Comments on: Chalk River nuclear reactor — Keynesian failure

By: Chalk River failure = we are demanding too much | ThePolitic.com

Chalk River failure = we are demanding too much | ThePolitic.com — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 10:16:40 +0000

[...] if the free market can be blamed for not delivering medical isotopes and the best the government can offer is to be out of service, then, maybe Canadians are expecting [...]

By: Jeffrey Wilson

Jeffrey Wilson — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 15:38:44 +0000

Does anyone know of a Brian A. Dunn, LLB or a Sara Jane Cohen? My company received a threatening letter in the mail from these people concering the Chalk River facility and AECL and we have nothing to do with these facilities. We are located in Indiana, USA and are not even in teh nuclear business. Trying to find out why we received this letter and who these people might be, before we turn it over to our FBI.

Thanks

By: Charles Anthony

Charles Anthony — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 22:14:50 +0000

Morty,
You do realize that any market in which the government intervenes is not a free market, right? It does not seem like you do. Any “failure” that you perceive in the market can not be blamed on the free market.

By the way, “market failure” is a fallacious concept. Do not get sucked into believing it is a valid economic concept. The term “market failure” is a euphemism that crony capitalists, confused socialists and other parasitic free-loaders use to hide the simple fact that their operating costs are high and they feel entitled to a subsidy.

Thus, what you believe is a “market failure” can not be separated from the effects of market distortion created specifically by the government.

By: Morty

Morty — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 19:48:48 +0000

You do realize that the NRU’s been running as a research reactor for 52 years, right? And that it only produces 99Mo on a contract basis for a private company (MDS Nordion)? And that our government has done nothing, historically, to dissuade private enterprise from building their own reactors for isotope production? The only reason the NRU represents a monopoly on Canadian 99Mo production is because private industry has not, until recently, been willing to invest in facilities to do it themselves. That’s a failure of the free market to provide a necessary service, not a failure of governments.

By: Scott Merrithew

Scott Merrithew — Fri, 29 May 2009 00:44:59 +0000

Thanks for the clarification.
Government and bureaucracy tend to be joined at the hip (wallet), so I dare say that getting government out of the AECL would return it to a workable business model, and restore a market-based incentive to retain our third of the market. After all, there is good money to be made by producing a limited commodity.
Since there are only a handful of players in this business, some cartel regulation would be required, but only enough to prevent the sort of price collusion we see in OPEC oil gouging, er pricing.

By: Saskboy

Saskboy — Thu, 28 May 2009 20:07:11 +0000

We’re not the single source, I heard it’s only 30%. The problem is 1/3 can’t be made up by others.

And we need an inquiry for any major failure of the government or officials because that’s the only way those bums get shut down later on. An inquiry was required to bring down the Liberals, and at least one will be required to turf the no good Conservatives too.

By: James Curran

James Curran — Thu, 28 May 2009 15:03:47 +0000

Really. The end game all along was for the Conservatives to sell off AECL and reduce their skyrocketing deficit. Just like when they sold off public properties with hardly a tender.

And why the big coverup by the Minister of Natural Resources?

http://whatdoiknowgrit.blogspo.....ranch.html

By: FredR

FredR — Thu, 28 May 2009 14:54:05 +0000

This is probably an over-simplification, but, in a nut-shell, I’d say the problem is over-regulation. Creating medical isotopes is not easy and not cheap – the Chalk River facility was a research reactor from 1949, that has been updated over time to produce medical-grade isotopes.

Here’s a link to a great letter written by one of scientists involved in creation of the ‘MAPLE” reactors that were to replace the Chalk River facility ( http://www.nuclearfaq.ca/cnf_sectionH.htm#g2 ) – and it clearly shows the timidity and foot-dragging of the nuclear bureaucracy that resulted in the demise of the MAPLE reactor.

The ultimate irony is that the HANARO reactor in Korea, based on the MAPLE design is producing medical isotopes, even as Canadian production falls to pieces.

The real question that should be asked of Canada’s nuclear program is why does it work overseas, but not at home?

By: Scott Merrithew

Scott Merrithew — Thu, 28 May 2009 13:21:13 +0000

If these isotopes are so important to the health care systems of the entire world, how on earth did we end up with a single source?
There are several potential sources of nuclear material in Canada, and in other nuclear nations in the world. What is preventing them from meeting the market demand that obviously exists?