John Mann wants to know why all of the waste can't be combined to save money, suggesting there is no urgency to bury medium level waste when a site for used fuel is at least decade away.
Questions to Prime Minister Trudeau were referred to the Environment Minister, who referred the question to Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr. He referred the question to back to OPG and the NWMO, where it started.
Mann, a registered participant in the Environmental Joint Review Panel for a depository to bury low and medium nuclear waste in Kincardine, calls plans for two Deep Geologic Repositories a huge waste of taxpayer dollars since all of the waste is currently stored all together by OPG at Bruce Power.
And Mann says since OPG is the majority owner of NWMO, they should be able to work together.
The recent response from Carr says OPG can determine the best approach for the waste, then the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission will conduct an environmental assessment
That has already been done for the OPG's Deep Geologic Repository at Bruce Power, which is awaiting approval from Environment Minister Catherine McKenna.
The OPG DGR would store items such as spent filters, resins and metallic components. Other items like "buckets and mops" or gloves and work clothes are actually incinerated to significantly reduce the volume. What remains is ash, and that is what is stored in the longer term. The NWMO DGR would store spent nuclear fuel.
The Honourable Jim Carr, Minister of Natural Resources, told Mann "The government of Canada's 1996 Policy Framework for Radioactive Waste states that in accordance with the "polluter pays" principal, waste owners are responsible for the funding, organization and operation of the facilities required for their waste, including long-term waste management facilities."
He points out the 2002 Nuclear Fuel Waste Act required OPG, new Brunswick Power and Hydro Quebec to establish the NWMO to propose to the Government approaches for long term management of nuclear fuel waste.
Carr's letter goes on to say, "The Government has not imposed any specific requirements stipulating which approach waste owners must take to meet their obligations under the policy framework; waste owners are responsible for proposing and implementing projects to manage their waste. It is therefore up to the owners to determine the approaches and projects that best satisfy their long term waste management needs."
OPG explains the requirements for handling, transporting and storing low - and intermediate level waste and used nuclear fuel are different. Two separate sets of waste management operations are required for receiving, processing and emplacement of the waste, so they would still need two DGRs co-located beside each other.
The NWMO's three-year study from 2002 to 2005 to engage 18,000 Canadian citizens, including specialists and First Nation and Métis people, in a discussion of long-term options for the safe, management of used nuclear fuel cost about $22.7 million. The NWMO has not responded about the cost of continuing consultation from 2005 to 2016.