RE: Media's bias

[Franta, Jaroslav]

John Jacobus wrote:

I am not aware of any instance where anti-nuclear

forces want to stop nuclear medicine per se. 

<><><><><><><><><><>



A very well known instance here in Quebec is what happened to Sherbrooke

University Hospital's proposed medical isotope production & heating

mini-reactor in the late 80s.

As I recall (and you can see a bit of it in the article below), the antis

staged noisy protests both in the city of Sherbrooke and (to a lesser

extent) here in Montreal & the rest of the province.



I believe a similar thing is happening today at Sydney's Hifar reactor

(ANSTO), though in this case the antis fortunately appear to have lost (but

their goal was to stop the nuclear medicine project).



Jaro 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^





Sherbrooke hospital seeks nuclear reactor 



SHERBROOKE (The Montreal Gazette, 28 April, 1988) - Sherbrooke University

Hospital wants to be the first institution in the country to acquire one of

Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd.'s baby nuclear reactors. 

Hospital director Normand Simoneau said a major increase in hydro rates,

which will hit 77 Quebec hospitals this fall, is one of the reasons the

hospital wants to install the mini-reactor. 

AECL official Pierre Gigučre said a contract between the Crown-owned agency

and the hospital should be signed within weeks. 

Gigučre also said the agency will undertake an environmental impact study

which will be made public at hearings that must be held before the federal

and provincial governments authorize the project. 

It's unlikely the reactor will be in service before 1991, he said. 

Simoneau said the reactor will be used to produce radioactive isotopes for

clinical and research use at the hospital, which has one of the country's

"most important departments of nuclear medicine." 

Would heat hospital 

The 10-megawatt reactor - tiny compare with AECL's full-sized 600-megawatt

Candu reactors - also will heat the hospital. 

AECL's critics says the project is a threat to the community and does not

make economic sense. Norm Rubin of Energy Probe says installing the reactor

in the hospital "will be an experiment in public safety and public

acceptance." 

"This will be the first to be built and run outside an AECL lab," Rubin

said. 

"The last place on earth you would want to put a reactor is in a hospital,

except maybe a nursery school." 

Gordon Edwards of the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility said

"taxpayers probably will foot the bill. I suspect it will be a very heavily

subsidized operation." 

Gigučre said AECL will build, own and operate the reactor and sell the heat

to the hospital. Both Edwards and Rubin said the reactor will generate

high-level radioactive wastes that must be disposed of and will produce

radioactive gases that will be vented. 

Isotopes first goal 

Simoneau said although the reactor was designed as a heating system - the

radioactive core heats water which is circulated through radiators - the

hospital is more interested in using it to produce isotopes. 

"If it was just a question of heating, we would not have agreed to it,"

Simoneau said. 

But he acknowledged that Hydro-Quebec has advised the hospital its heating

bill will increase this fall to $1.14 million from $620,000 a year. 

The increase marks the end of a program under which the provincial utility

sold excess power from its northern dams to such institutions as hospitals

at subsidized rates. 

Robert Nadon of the Quebec Hospitals Association said 77 hospitals will be

affected by the program's termination. 

"The power bills for those hospitals will increase by a total of $8.5

million a year. We have asked the Department of Health and Social Affairs to

cover those costs but we have not yet had a response." 

Energy Minister John Ciaccia said in a telephone interview from Quebec

yesterday that he is "not prepared to see hydro power displaced by nuclear."



Ciaccia said he discussed the issue with the president of Hydro-Québec. "We

are prepared to look at special cases" that merit subsidized rates, be said.





^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^