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Greenpeace Blocks Entrance to Pickering Nuclear Power Station © Greenpeace / Anand Maharaj

Nuclear power is not a solution to the climate crisis that the nuclear industry claims it is. Canadians have been burdened with dangerous and unreliable nuclear plants that were billions of dollars more expensive than promised. They are the source of cancer-emitting hazardous waste that we will be left with for up to a million years. Yet, in Ontario the government and the official opposition are poised to spend billions on new nuclear plans.

Government and industry perpetuate the myth that nuclear energy will save our planet. This could not be further from the truth, and the proof dates back to the beginning of the nuclear age.

Japan nuclear disaster --- Canadian nuclear reactors
More on the safety risks here.

In 1953, eight years after the U.S. tested the first nuclear bomb, President Eisenhower launched his Atoms for Peace program at the United Nations, ushering in a wave of atomic optimism that went from bombs to reactors and a radical and dangerous rethinking of how to power the globe.

In those early years, the true cost of going nuclear wasn't clear --- the victims of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, millions of tonnes of dangerous radioactive waste, and billions in taxpayer dollars diverted from ready-to-deploy green energy sources.

In November 2000, the world recognized the nuclear dirty and dangerous realities of this unnecessary technology by refusing to give it greenhouse gas credits during the UN climate change talks in The Hague. A further blow to nuclear power came in April 2001 when a UN sustainable development conference refused to label nuclear a sustainable technology in April 2001.

Today, the so-called nuclear renaissance of the 21st century is dead on arrival, even though industry and politicians — particularly in Canada — work hard to claim this lethal technology with it's radioactive legacy is a solution to the climate crisis. What they are doing is undermining green energy.

Climate Action Against Nuclear Energy © Greenpeace / Vinai Dithajohn


Without the favours of legislative breaks and billions in direct and hidden subsidies over the past 50 years, the nuclear energy couldn’t exist. Read Greenpeace’s Nuclear Liability and Compensation Act report to learn more.

The insurance industry refuses to insure nuclear plants. Only a special act of Parliament protecting the nuclear industry from the financial liability of a meltdown keeps nuclear operating. This is an unfair advantage for nuclear over renewable energy providers that pay the full cost of operations and insurance.

Green energy is getting nuked in an unfair fight with a dangerous, expensive and unreliable industry that is more concerned with robbing taxpayers than getting serious about fighting climate change.

Greenpeace continues to campaign to shut down reactors in Canada. In Ontario, both the governing Liberals and opposition Progressive Conservatives want to spend $36 billion dollars on rebuilding old and building new reactors at the Darlington site, 60 km east of Toronto. Making another mistake by spending billions on reactors would block a green energy future for Ontario. We need to Stop Darlington and put the money planned for reactors into cleaner and affordable green energy.