Commenting on the Initial Project Description
It's important that the Impact Assessment Agency (IAAC, or "the Agency") hear from you.
During this comment period it will be helpful if comments on the Initial Project Description provide your view on whether enough information was provided. But you are also within your rights to simply express your view on the project. It will also be helpful to comment on information that you think is incorrect, or statements that the NWMO did not provide information in support of.
One approach to your review is to ask whether the Initial Project Description includes all the topics you think are important. For example, in your review you can simply comment on whether in what you read (in the 10 page summary, 92 page summary or the full IPD!) NWMO provided the necessary information to describe their project and its potential impacts.
For example, your review might comment on whether the Initial Project Description adequately describes transportation and related risks and impacts [spoiler alert: it does not! The NWMO has specifically excluded transportation from their project description, as part of their effort to have transportation excluded from the impact assessment process!). How about seismic risk? Downstream effects? Health impacts? Releases of radionuclides to the local airshed from the Used Fuel Packaging Plant? Releases of contaminated air and water pumped up from the underground repository to the surface? Contingency plans including retrieval of the waste after it has been placed underground? Short and long-term monitoring? Final closure, decommissioning and long-term safety?
