A local Huron-Kinloss resident presented a petition in opposition of the deep geological repository to Huron-Kinloss Council on Monday.
Laura Cardinal, a small business owner and head of the petition, said she heard a councilor say at an October 7 meeting that no one in Huron-Kinloss had stated they were opposed to the DGR.
"So we started the petition to basically say 'well, we'll bring you a list of some of the names.' We figured we'd get a couple hundred names or something, just a small amount. But there were so many people that wanted to sign it that we ended up getting over 1,100 names and we didn't even come close to covering all of Huron-Kinloss."
Cardinal said some of the concerns people have with the DGR is that the technology could fail, despite promises of it being completely safe.
"With any new technology or any new engineering feat, you can never guarantee it's going to go right, and the consequences if it were to go wrong, it's next to our largest freshwater source in the world," she said.
Outside of the safety concerns, Cardinal said there are also worries about the impact on the community.
"One of the other big things is property values. I was talking with someone recently who has a farm and said they were told by a real estate agent to sell now, because if the DGR comes to this area your farm will be worth nothing," she said.
Cardinal also said there are no clear benefits to hosting the DGR in Huron-Kinloss even though it's been mentioned it could create jobs and economic gains. She said there's no hard evidence of that, and there's concern it could also affect local tourism and other industries in the area.