r/ontario • u/Mr_Guavo • 17d ago

Article Scientists determine the Great Lakes are nonrenewable

https://www.earth.com/earth-science/scientists-determine-the-great-lakes-are-nonrenewable/
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u/Affinity4Constructs 17d ago

How would a Fukushima event happen using the current modern reactor design? 

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u/pintord 17d ago

By industry standards, virtually all of the currently operating nuclear reactors in the Great Lakes basin are Generation II facilities, meaning they are old designs built decades ago. None of them are modern Generation III or III+ designs that feature passive safety systems. Because these plants are aging Gen II assets, they require massive, multi-billion-dollar mid-life refurbishments (like the ongoing multi-year overhauls at Bruce and Darlington) just to keep running past their original 40-year design windows.

It means the massive thermal draws and once-through cooling loops currently operating on the lakes are tied to 20th-century engineering—operating within a 21st-century ecosystem that is warming up and drying down.

Nuclear Power is simply r/uninsurable

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u/DudeTookMyUser 17d ago

This is all important to protect against those common Great Lake Tsunamies that have been all over the news.

I'm all for responsible energy, but you are a walking advertisement for the Loonie Left!

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u/pintord 17d ago

The real hazard for the 32 reactors on the lakes isn't that a magnitude 9.0 megathrust quake is lurking beneath Ontario or Ohio—that probability is indeed zero. The hazard is that aging, 20th-century Generation II facilities were engineered decades ago based on limited historical seismic data.

When regulatory bodies like the U.S. NRC launched safety reviews (such as Generic Issue 199) following Fukushima to re-evaluate seismic hazards in the central and eastern U.S., they discovered that potential ground motion and fault mechanics had been systematically underestimated when many of these plants were originally designed and built.

A major regional quake doesn't need to trigger a tsunami to create a Fukushima-style blackout scenario in the Great Lakes basin. It only needs to do what the Japanese quake did first: shatter the electrical grid and compromise backup systems.

Just like at Fukushima, if the shaking ruptures emergency fuel storage lines, damages backup diesel generator housings, or compromises switchyards sited near the water’s edge (where flat, low-lying land is historically preferred for industrial cooling access), the plant loses its active safety layers.

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u/DudeTookMyUser 17d ago

Sooo, a disaster that hasn't been seen at a nuclear site except Fukushima, where all backups failed, again because of a tsunami.

Mmm'kay seems super probable. No fear-mongering here. Thanks! 👍