Small Modular Reactor Development and Deployment Plan launched

By John Gorman, President and CEO , Canadian Nuclear Association

The federal government today announced its SMR Action plan, which will pave the way forward for Canada to be a first mover of small modular reactor technology in the free world. 

It will also help to create jobs in Canada by tapping a potentially lucrative export market valued in the hundreds of billions annually. 

The nuclear industry is ready to work with and enable governments to meet their climate change targets by working with other non-emitting energy sources to provide clean electricity. We need to invest aggressively right now with the non-emitting sources of power we have and invest in technologies like SMRs because climate change requires us to act now.

Canada can use its world-leading expertise in nuclear technology to provide the vast amounts of clean heat and electricity needed to enable an energy transition and work in partnership with renewables on the pathway to net-zero emissions 2050.

Today’s action plan will lay out the next steps to develop and deploy small modular reactor technology.  

This is what Canada is about. People from diverse regions of the country coming together to find solutions to our problems. In the past it was building a national railroad or creating a universal health-care system. Today, it is climate change and reaching net zero emissions. This Action Plan represents another step in that direction.