Saskatchewan spending $80M in 1st step to bring a microreactor to the province

Saskatchewan is giving the Saskatchewan Research Council tens of millions of dollars for the initial effort to bring a very small modular nuclear reactor, a so called microreactor, to the province.

The $80 million announced Monday will allow the research council to tend to the licensing process and project costs related to bringing the microreactor to Saskatchewan, according to the council.

Its president and CEO, Mike Crabtree, estimates that will take about five years.

"If all of that is successful, we will be licensed to bring the eVinci reactor into the province," Crabtree said of the microreactor built by U.S.-based Westinghouse Electric Company, which focuses on carbon-free and nuclear energy.

Westinghouse president and CEO Patrick Fragman said the microreactor will provide carbon-free electricity and heat. The province expects it would be operational by 2029.

The eVinci microreactor can produce up to five megawatts of electricity and as much as 13 megawatts of heat. 

It could, Crabtree said, power a 3,000 home community for a decade with the equivalent of three drums of about 200 litres of the TRISO fuel that powers the reactor.

"In some of our northern communities that are powered by diesel or mine sites that are provided by diesel, those three drums replace a million drums of diesel," Crabtree said.

"That million drums of diesel represents a half a million tons of CO2."

Once it has run out of fuel in about eight to 10 years, Crabtree said, it would be returned to the factory and refuelled, therefore operating like a rechargeable battery. 

Saskatchewan is not certain where it will land if it comes to the province — that is something that will become more clear to the province as the microreactor goes through the regulatory and licensing process.

Premier Scott Moe said he wants to keep Saskatchewan ahead of a global shift to "cleaner, nuclear power" usage.

"At the end of the day, there's going to be, yes, renewables and there's going to be nuclear power," Moe said.

The Saskatchewan Research Council will be in charge of operating the reactor, a task Moe believes they are able to manage given their experience with nuclear reactors.

The council managed a nuclear research reactor at its environmental analytical laboratories in Saskatoon.

The site was decommissioned in late 2021 at the council's request after 38 years in operation.