Feds provide $10 million to help privatize Whiteshell URL

The federal government is committing up to $10 million to support painfully slow efforts to privatize portions of the Whiteshell laboratories, which were slated for closure in 1998 by Atomic Energy of Canada (AECL). AECL will receive $5 million over two years to "help facilitate the privatization process now underway", while the second $5 million will be used to develop an international training and development centre for nuclear fuel waste at the Underground Research Laboratory (URL) in Lac du Bonnet MB. To be managed by Western Economic Diversification, the latter financing is over five years and contingent upon AECL's success in finding a buyer for the URL. The scheme is to create an international demonstration facility for nuclear fuel waste management, building upon AECL's research into the viability of storing such waste within Canadian Shield granite. To prepare for privatization, AECL has created a Waste Technology Business Unit, comprising the URL and its existing Nuclear Fuel Waste Management Program....