In 2018, Canada launched an ambitious plan to build small modular reactors (SMRs) across the country. Eight years and $4.5 billion later there isn’t yet any reactor operating.
🗓 Wednesday March 18, a presentation was given on what’s really been going on with two researchers who know this file inside out:
🎙 Susan O’Donnell (St. Thomas University) & M.V. Ramana (UBC).
This webinar co-hosted by NTW, was moderated by one of its member, Madis Vasser (Friends of the Earth Estonia) and based on the following CEDAR report addressing SMRs’ developement in Canada: https://cedar-project.org/roadmap/
Summary of the webinar: An Assessment of SMR Projects: The Case of Canada
The speakers were Susan O’Donnell, PhD, St. Thomas University and M.V. Ramana, PhD, University of British Columbia. The moderator was Madis Vasser, PhD, Senior expert on SMRs for Friends of the Earth Estonia. The discussion refers to the report Assessing Small Modular Nuclear Reactors (SMRs) in Canada, published by the CEDAR project.
Overview
This webinar presents an assessment of small modular reactor (SMR) projects in Canada, framed around a newly released report by Susan O’Donnell and M.V. Ramana. The speakers argue that Canada has become a global test case for SMRs, but that actual progress is much weaker than the hype suggests. Their central conclusions are that SMRs in Canada are heavily dependent on public funding, technologically uncertain, economically uncompetitive, and still far from proving commercial viability.
1. Why Canada matters
The moderator explains that Canada has been treated internationally as a flagship SMR country, especially since it adopted a strategic SMR plan in 2018. The purpose of the webinar is to assess, factually, how well those projects are actually going and what others can learn from them.
Susan O’Donnell notes that the original 2018 Canadian SMR roadmap claimed that the first demonstration SMR could be deployed by 2026, with first commercial deployment by 2030. Since 2026 has now arrived, the speakers say this is the right moment for a reality check.
2. Main claim of the report
The report reviews 10 SMR designs that have had a presence in Canada. It evaluates them using two main indicators:
- how much financing they have secured in Canada,
- and how far their design and deployment status has progressed in Canada.
The speakers stress that, although SMRs are promoted as climate solutions and job creators, the results so far are poor relative to the very large public subsidies involved. Susan states that more than CAD 4.5 billion in public money has already been spent on SMR-related activities in Canada.
3. What SMRs are, and why “small” does not mean simple
Susan explains that an SMR is defined here as a reactor designed to produce 300 MW of electricity or less. She emphasizes that “small” refers to output, not necessarily physical size, giving the example of the Darlington BWRX-300 structure, which is about 73 meters tall overall. She also says “modular” is aspirational: it assumes factory production of modules that can later be assembled onsite.
She argues that SMRs represent a major break from Canada’s historical nuclear path. Traditional CANDU reactors became larger over time to benefit from economies of scale, whereas SMRs abandon that logic and instead rely on hoped-for cost reductions from factory manufacturing. But such savings would require many orders, which the speakers consider unlikely.
4. The four flagship designs in Canada
Ramana reviews the four reactor streams highlighted in the original roadmap:
BWRX-300
This is the leading grid-scale SMR project, planned for Darlington, Ontario. It has received a construction licence, but Ramana says the design was still incomplete even at the licensing hearing, with unresolved safety-related design details still to be addressed before operation could ever be licensed.
He adds that the project has received over CAD 3 billion from the federal government and CAD 1 billion from Ontario, all public money, while failing to attract private investors. The first reactor alone is estimated at CAD 6.1 billion, plus CAD 1.6 billion for site preparation, and the four-reactor plan is now estimated at CAD 20.9 billion, which he suggests is likely an underestimate.
ARC-100
This sodium-cooled fast reactor would use enriched uranium, which Canada does not produce, meaning fuel would likely need to come from abroad, probably the United States. Ramana also raises technical concerns about the fuel design, especially swelling under irradiation.
Moltex Stable Salt Reactor
This molten salt design is described as highly experimental. Ramana says it would use fuel containing plutonium, extracted through a form of reprocessing called pyroprocessing. He stresses that there is no commercial-scale experience with this approach and that there are unresolved technical problems, including corrosion and scaling up the fuel cycle.
Micro Modular Reactor (MMR)
This was once expected to become Canada’s first SMR. But the company behind the proposal, Ultra Safe Nuclear Corporation, entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the U.S. in October 2024, leaving unpaid debts, including money owed to the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.
5. The other six designs
Susan then summarizes six additional SMR designs examined in the report. She says these projects are much weaker overall: not one of the final six has a proponent actively moving it forward, and only three received notable public funding.
Examples include:
- Westinghouse eVinci, with over CAD 27 million in public funds, now mainly tied to U.S.-based staffing and only being studied in Saskatchewan.
- Terrestrial Energy’s IMSR-400, with over CAD 25 million in public funds, but recent company updates now focused on the United States rather than Canada.
- Canadian Space Mining Corporation’s LEU-NR, which received over CAD 3 million, but whose CEO reportedly wants to commercialize it for people living and working on the moon; the presenters say they found no meaningful development progress.
Susan highlights that most SMR vendors active in Canada are foreign firms, especially from the United States, raising the question of why Canada has become such a convenient host country for these projects.
6. Provincial activity
Only four Canadian provinces are described as seriously involved in SMRs: Ontario, New Brunswick, Saskatchewan, and Alberta.
- Saskatchewan has received over CAD 130 million in federal funding and spent about CAD 85 million provincially on SMR activities. SaskPower has selected the BWRX-300 as its preferred option but has not ordered one, and the province says it will decide in 2029 whether to proceed.
- Alberta has received more than CAD 15 million federally and just over CAD 1 million provincially for studies. One study for the oil sands concluded that SMRs are not economic or commercially feasible at present or in the near future.
7. The economic critique
A major part of the webinar is Ramana’s argument that SMRs are structurally uneconomic.
He explains that smaller reactors lose the cost advantages of large plants because of the loss of economies of scale: a smaller reactor may produce much less electricity, but it does not cost proportionally less to build.
He then compares SMR cost estimates with large nuclear reactors and other energy sources:
- He cites NuScale’s cancelled U.S. project, whose cost estimate reached USD 9.3 billion for 462 MW, making it dramatically more expensive per kilowatt than the already very expensive Vogtle large reactors.
- He says that if large reactors are already not economically competitive, SMRs are even less likely to compete.
- Using Australia’s CSIRO estimates, he says SMRs appear to be the most expensive electricity source in the comparison, at roughly three to six times the cost of wind and solar.
He also rejects the claim that SMRs make sense for remote communities and mines. Based on earlier research, he says there is not enough demand to justify building factories for mass production, and that the electricity cost in such settings would be around USD 3+ per kWh versus roughly USD 0.30 for diesel, making SMRs uneconomic even there.
8. Chalk River and the deeper political-industrial context
Susan argues that one of the main institutional drivers behind SMRs in Canada is Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL) and the modernization of Chalk River Laboratories.
She says the modernization plan was built around SMRs, especially the goal of demonstrating commercial viability by 2026. The federal government committed CAD 800 million over five years in 2016, later rising to CAD 1.2 billion, while the new research centre under construction is now projected to cost over CAD 1 billion, triple its original estimate.
She also says Chalk River’s finances are opaque because CNL was privatized about 12 years ago, meaning it is no longer subject to normal public transparency rules. Most notably, she says the site is now run under a CAD 24 billion, 20-year contract by American companies with ties to the nuclear weapons industry. She presents this as an important and underexamined part of the SMR story.
9. Waste, safety, and fuel-cycle concerns
On nuclear waste, the speakers argue that there is no clear disposal plan for many SMR waste streams, especially for advanced reactor designs such as ARC-100 and Moltex. They say the Nuclear Waste Management Organization has been vague and inconsistent about whether existing repositories designed around CANDU waste could handle these new waste types.
On Moltex’s claim that it can use nuclear waste to make energy, Ramana says this is misleading. According to him, the process would only use a small fraction of the waste, mainly plutonium, while leaving the rest of the radioactive waste problem in place.
On health and safety, the speakers say SMR proponents often claim smaller reactors are safer, but Ramana argues that this is not persuasive in practice. He notes that:
- multiple reactors are often proposed at one site, which can compound accident risk, as Fukushima showed;
- some vendors want to cut safety features such as containment structures or emergency planning zones;
- therefore, SMRs may look safer “on paper” but not necessarily in reality.
10. Darlington: where things actually stand
Later in the Q&A, the moderator asks about the real status of the Darlington project, since it is often described internationally as if it were nearly finished.
Ramana responds that construction has started only in a limited sense. By the usual international benchmark, a reactor is counted as truly under construction when first concrete is poured for the basemat, and that has not yet happened. He says the site is currently still being excavated.
The speakers also stress that Darlington is a special case and should not be treated as proof that the design can be easily replicated elsewhere. It is not a greenfield site, it is beside an existing nuclear station, and it benefits from earlier regulatory and environmental work.
Susan adds that the project also requires major cooling-water infrastructure, including more than 3 km of large tunnels, which raises questions about how portable or widely replicable this design really is.
Ramana concludes that industry promises of quick modular construction are not credible. He compares them to earlier promises made for Westinghouse’s AP1000, which was supposed to be built in 36 months but in reality took roughly three times longer. He expects similar delays for SMRs, especially because their supply chains depend on multiple suppliers across countries, which often creates coordination failures and bottlenecks.
11. Why the hype continues
A recurring question in the discussion is why governments and companies keep promoting SMRs despite weak evidence.
The speakers suggest several reasons:
- politicians are attracted by promises of jobs, growth, and technological leadership;
- the economics often matter less politically than the vision being sold;
- and there may be broader strategic and industrial interests at work, including ties among nuclear institutions, fossil fuel interests, and military-linked sectors.
Susan says that expert briefings warning politicians about technical and financial problems have often had little impact because decision-makers are more persuaded by charismatic industry advocates and sweeping promises.
12. Final takeaway
The webinar ends on the idea that Canada is being closely watched internationally. The speakers argue that if Darlington succeeds, other countries may use it as validation for their own SMR plans; if it fails, many other projects may collapse as well.
Their overall message is that the Canadian SMR story is not one of proven innovation, but of large public expenditures, uncertain technology, unresolved waste and fuel issues, and a widening gap between political rhetoric and practical reality.
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Full paper -> Click here
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