Residents of the unorganized community of Melgund say they have felt overlooked in the site selection process for a planned nuclear waste facility.<\/p>\n
MELGUND \u2014\u00a0\u201cIts nice to be recognized finally, because we haven\u2019t been up until now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pat Daignault is chair\u00a0of the Melgund\u00a0Local Services Board, the highest elected official for the unorganized community just 12 kilometres from the\u00a0proposed location<\/a> of a\u00a0deep-geological repository for high-level nuclear waste.<\/p>\n The tiny community of only 49 permanent residents is closer to the Revell Lake site than\u00a0host communities\u00a0Ignace<\/a> and Wabigoon Lake Objbwe\u00a0Nation<\/a>, although the site is within\u00a0the traditional territories of both Wabigoon and Eagle Lake First Nation.<\/a><\/p>\n On April 22,\u00a0the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) and\u00a0Impact Assessment Agency of Canada (IAAC)\u00a0held an open house and presentation in Dyment, a small settlement within Melgund.<\/p>\n “The decision on whether the project is approved or not is going to governor council, and so it\u2019s not a done deal that the project will happen,” said IAAC representative \u00c9lyse Maisonneuve-Campbell.<\/p>\n That was a surprise to\u00a0Sylvia Green-Guenett, a member of the Dryden-based anti-nuclear\u00a0group Sunset Country Spirit Alliance, who said\u00a0the community has been under the impression the project was indeed \u201ca done deal.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAs far as we knew, this is going in, this is when it\u2019s going to start, this is when it\u2019s going to end, and we\u2019re doing this. That\u2019s what we\u2019ve been taught,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n As officials prepare to decide or whether and under what conditions the project would move ahead,\u00a0Daignault had one big question.<\/p>\n \u201cWho represents us?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n Maisonneuve-Campbell explained that there is an option to apply for funding to hire a lawyer on behalf of the community.<\/p>\n \u201cWe will apply for funding, and we will be represented professionally by experts. It\u2019s the only way we can do it. We can\u2019t do it on our own.\u201d Daignault said.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause we\u2019re such a small community, we\u2019re just overlooked. They look at the bigger picture, not who is actually here and who it\u2019s really going to affect\u201d said lifelong Melgund resident Karen Daignault, Pat’s wife.<\/p>\n Roughly 15-20 people attended the meeting, a mix of Melgund residents and anti-nuclear activists who travelled from\u00a0as far as\u00a0North Bay.<\/p>\n One Melgund resident said that she would like to see water testing on a twice-yearly basis, and the results distributed to all residents. \u201cIf somethings going to happen, it\u2019s going to happen to us. Not Ignace, not Dryden.\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Following the first comment period, which saw over 600 comments<\/a>, the IAAC referred the project to the current\u00a0independent review panel<\/a>.<\/p>\n The officials explained the impact assessment process\u00a0and how their input will be\u00a0used when it comes time to make a decision.<\/p>\n \u201cThe review panel can only look at what\u2019s in the registry to make their decision, that is the only source of information they have\u201d said CNSC representative\u00a0Kendra Warnock-Juteau.<\/p>\n The team explained they are currently developing the\u00a0guidelines that will\u00a0act like an \u201cinstruction manual\u201d for what the NWMO has to study. The NWMO\u00a0provides those studies in an\u00a0impact statement. After that is received, another comment period will be held.<\/p>\n \u201cBut for now, these guidelines are really important because if there\u2019s something that\u2019s not in there, then the NWMO doesn\u2019t have to produce that study and there might be somethings that\u2019s missed\u201d Maisonneuve-Campbell said.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you read through (a section) of the guidelines and think there\u2019s a big gap there, the scope isn\u2019t right, its not described the way that it actually is in reality, please let us know and we will do our best to ensure that those values and concerns are reflected throughout the process and go in front of the review panel when it comes time for decision making\u201d said Warnock-Juteau.<\/p>\n Maisonneuve-Campbell\u00a0explained that information will be reviewed from experts from all levels of the government, from First Nations, the CNSC and the NWMO.<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019ll have different views, and the panel will have to ask them questions to figure out who has the most credible arguments, who makes the most sense,\u201d said Maisonneuve-Campbell.<\/p>\n “The impact assessment process,\u00a0it’s a different game,” said Maisonneuve-Campbell in response to concerns about the NWMO’s responsiveness to questions from the public.<\/p>\n “We encourage you\u00a0to participate …\u00a0We’re trying to make sure that everybody has a voice. And that is the goal.”<\/p>\n More than 1,000 comments have been submitted to-date in the\u00a0current review period<\/a>, which will remain open until midnight on Sunday.\u00a0More information on the project\u00a0and\u00a0how to submit\u00a0a\u00a0comment is available on\u00a0the\u00a0IAAC website.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Residents of the unorganized community of Melgund say they have felt overlooked in the site selection process for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":660628,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,295,66],"class_list":["post-660627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/660627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=660627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/660627\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/660628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=660627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=660627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=660627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}