BE IT RESOLVED, That, to protect the Great Lakes and its tributaries, we, the Mayor and Members of the Chicago City Council, urge that neither this proposed nuclear waste repository at the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station site nor any other underground nuclear waste repository be constructed in the Great Lakes Basin, in Canada, in the United States, or in any First Nation property.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, That we urge the Government of Canada and the Government of Ontario to reject, and seek alternatives to, Ontario Power Generation's proposal to bury and abandon radioactive nuclear waste in the Great Lakes Basin.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, That copies of this resolution be transmitted to the Premier of Ontario, the Prime Minister of Canada, Canada's Federal Minister ofthe Environment, Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Canada's Minister of Natural Resources, the President ofthe United States, the United States Secretary of State, the President ofthe United States Senate, the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, the members of the. Illinois congressional delegation, the governors or premiers and the legislative majority leaders, in Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Ontario, and Quebec, the Board of Directors ofthe Great Lakes Commission, all Members of Ontario's Provincial Parliament and all Members of Canada's Parliament, and to the Joint Review Panel Deep Geological Repository for Low and Intermediate Level Radioactive Waste Case Reference Number 17520, c/o Panel Co-Manager, Ms. Debra Myles.
2
SUBSTITUTE RESOLUTION
WHEREAS, Ontario Power Generation (OPG), a corporation wholly owned by the Province of Ontario, is proposing to construct a deep geologic repository (DGR) and bury and abandon in the DGR all of Ontario's low and intermediate level radioactive nuclear waste, some of which will remain highly radioactive and toxic for over 100,000 years. The proposed site is located at the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station, less than one mile from the eastern shore of Lake Huron; and
WHEREAS, OPG did not consider or evaluate any other actual sites for the location of the proposed DGR; and
WHEREAS, The creation of a permanent nuclear waste storage facility so close to one of the Great Lakes is a matter of vital concern to the region's states and provinces. Millions of United States and Canadian citizens rely on the lakes as a source of drinking water, tourism, recreation, and as a key industrial asset; and
WHEREAS, A leak of radioactive waste would almost certainly have a cataclysmic effect on the delicate ecological balance of the world's largest group of interconnected freshwater bodies of water; and
WHEREAS, The Mayor and City Council ofthe City of Chicago have a deep obligation to protect the public health, safety, and welfare pf Chicagoans by working diligently to preserve our precious natural resources; and ,
WHEREAS, Under the 2012 Protocol Amending the Agreement Between Canada and the United States of America on Great Lakes Water Quality, the governments of Canada and the United States acknowledge the importance of anticipating, preventing and responding to threats to the waters ofthe Great Lakes and share a responsibility and an obligation to protect the Great Lakes from contamination from various sources of pollution, including the leakage of nuclear waste from an underground nuclear waste repository; and
WHEREAS, In the, mid 1980s, the U.S. Department of Energy was considering potential. sites for a nuclear waste repository, including locations in the Great Lakes Basin. As a result of significant Canadian opposition, Joe Clark, then Secretary of State for External Affairs, intervened, and the U.S. government honored Canada's request to rule out any sites within 40 kilometers of the Canadian border; and
WHEREAS, In September 2014, resolutions HR 716 and SR 565 were introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate expressing the sense that: (1) the Canadian Government should not allow a permanent nuclear waste repository to be built within the Great Lakes Basin; (2) the President and the Secretary of State should take appropriate action to work with the Canadian Government to prevent a permanent nuclear waste repository from being built within the Great Lakes Basin; and (3) the President and the Secretary of State should work together with their Canadian Government counterparts on a safe and responsible solution for the long-term storage of nuclear waste; now, therefore,
January 21st, 2015
To the President and Members of the City Council:
Reporting for your Committee on Health and Environmental Protection for which a meeting was held on January 20th, 2015; having had under consideration a substitute resolution regarding construction ofa nuclear waste burial and storage facility near Lake Huron which was introduced by Mayor Emanuel on December 10th, 2014, begs leave to report and recommend that Your Honorable Body Pass the proposed ordinance transmitted herewith.
This recommendation was concurred in by a viva voce vote of the members of the Committee.
Respectfully submitted,
Chairman Cardenas