I put “become” in italics because I’ve always considered AECL a niche player, so the better word is remain. There’s this thinking in some Canadian circles that AECL is being held back from becoming a big player in the international scene, like it’s some washed-up boxer that “coulda been a contender!” But AECL’s chance at international stardom faded some time ago, and the thought that Ontario buying two Advanced Candu Reactors will suddenly make it a contender in the global nuclear marketplace is ridiculous. How can AECL deliver on a new, unfinished design when it can’t even get its old finished designs right? Two Candu refurbishment projects under way in Canada are way over budget and way behind schedule. I remember Bruce Power chief executive Duncan Hawthorne telling the Toronto Star’s Sandro Contenta in 2007 that the refurbishments at Bruce were ”a destiny issue for the industry” and that “the failure of this probably means that we wouldn’t want to do it again.” Now that project is two years delayed and $2 billion over budget, as we learned earlier this month. It boggles the mind why the Ontario government would still seriously consider a new reactor purchase based on the poor track record of this technology, which continues to this day, and it’s no surprise the federal government doesn’t want to backstop it given how much of taxpayers’ money it has already put at risk. Nor does Bruce Power, one of only two groups (both Canadian) willing to bid for AECL’s reactor business but unwilling to shoulder risk in such a deal.

Can we stop with this nonsense that AECL is a gem that only needs to be cleaned and buffed to prove its worth? Yes, it has talented, hard-working people working for it, but that doesn’t mean it has the right technology nor does it mean, just because it’s Canadian, that an unsuccessful technology should be perpetually put on public crutches. This is not the Avro Arrow all over again, as some contend. That’s because the Avro program didn’t have a history of overruns, didn’t have the MAPLE reactor fiasco, or the Chalk River fiasco, or the current-day refurbishment fiasco, or the unfinished ACR development project that has proven itself as nothing but a sinkhole for taxpayer dollars. This is a company that has consistently failed to prove its worth in a world that’s quickly blowing past it. If it dies, it dies on its own sword, just as any other company would if it were in the private sector.

This isn’t an anti-nuclear rant. This isn’t even a criticism of Candu’s heavy-water technology, which may be better than more popular light-water technologies but simply failed to get the market excited (read: Beta vs. VHS syndrome). This is just about business, a poorly run business.

Now we know that Canadian engineering giant SNC-Lavalin wants to take control of AECL. Personally, I don’t care who owns the thing as long as taxpayers aren’t on the hook for its future losses and liabilities. The question, at least for the scientists who have built their careers at AECL, is whether the new controller cares about Candu intellectual property, advanced reactor designs, and staying in the game with the big boys of nuclear — i.e. Westinghouse, GE and Areva — or simply wants to milk the company’s pipeline of refurbishment opportunities as previously sold reactors around the world reach their mid-life crisis. SNC-Lavalin is an engineering company. It just wants work and it wants profits. It doesn’t really care, as a matter of national pride, if we build AECL’s next-generation Advanced Candu Reactor. It’s just as happy fixing up old Candu 6s and building new Candu 6s in developing countries just getting into nuclear and which don’t need the mammoth reactors being pitched by the competition.

Here’s a little anecdote: When Linda Keen, former head of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, required that the Candu 6 design after 9/11 be improved to handle major impacts, like from an airplane, SNC-Lavalin had a shit-fit. Back in 2006, Ontario Power Generation was more interested in building a Candu 6 than an Advanced Candu Reactor. The Candu 6 was a known design, had previous approvals, so in the minds of SNC-Lavalin — which was part of the Team Candu build consortium — constructing a Candu 6 would be a cakewalk compared to getting approval for a new design. Keen apparently deflated those hopes. In her view, it was SNC-Lavalin more than AECL that was gunning for her dismissal. Here’s a quote from Keen from an interview I had with her in July 2009 in which she discusses SNC-Lavalin’s reaction to Keen’s decision. This part of my interview has never before been published:

 ”What they had felt in October 06 was this (Candu 6 contract) is a sure deal; that we’re going to get this contract as part of the Candu group…. They were really upset, because this was money in the bank that they were going to get this.”

Keen said in early 2007 that SNC sent one of its vice-presidents to a Canadian Nuclear Association meeting to raise a storm over the regulatory uncertainty Keen was creating. Keen went to SNC-Lavalin’s board meeting in August 2007 to chat about it. “They were super furious. They said, ‘You’re not being patriotic. How could you do this? It’s being built in other places.’ ” What followed was “the Slaughter on Slater,” she said, with 280 Slater St. being the regulator’s address in Ottawa. Keen said SNC, with the help of lobbiest Hill & Knowlton, began to make life miserable for Keen and demand that she be replaced.

Let’s remember, SNC-Lavalin is an engineering firm. It doesn’t care whether it’s building bridges, refineries, desalination plants, or nuclear plants, and when building nuclear plants it doesn’t care what it’s building — as long as someone buys it and it gets built, because building is what they do. It has received plenty of business from AECL over the years, and it fears not getting as much in the future if someone else buys it. This proposal to purchase is about protecting its turf; it’s not about preserving AECL’s legacy and pushing forward on new technologies.

I’m not passing judgement. It’s a smart move on SNC’s part. I’m just offering some perspective on why it may want AECL.

I can understand the Areva price (apparently it’s based on a similar bid for a plant being planned in Maryland), but like many I’m personally shocked at the high amount of the AECL bid. Yes, I wrote the story but like many have a difficult time believing such a high number. My sources, however, are quite credible.

I’ve yet to get any reply from the government or industry that denies or confirms these numbers. Premier Dalton McGuinty was scrummed by reporters earlier this morning and he didn’t refute the numbers, saying only that the process is confidential. McGuinty could have said something general like “The numbers are far off” or “Not even close” to dispute the article, but he didn’t. The $26 billion figure, by the way, almost completely consumes the budget for Ontario’s 20-year nuclear expansion strategy, as estimated in 2007 by the Ontario Power Authority. That budget was to cover a new build at Darlington and at least two refurbishment projects.