Bécancour - Trois-Rivières
Latest Updates
2013
- January 30: Presentation by Ramzi Jammal, Executive Vice-President and Chief Regulatory Operations Officer to the Quebec National Assembly Committee on Agriculture, Fisheries, Energy and Natural Resources (PDF)
- January 24: Protocol on the End of Commercial Operation of the Gentilly-2 Nuclear Reactor (PDF)
2012
- October 11: Fact Sheet - Decommissioning of Nuclear Power Plants
- October 10: CNSC issues a statement on the earthquake in the Montreal region
- October 3: Gentilly-2: Verify the Assertions
- September 20: In defence of the messenger at the expense of the truth?
- September 13: Gentilly or Not To Be: hype not truth!
- July 13: Response to Ottawa Citizen article entitled “Decaying concrete worries safety officials” published on July 9
- July 10: The CNSC invites you to comment on Discussion Paper DIS-12-04, Regulated Timelines: Proposed Amendments to the Class I Nuclear Facilities Regulations and the Uranium Mines and Mills Regulations
- May 2: Heavy Water Leak in the Reactor Building at Gentilly-2
On Thursday, April 26, Hydro-Québec informed the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission of a heavy water leak in the reactor building at Gentilly-2. Two workers received very small doses of 0.02 and 0.03 mSv and releases to the environment were well below regulatory limits. The event did not pose any risk to the public. Hydro-Québec is required to submit a detailed event report by mid-June.
The matter will be discussed at the Commission’s regularly scheduled public meeting on May 3.
- April 21: Reply to the letter of Michel Duguay entitled “Definitely, the core will melt.” published in the Courrier Sud of April 13, 2012
- April 20: Response to the article entitled: “Is the future of Gentilly-2 compromised by Fukushima?” published in the Nouvelliste of April 20, 2012
- March 27: Letter in response to statements made by Robert Duchesne, published on March 27, 2012
2011
- July 29: Hydro-Québec and the CNSC sign protocol on the operation of the Gentilly-2 nuclear power reactor and radioactive waste facility (PDF)
- April 19: Update to regulatory action issued to all Class I facilities and uranium mines and mills in Canada
- April 12: Update to regulatory action issued to all major nuclear facilities in Canada
- March 22: CNSC request to all Class I nuclear facilities and uranium mines and mills in Canada pursuant to subsection 12(2) of the General Nuclear Safety and Control Regulations
- March 19, 2011: Seismic activity near Gentilly-2 Nuclear Power Plant
- March 17: CNSC Request to all major nuclear facilities in Canada pursuant to Subsection 12(2) of the General Nuclear Safety and Control Regulations
2010
Current Issues
Nuclear Facilities in Bécancour - Trois-Rivières
The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) licenses three nuclear operations near the community of Trois-Rivières, a nuclear generating station and two waste management facilities.
Gentilly-2 nuclear generating station
Hydro-Québec owns and is licensed to operate the Gentilly-2 Nuclear Generating Station, which has one power reactor licensed to generate 600 megawatts of electricity. It began operating in 1982 and remains in service today.
Gentilly-1 and Gentilly-2 waste management facilities
Located within the Gentilly-2 generating station’s boundary is the Gentilly-1 Waste Management Facility, which Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) owns and is licensed to operate. The Gentilly-1 Nuclear Power Station, which operated intermittently from 1972 to 1978, is also located on site. A decommissioning program was initiated in 1984 to bring the facility to a safe sustainable shutdown state. The site is now partially decommissioned and in a storage-with-surveillance mode and is licensed as a waste facility.
The Gentilly-2 Waste Management Facility, on the same site, but owned by Hydro-Québec, is licensed to accept and store radioactive waste and spent fuel produced at the generating station.
Full-time CNSC personnel work on site at the Gentilly-2 Nuclear Generating Station and carry out inspections to evaluate operations and verify compliance with regulatory requirements and licence conditions.
For more information about the Gentilly nuclear generating stations, please see Hydro-Quebec’s Web site.
Please note: Links to Web sites not under the control of the CNSC are provided solely for the convenience of users. The CNSC is not responsible for the accuracy, currency or the reliability of the content of those sites. The CNSC offers no guarantee in that regard and is not responsible for the information found through these links, nor does it endorse the sites or their content.
Users should be aware that information offered by non-Government of Canada sites, to which the Official Languages Act and certain other requirements may not apply, may be available only in the language(s) used by the sites in question.