CNL marks Port Hope remediation milestone

CLARINGTON, ONT.—Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL) recently announced it has completed the excavation and transfer of legacy radioactive waste away from the Lake Ontario shoreline in southeast Clarington, Ont.

The placement of the last truckloads of waste in an aboveground mound at the new long-term waste management facility, located about 700 metres north of the shoreline site, marks a milestone for the Port Granby Project and the Port Hope Area Initiative (PHAI), stated a release. CNL is implementing the PHAI on behalf of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, a federal Crown corporation.

The soil was contaminated from the radium and uranium refining and processing operations of the former Crown corporation Eldorado Nuclear and its private sector predecessors, which operated from the 1930s to 1988.

Remediation of the legacy waste management site began in 2016 and was undertaken in stages, with each section of the site undergoing a testing process to confirm that all contaminated material had been removed. Verified areas were then backfilled with clean soil and restored by hydroseeding and planting vegetation. As the cleanup neared completion, internal roads and other infrastructure were removed.

Capping and closing of the engineered storage mound at the new facility is underway and expected to be completed in summer 2021, with final landscaping targeted for summer 2022.

Monitoring systems are being installed within the mound and around the perimeter of the new facility to ensure the integrity of the facility.

“The safe and successful completion of this remediation is the culmination of years of hard work and planning carried out by CNL’s Port Hope Area Initiative team, and fulfills a key commitment by the Government of Canada to restore these lands for the local community,” said Joe McBrearty, CNL president and CEO, in a statement. “This milestone represents continued progress in one of the largest and most complex environmental clean-up missions ever undertaken in Canada.”