Ontario Minister of Energy and Electrification Stephen Lecce announced plans for a new hot cell facility to process medical radioisotopes during a visit to the plant which will enter its Major Component Replacement outage on 1 February. Meanwhile, Ontario's Green Party has passed a resolution reversing its blanket opposition to nuclear energy.
Major Component Replacement - or MCR - involves removing and replacing key reactor components including steam generators, pressure tubes, calandria tubes and feeder tubes and adding 30-35 years to the reactor's operating life. Bruce unit 4 will be the third of six Candu units at the Bruce site in Ontario to undergo the process, which is currently under way at Bruce 3. Bruce 6 returned to commercial operation last September after completing its MCR. Units 5, 7 and 8 will also be refurbished over the next 10 years.
In 2025 alone, Bruce Power said, it will invest CAD3 billion (nearly USD2.2 billion) in Ontario through MCR and Asset Management investments, and the start of unit 4 MCR will double the construction activities on site. "In terms of number of activities per day, no utility has ever taken on a project of this magnitude on an operating site", the company said.
'The sky's the limit'
Last week, Bruce Power set out its plans to expand production of medical radioisotopes using its Candu reactors, increasing long-term production capacity for lutetium-177 (Lu-177) as well as exploring the production of other isotopes.
The hot cell - a shielded facility where initial processing of Lu-177 produced in Bruce Power’s unit 7 using the proprietary Isotope Production System (IPS) will take place - will play a key role as the Bruce Power and its partners explores the possibility of producing other medical isotopes and expands its Isotope Production System (IPS) to other units, the company said. The hot cell will be installed either on the Bruce site or at one of its partner Isogen’s local facilities (Isogen is a joint venture between Kinectrics and Framatome).
Lecce described medical isotopes from Ontario's nuclear generating stations as "one of the most consequential tools doctors have available" to diagnose and treat cancer. "As someone who has been impacted by cancer in my family like so many Canadians, I know that this initiative will save lives and further cement Ontario's place as a global leader in the production and processing of cancer-fighting medical isotopes," he said.
"The exciting part of this is that when we have all of the infrastructure in place with our IPS and the new hot cell fully operational, the sky is the limit on our production and research of new medical isotopes for doctors and patients around the world, allowing a breakthrough in cancer treatment," Bruce Power President and CEO Eric Chassard said.
Green turn-around
Nuclear energy was at the core of the Government of Ontario's plans to build critical infrastructure and spur economic growth set out in its latest economic statement in October. One of Ontario's opposition parties - the Green Party of Ontario - has now passed a motion at its 2024 Annual General Meeting reversing a blanket opposition to nuclear energy. The Society of United Professionals - a union representing more than 10,000 professionals from Ontario's energy and legal sectors, and an advocate for the expansion of Ontario's Candu nuclear fleet - said the resolution "explicitly calls for the use of made-in-Canada Candu reactors".
"There is scientific consensus that a significant increase in nuclear energy, in tandem with hydro, non-hydro renewables, storage and other ultra-low emission energy sources, is necessary in order to power the electrification of our economy required to reach net-zero emissions," said Michelle Johnston, President of the Society of United Professionals. "Given the Green Party's long-standing opposition to nuclear energy, we were pleasantly surprised to see this resolution pass. As a party genuinely invested in the fight against climate change, it makes sense to see them recognize that nuclear energy is one of the most potent tools in that fight."
Two of the provincial government's 124 seats are currently held by the Greens. The New Democratic Party of Ontario, which holds 28 seats, still maintains anti-nuclear policy positions, but with its policy conference scheduled for January 2025 the Society said it is "hopeful that we will see similar resolutions passed in support of made-in-Canada nuclear technology, and that the next election will be the first where all parties are running on platforms that recognise the environmental, economic and jobs benefits of nuclear energy".