Here’s the question at the heart of it: Should we be worried about radioactive waste leaching into the Great Lakes? Absolutely we should, notes a coalition of 110 Canadian and American environmental groups. For a year they’ve been calling on both governments to reduce what they believe are the harmful ramifications of radioactive isotopes in humans.

Gauging the extent of nuclear contamination in the Great Lakes is daunting. Yet a report released in March 2016 by the Canadian Environmental Law Association proposed a simple solution: List radionuclides, a form of unstable radioactive atom, as a “chemical of mutual concern” under the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement. By listing the radioactive agent as one to watch, Ottawa and Washington would commit themselves to understanding the severity of the problem, all while developing control strategies to reduce any hazardous ecological or health impacts.

Since 1972, Canada and the United States jointly agreed to restore and maintain the “chemical, physical, and biological integrity” of the Great Lakes. And in May 2016, both countries released the first set of eight chemicals they committed to monitor. Some usual suspects—mercury and polychlorinated biphenyls—were included alongside newcomer flame retardants and acids.

Radionuclides didn’t make the cut, an oversight that means “the most comprehensive environmental monitoring program for the lakes” cannot be applied to them, Canadian Environmental Law Association (CELA) head Theresa McClenaghan said at the time.

Known as isotopes, radionuclides emit energy as radiation as they seek stability. This speeds their decay; while some deteriorate rapidly, other isotopes remain in an environment for millions of years. It’s the power of this breakdown that allows radionuclides to damage living tissue, causing lung and bone cancer, mutated DNA, birth defects, and leukemia.

While radionuclides do exist organically in the Great Lakes region (most commonly from uranium, used in nuclear fuel), it is human activity that’s made the basin a “hot-bed for nuclear-related activity,” notes John Jackson, CELA director and the report’s lead author.

More than 30 pieces of nuclear infrastructure have been built around the four lower Great Lakes over the past six decades. Uranium mines, nuclear waste sites, power plants—all brought dangerous elements to the province’s radioactive mix. Iodine-129, one isotope commonly used in Ontario in nuclear fuel bundles, has a half-life of 15.7 million years; it’s also known to destroy thyroids.

Cumulative impacts matter. Any new addition of radionuclides to the Great Lakes, however small, Jackson notes, compounds the effects of harmful isotopes already present. And unlike rivers or oceans where water turnover happens quickly, the Great Lakes are a relatively closed system. Lake Superior, for example, needs almost two centuries to replace its water, trapping damaging radionuclides for generations.

Mark Mattson, head of Lake Ontario Waterkeeper, told current events show The Agenda late last year that nowhere else on Earth is the same water that’s needed to cool nuclear facilities also used by 45 million people for drinking water. That’s a dangerous anomaly that should give everyone pause. “We don’t have extra-special protections that I think are warranted given how much we rely on the Great Lakes,” he said.

Not everyone agrees that radionuclides are a clear danger. David Shoesmith, the Industrial Research Chair in the University of Western Ontario’s chemistry department (a position funded in part by nuclear operator Ontario Power Generation), says there is “no reason whatsoever” for Ottawa and Washington to list radionuclides as a chemical of mutual concern.

Their presence in the Great Lakes is insignificant, Shoesmith tells me. “The only sources for significant levels of radionuclides in that water would be from whatever nuclear reactors there are on the shoreline,” he said. “And whatever they emit, which would be incredibly small if anything at all, would be already noted and dealt with” by power producers and regulated by a host of monitors as mandated by federal and international law.

“Radioactivity is a fact of life whether we want to think about it or not,” Shoesmith adds. And the chance of radionuclides escaping from a nuclear facility “is as close to zero as we can guarantee.”

Despite this, why choose to stifle our knowledge of and ability to act on the danger of something as grave as nuclear waste in our drinking water? Listing radionuclides as a chemical of mutual concern upholds the spirit (and the legal obligations) of the Water Quality Agreement that Canada and America signed back in ’72. And, more critically, such a move could make both countries better informed of nuclear power’s potential pitfalls. This is crucial at a time when we’re debating nuclear licence renewal in Ontario and deciding what underground reservoir will have the dubious honour of housing some of the 37 million kilograms of nuclear waste currently sitting in storage cells across the province.

“There is no level of radionuclides below which exposure can be defined as ‘safe,’” Jackson notes ominously in his report. He’s right. And while Shoesmith’s point that radioactivity is a fact of life is well taken, our overwhelming reliance on the Great Lakes to sustain the lives of millions residing in the basin trumps any call for complacency. After all, we were reckless in situating nuclear power plants deep in the belly of Canada’s most populous province. Let’s at least be bold in knowing the dangers we face.

Demonstration wind turbine in Toronto. Ontario wind power installations will be the first to shut down when conservation measures are successful, This Magazine has learned. Creative Commons photo by Flickr user Diego_3336.

Despite its recent investment in wind energy, Ontario will periodically ask wind operators to turn off their turbines, leaving gas and nuclear operating, This Magazine has learned.

Conservation efforts and more energy production have led to an occasional surplus of electricity in the province, requiring Ontario to power down some generators at certain times of the year. According to a source within Ontario’s non-renewable generating sector, wind generators will be the first to be shut down during surplus periods due to contracts that favour older natural gas plants. Ontario will soon have 1,200 Megawatts of wind power installed, and significant portions of it would periodically go unused under the scheme.

“It makes no sense to burn natural gas or nuclear fuel while wind turbines are locked out,” said the source. This agreed not to name the individual because doing so could lead to employer sanction.

Without any significant ability to store electricity, Ontario’s Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO) balances energy generation with the amount being consumed every five minutes. The IESO adds power based on the lowest cost bids offered by generators, going from lowest cost up.

Some older gas plants have contracts that allow them to generate fixed amounts of power at all hours. Nuclear plants, which are unable to quickly change their level of production, offer their power at a negative price at times when demand is low. The need can become so low that only those offering at negative prices are asked to generate power.

However, the Ontario Power Authority, the government agency that controls contracts and planning for Ontario’s energy system, does not permit wind generators to run at negative pricing. A “Feed-in-Tariff” program offers a fixed cost for clean energy producers to operate. Key to the business plans of wind turbines is being able to sell every megawatt they are able to generate. The effect will be that nuclear and older gas plants will continue to run, while wind farms, co-operatives, First Nations, and farmers will be the first asked to shut down their turbines.

The generally accepted purpose of energy conservation—to reduce the need for dirtier power—will be turned on its head as turbines shut down when use is low. The policies will mean that when Ontarians work to reduce their energy use—if, say, Earth Hour happens at a time of moderate temperatures, as it did in 2010—consumers may unwittingly prompt the shutdown of greener energy producers.

Such negative pricing periods happened for 351 hours in 2009 and the issue will become more acute this year, with significantly more wind-power generators on the grid.

The OPA plans to add significant capacity throughout the province. Because Ontario’s demand for electricity can range from 12,000 to 27,000 megawatts, the OPA has reasoned that more generation is needed for peak times. Ontario recently signed a deal with Samsung C&T and Korean Electric Power to build and generate 600 megawatts of wind power in the province. Last Thursday, it announced 184 additional contracts for renewable energy projects, including wind and solar. It is also pursuing natural gas power plants including controversial projects in King and Oakville as well as renewable projects throughout the province. The King plant is planned to run on an as-needed basis, but that plan has been criticized by Holland Marsh farmers and environmental organizations.

According to a report by the Ontario Clean Air Alliance, the area’s power needs could be met by expanding programs which pay companies to reduce power, along with increased renewable generation and possibly cleaner ways of using natural gas.

The province’s plans for new nuclear generation last year stalled after a bid for two reactors came in at a cost of $26 billion. According to the Alliance, the cost of new nuclear energy is 21 cents per kilowatt hour, versus three cents for conservation and nine to thirteen cents for wind and water power.

Update – July 3, 2019: Those looking for technology recycling facilities can also visit this Tech Recycling Map for nearby centres.

K.R. Sridhar of Bloom Energy shows off a component of his "Bloom Box" to 60 Minutes' Leslie Stahl.

60 Minutes aired this report last night on Bloom Energy, a California company officially launching this week that says it has perfected a fuel-cell technology that is capable of making the conventional energy grid obsolete and producing clean(er), cheap(er) power. I get the strong whiff of bullshit off this whole story, and yet there’s something still irresistible about it: the idea of putting a refrigerator-sized box in your basement that’s capable of powering your whole house is just so enticing.

The thing that appears to set the “Bloom Box” apart from run-of-the-mill cold-fusion swindlers is that the technology is already in use, powering a Google datacentre with natural gas and the headquarters of eBay with landfill biogas. So actual people have paid actual money for these boxes and use the electricity they produce—and are willing to show them off to a CBS camera crew. So, with the usual caveat that when something seems too good to be true, it usually is, and also that highly choreographed public relations campaigns by self-proclaimed “revolutionary” companies make me want to puke, this is still totally worth a few minutes of viewing time.

It is my birthday this week. As I turn 25, there is one question I face: do I have a future? My life from here on out, and the lives of my generation, will be shaped by the choices we make now. The choices we make depend on one word: energy.

We are at a precipice. We either make a paradigm shift in the 21st century with our energy consumption. Or we stand to repeat the 20th century with “fossil fool” reliance and be doomed. Essentially, I either have a future or I don’t.

Energy sourcing will be the most important issue in the next 10 to 20 years and will shape the remainder of this century, as well as beyond. Presently, 86 percent of the world’s energy comes from fossil fuels — oil, coal and gas. These energy sources ave shaped our way of life in the 20th century, providing us with our technological advances and many creature comforts along the way. But running cars, heating up our bathtubs and blaring TV sets come with a price tag of more than just money.

The price could be the my generation’s future. Fossil fuels are destroying landscapes with strip mining (such as what’s happening in the Appalachian Mountains for coal), polluting air and water, and is the number one contributor to anthropogenic climate change.

Yet there are reasons for hope as U.S. President Barack Obama has shown great strides in changing energy practices. The president plans to make sustainability “the centerpiece of a new American economy.” He aims to implement a “Green New Deal” that would double solar, wind and biomass energy sources and cut U.S. dependency on oil with fuel-efficient auto standards. These transformations can create jobs and make for a more energy-secure superpower.

However, developing countries like China, India, and parts of the Middle East will still account for 80 percent of future oil demands. Therefore, “fossil fuels will continue to meet 80 per cent of global energy needs for the foreseeable future,” Thomas Axworthy recently wrote in the Toronto Star.

And if there is no global plan to reduce emissions, scientists are now stating there is a 90 percent probability that temperatures will rise between 3.5° to 7.4°C on the earth’s surface. This will have a horrendous impact on all life on the planet.

Hence, there needs to be a global energy shift. Some argue that this shift comes in the form of nuclear. Jeremy Nelson makes this argument in the current cover story of This: that to battle climate change, he says, it’s not renewables we need to turn to, but an older generation of power, nuclear. He argues that solar and wind energy is unreliable because they fluctuate, and still lag in development, while nuclear energy is zero-emissions now.

Despite grudgingly agreeing with Nelson that to be a pro-environmentalist today might mean being pro-nuclear, there is still a mighty can of worms being opened with nuclear power generation.

Nuclear might in fact be used to accelerate Canada’s desire to become the next fossil-fuel superpower: It will be used for the energy needs of the Alberta tar sands, says Andrew Nikiforuk in his book Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent. Nuclear would assist in the production of the unconventional oil that already emits three times more greenhouse gases than a conventional barrel of oil does.

So ironically, increasing nuclear power in Canada may actually increase fossil fuel emissions, rather than lowering them. There are some benefits to shifting now to a low-emission nuclear — but nuclear is not the be-all-and-end-all for energy. At best, it might be a temporary solution for action today, this year, even perhaps for the next 10-20 years on climate change. But for the remainder of the century, other means of energy need to be considered.

We, as humans, think we know it all. But perhaps we don’t know what the energy of the 21st century will be yet. Perhaps it is in research and development that we could find it. The Obama administration has recently given stimulus to R&D with 3 percent of the nation’s GDP — that is US$46 billion annually — put into prospects for the future.

Is my sense of urgency premature? I am, after all, only 25. But this is the year, a make-it or break-it year, with the Copenhagen Climate Conference. A year that is our next, and probably final, chance for a climate agreement to make fossil fuels history. We either have a future or we don’t: the answer depends on shifting energy — and shifting now.

Emily Hunter is an environmental journalist and This Magazine‘s resident eco-blogger. She is currently working on a book about young environmental activism, The Next Eco-Warriors, and is the eco-correspondent to MTV News Canada.