Hearings Begin On Expansion of Ontario Nuclear Plant

The Ontario government plans to build two new reactors at Darlington, 70 km east of Toronto.

Just a guess, but the word “Fukushima” will probably be on many people’s lips as hearings begin Monday into the Darlington nuclear plant expansion. The hearings are intended to get public input on the plan and couldn’t come at a worse time for its proponents, with Japan’s ongoing nuclear crisis casting fresh doubt on the safety of nuclear power. The provincial government is hoping to add two more reactors to the four-unit Darlington plant and bring them online by 2018, but anti-nuclear groups say details remain vague and the government hasn’t even decided what type of reactor it plans to purchase. The nuclear industry maintains that Ontario is at no risk for the massive earthquake that crippled the Fukushima nuclear plant.