TAP Canada

SRB is the tritium light factory in Pembroke Ontario that has emitted extremely large quantities of tritium into the environment in the City of Pembroke since beginning operations in 1991. In two years out of the last 10, SRB emitted more tritium than all of Canada’s nuclear generating stations combined. Mr. Stuber lives  a few hundred metres from SRB’s stacks; vegetables grown in his backyard have been contaminated with tritium at thousands of times the background  level.

Dear Commission members, I live in one of the worst places one could ever live, right next door to a nuclear facility where the environment has become so polluted with tritium that people are becoming ill. I wonder how come the Commission could ever let this happen.

I believe that my wife and I had high levels of tritium in our bodies because of eating vegetables from our garden thatwere laced with tritium. What a shame to eat contaminated food when we thought we were eating organically vegetables grown in our own backyard; a garden that the wife and I worked very hard to grow. Concerned citizens of Renfrew County and the CNSC both took tests of gardens that showed we had high levels of tritium in our vegetables, more than anywhere else in Pembroke. Mr. Levesque stated at one of our meetings that tritium was very hard to understand and I agree with him. All I know is that one of the worst pollutants to cause cancer.

In 2001 I was diagnosed with cancer. I spent almost one year being treated in Ottawa. I still have to have a check-up every six months. In 2006 my wife was diagnosed with colon cancer — a healthy person — which had already spread throughout her body. The tumours in her body started about eight years ago, which is approximately the same time when SRB was releasing huge amounts of tritium into the environment. My wife, Sandra, has been very — has been terribly sick. She has received 24 chemo treatments so far and each time she is treated she is very sick. I used — she used to be so healthy; now she has all sorts of problems. Many nights she can’t sleep. We are always running to Renfrew or Ottawa for treatment or doctor appointments. Her appetite is very poor. She is full of pain, can’t eat or drink. Sandra was admitted to the Pembroke Regional Hospital June the 2nd. CT scans were taken and I was told the cancer has spread.

It is only a matter of time before, maybe one or two weeks, and she will die, just like all the rest of the people from our area. The people have been dying off just like flies. My wife has cancer, my neighbour’s wife died, the other fellow died right in a row. All cancer. And my neighbour’s wife died right across the road. All died of cancer. And more people have cancer. Two of my neighbours across the road died. They all died around that area — sorry — the rest of the people in the area. The people have been dying off just like flies.

I cannot understand why the government has not made a good survey instead of saying “Everything is ok”.