TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. – A Canadian power company has withdrawn its request for U.S. permission to ship 16 scrapped steam generators with radioactive contents on three of the Great Lakes, saying it wants to consult further with critics of the plan before moving ahead.

Bruce Power Inc. received a license from Canada’s Nuclear Safety Commission for the operation earlier this year but also needed U.S. approval because the vessel would cross into U.S. territory. The company submitted an application to the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration but recently withdrew it.

“Bruce Power will not set a date for shipping the decommissioned steam generators, but will take the necessary time to meet with stakeholder groups to answer any questions they may have about the project,” Frank Saunders, vice-president for nuclear oversight and regulatory affairs, said in a letter to the agency.

Environmental groups, native tribes and local government officials in both countries have raised concerns about the company’s plan for the generators, each the size of a school bus and weighing about 100 tons.

The giant boilers contained metal tubes filled with hot water, which created steam that powered electricity-producing turbines. Bruce Power, whose 4,700-megawatt power plant 155 miles northwest of Toronto is the largest in North America, took 32 of the generators out of service in the 1990s and wants to ship them to a Swedish plant for recycling.

They would be hauled aboard a 387-foot ship that would depart from a port on Lake Huron’s Owen Sound and traverse Lakes Erie and Ontario, plus the St. Lawrence River, before reaching the Atlantic Ocean.

The company plans two shipments of 16 generators each.

Bruce Power says each generator has less than an ounce of radioactive material and would be welded shut to prevent leaks. Staffers with the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission said there would be little if any danger to human health or the environment.

But opponents say the risk of a spill is too great, especially in narrow channels that wind through major population centres. They also worry about creating a precedent for allowing other nuclear cargo on the lakes.

The Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative, which represents municipalities in the region, says the amount of nuclear waste in the proposed shipment exceeds by 50 times the International Atomic Energy Agency’s radioactivity standard for a single freight vessel on the lakes.

David Ullrich, the group’s executive director, praised Bruce Power’s decision to postpone the shipment.

“All along, we have felt there was inadequate consultation and inadequate assessment of potential risk,” Ullrich said Monday.

Bruce Power is not giving up on its plan to recycle the generators, which the company believes would be good for the environment, spokesman John Peevers said.

“The important thing is we do this right, not that we do it quickly,” company president and chief executive Duncan Hawthorne said in an earlier statement announcing the delay.

Rep. Candice Miller, a Michigan Republican, said if Bruce Power resubmits its application, U.S. agencies should conduct “a thorough and factual investigation.”