A public interest information project about nuclear waste burial in Canada.

Know Nuclear Waste 

Nuclear Waste On-line 

Webinar Series presentations from past years are now available onthe Know Nuclear Waste YouTube Channel CLICK HERE 

The Nuclear Waste Management Organization says they are seeking an "informed and willing host". Read more about the NWMO "Willingness" Projects 

​Important Links and Documents for Review Closing Feb 4
The Impact Assessment Agency web page about  the NWMO DGR project  review includes key documents and notices  related  to the review,  as  well  as posting of public comments. The current comment period is on the Initial project description, and there  are two versions: the summary document is 92 pages long,  and the full  document including the Initial Project  Description is 1,322 pages BUT only the first 262 pages of that  document is the detailed (well, more detailed than the summary) version of the Initial Project Description. There is  also a 10 page  summary at the beginning of the full IPD.

​The NWMO had pronounced in August that the transportation of radioactive waste would not be part of the impact assessment process. It’s a weak argument – for 20 years the NWMO has been describing transportation as part of their project, the regulators have acknowledged that, and the Impact Assessment Act requires activities that are integral or – in the language of the Act - ‘incidental’ to the project be included in the assessment. There's no nuclear waste burial project if there's no nuclear waste to bury, and there's no nuclear waste in northern Ontario unless the NWMO transports it in from reactors in other regions.

NWMO's Nuclear Waste Project Milestones

2020 - In 2020 the Nuclear Waste Management Organization focused their investigation of potential burial sites for all of Canada's high level nuclear fuel waste on two remaining areas: the Revell Lake area, 45 kilometres west of Ignace, in northwestern Ontario, and an area just north of Teeswater in the Municipality of South Bruce in southwestern Ontario.  In November 2024 they announced that they had selected the Revell site in northwestern Ontario

January 2026 -   A federal review of the Nuclear Waste Management Organization’s nuclear waste transportation and burial project was launched on January 5th with a 30 day comment period on the Initial Project Description closing on February 4th.  

The NWMO has excluded transportation from its Initial Project Description, proposing that transportation issues not be part of the federal review.   

• Read more HERE. 
• Register for January 28 (6 pm CST, 7 pm EST) preparatory webinar HERE.
• Read more in the We the Nuclear Free North January 6 E-Bulletin Announcing Launch of Impact Assessment
  

Nuclear Waste On-line is a series of on-line presentations about nuclear waste in Canada. For the 2026 line up and past recordings  click HERE.

2024 - On November 28th 2024 the Nuclear Waste Management Organization announced that it had selected the Revell site in northwestern Ontario as the location for their proposed deep geological repository for all of Canada's high-level nuclear waste. Read more HERE 

Send your comments by February 4th. Key messages include:

• NWMO's project must be the subject of a full impact assessment and public hearing
• Transportation must be included in the impact assessment

Email your comments to nuclearwaste-dechetsnucleaires@iaac-aeic.gc.ca or post them on the public registry HERE.

IMPACT ASSESSMENT LAUNCHED OF NUCLEAR WASTE PROJECT - COMMENT BY FEBRUARY 4

Welcome

Welcome to our information web site about nuclear waste. 

This site has been created to provide ordinary people with information about an extra-ordinary challenge: the long term management of the highly radioactive waste that is created as a byproduct of using nuclear power to generate electricity.

In Canada - as in several other countries that use nuclear power - the nuclear industry is committed to the idea of burying the nuclear fuel waste deep underground in a rock formation. In 2002 the federal government gave the nuclear industry permission to organize themselves as the Nuclear Waste Management Organization  and so relaunch their search for a suitable site and a willing community, and in May 2010 the Nuclear Waste Management Organization formally launched their search for just such a community. 

As of August 2012 twenty-two communities were allowing themselves to be studied as possible end points for all of Canada's high level nuclear waste: three in northern Saskatchewan, thirteen in northern Ontario, and six in southwestern Ontario. 

In November 2013 the NWMO dropped two from northern Saskatchewan and two from northern Ontario. In January 2014, two communities in Bruce County were dropped, and in June 2014 the town of Nipigon withdrew. The NWMO dropped Brockton in December 2014, and Spanish and the Township of the North Shore in January 2015. In February 2015, Creighton, Saskatchewan and Schreiber, Ontario were removed from the NWMO investigations. The Municipality of Central Huron and the Township of White River were dropped by the NWMO in June 2017, and in December NWMO announced that the area around Blind River and Elliot Lake, Ontario, will no longer be considered. In November 2019  the Townships of Hornepayne and Manitouwadge were taken off NWMO’s list, and in January  2020 NWMO announced that it had signed agreements with landowners in South Bruce , and would no longer consider Huron Kinloss as a potential host.

On November 28 2025 the NWMO announced that it had selected the Revell site between Ignace and Dryden in the heart of Treaty 3 territory in northwestern Ontario.