OTTAWA—It could give a whole new meaning to buried treasure.

A national foundation wants to store millions of videos, films and other recordings 60 storeys underground in an old Norad bunker near North Bay, Ont. in an effort to preserve the vast electronic record of Canadian history.

The Canadian Broadcast Museum Foundation is talking to federal officials about turning the mothballed complex into a secure repository for the country’s endangered audio-visual archive.

The foundation, a charitable organization dedicated to preservation, is working with the CBC to document its analog collection dating from the 1930s — a move that will help smooth its eventual transfer to the foundation’s custody.

Kealy Wilkinson, the foundation’s executive director, says the space needed to safeguard the CBC/Radio-Canada collections alone will be about one million cubic feet.

The foundation is also aware of other significant collections held on a makeshift basis in institutions around the country.