London Nuclear waste safety case on display at GTA demo centre An example of a carbon steel and copper-lined canister that could be used to store Canada’s used nuclear fuel bundles, seen in Oakville on June 25, 2024. (Scott Miller/CTV News London) Share Jeff Binns is one of many scientists who has spent the past two decades trying to come up with the safest way to keep Canada’s most radioactive waste safe for the next million years. “We often use that number, but that means forever,” said Binns, who works for the Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO).
Binns and a team of scientists and researchers have been doing some of that work at NWMO’s Discovery and Demonstration Centre in Oakville. They’ve spent over a decade designing a copper-lined, carbon steel canister to protect the used nuclear fuel bundles from corrosion, and the bentonite clay boxes that could house each copper lined canister. Those bentonite clay boxes would then be placed in a series of cavernous underground tunnels, called emplacement rooms, approximately 550 metres underground.
Each designed to keep the highly radioactive fuel bundles from interacting with the natural environment. An example of a used nuclear fuel emplacement room, where Canada’s used nuclear fuel bundles could be placed in, within copper-lined canisters inside bentonite clay boxes, seen in Oakville on June 25, 2024. (Scott Miller/CTV News London) “Each level of safety has a very, very low chance of failure in and of i.
