uranium fuel and the avoidance of domestic enrichment—and to open the door to nuclear fuel enrichment in Canada. This would be intended not only to supply non-Canadian-designed reactors operating in Canada, but also to produce fuel for export to other countries.
At the same time, the strategy is silent on the matter of nuclear weapons non-proliferation. This is despite the demonstrated risk of Canadian uranium exports being used for nuclear weapons development, as infamously occurred with India in the 1970s. Canada has recently agreed to resume nuclear exports to India, even though India has never joined the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
Rendering of GE Hitachi’s BWRX-300 small modular reactor, the technology selected by Ontario Power Generation for its planned Darlington SMR project. Image courtesy GE Hitachi.
PONIs and radioactive waste
The federal nuclear strategy includes a section on Canada’s nuclear waste management “ecosystem.” The strategy’s publication was quickly followed by an announcement of the federal government’s intention to designate the Nuclear Waste Management Organization’s proposed deep nuclear waste fuel repository near Ignace, Ontario, as a PONI for the purposes of Bill C-5. Such a designation would provide for a streamlined and accelerated approvals process for the project.
The project was originally intended to house the estimated 3.3 million spent CANDU fuel bundles currently in storage at reactor sites in Ontario, Québec, and New Brunswick. Its scope has now expanded to include all types of waste nuclear fuels, including from reactors using enriched uranium. The project has prompted deep public opposition in northwestern Ontario.
It is important to note that the provisions of Bill C-5 state that “Every determination and finding that has to be made and every opinion that has to be formed in order for an authorization to be granted in respect of a national interest project is deemed to be made or formed, as the case may be, in favour of permitting the project to be carried out in whole or in part.”
This means that even if federal regulatory staff identify problems with a project, it is to be approved regardless.
These provisions set up an exceptionally dangerous situation, particularly with respect to nuclear projects that will be “first of kind”—never built or operated before in Canada or, in some cases, globally. Concerns over the handling of nuclear projects under these provisions were reinforced by the federal government’s May 2026 proposals that, where issues are identified with nuclear projects, approvals would be provided by the federal cabinet rather than the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. This would effectively enable cabinet to authorize nuclear projects even in the face of serious technical or safety problems identified by the commission.
Paths forward
Analyses have suggested that Canada’s achievement of a net-zero emissions target by 2050 through electrification could require a two-to-three-fold increase in electricity generation by mid-century. Additional growth in demand is projected from new industries as well, particularly AI data centres.
The federal strategy suggests an overwhelmingly nuclear response to these needs, while ignoring the accelerating global movement in the direction of renewable energy, whose costs have fallen dramatically over the past decade. The current plan would place Canada on a high-cost, high-risk energy trajectory of its own and, at a moment of intense global stress on geopolitical and energy security, further weaken already faltering nuclear arms control and non-proliferation regimes.
An electricity strategy rooted in energy
productivity and renewable energy expansion, supported by making optimal use of new and existing energy storage capacity, regional interties and grid management technologies, remains Canada’s best option for decarbonization, affordability, competitiveness, and sustainability.
Photo by Doug Ford's office
