Angel Hamilton sat before a panel of nuclear experts in Peterborough on Wednesday and told them about her friend's three-year-old child Lilian.

Hamilton is a documentary filmmaker who works in a health food store.

She was speaking at a hearing that will help experts determine whether the local BWXT plant can start manufacturing uranium pellets in Peterborough.

But the move could affect local children such as Lillian, she said - particularly if uranium particles were to seep into Peterborough's water supply, for example.

"It doesn't matter how small (the risk) - it's not good for human health, in my opinion," she said.

BWXT Nuclear Energy Canada manufactures nuclear fuel bundles in Peterborough and assembles uranium dioxide pellets that are manufactured in Toronto.

The Peterborough plant operates from part of the now-closed General Electric site on Monaghan Road.

Its licence expires at the end of 2020 and the company has applied for a new licence with one change: BWXT would like to be allowed to move the pelleting operation from Toronto to Peterborough.

Although the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission's staff assessment recommends that the pelleting be allowed in Peterborough, the commission has not made a decision yet and is holding a hearing this week before any licence can be granted.

The commission regulates the use of nuclear energy and materials in the country and enforces the regulations set out in the Nuclear Safety and Control Act. Its tribunal is a quasi-judicial body that operates independently of commission staff.

The public hearing began Monday and Tuesday in Toronto and continues until Friday at the Holiday Inn in Peterborough.

Over three days in Peterborough, 55 citizen presentations are scheduled. The hearing will also review more than 100 written submissions from concerned citizens.

Experts such as epidemiologists - some gathered at the hearing in Peterborough, some speaking via videolink from Ottawa - explained Wednesday that they don't anticipate harm to human health if the Peterborough licence is granted.

But none of it reassured Sue MacKay, who gave a presentation at the hearing.

"All your number crunching and estimates do not give me comfort," she said. "Inhaling one particle, if it lodges in my lung, will damage the surrounding tissue and may potentially turn to cancer."

While BWXT staff said at the hearing Wednesday they've held community barbecues to impart the message about their licence renewal process, MacKay said it wasn't enough.

She said the last barbecue was scheduled in the middle of the day in the pouring rain - and whenever BWXT experts talk they use scientific "gobbledygook" that she can't understand.

What she wants from BWXT is simple, she said: communications in plain English. She also wants them to answer their questions a year or so in advance of an application for a licence change - not at the 11th hour.

"Treat us like a community," she said. "Do the right thing. We are worried."

Members of the community group Citizens Against Radioactive Neighbourhoods have also said they're concerned.

About 30 people - many of them CARN members - protested outside the hearing at the Holiday Inn on Wednesday.

Kathryn Campbell predicted at the protest that pelleting is about to be allowed in Peterborough - never mind that the hearing.

"It's a guarantee - they've never turned down a licence before," she said.

Inside, the tribunal had scheduled a dozen citizen presentations on Wednesday from people who've said they're concerned.

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A dozen presentations from citizens were scheduled in the afternoon and evening on Wednesday; by the dinner break at 6 p.m., the tribunal had heard four presentations.

Several presenters - including both Hamilton and MacKay - spoke about BWXT's use of beryllium, which is a carcinogen.

Soil samples taken across the street from the plant at Prince of Wales Public School have seen increasing concentrations of beryllium in the soil.

BWXT president John MacQuarrie confirmed to the tribunal that soil samples taken at Prince of Wales Public School in 2019 were significantly higher than those taken in 2018.

They did further testing, he said and took samples from the plant roof (which he said had been undergoing repairs).

"We've confirmed that in our view, there's no way what we're emitting could account for that increase.. Nevertheless, we understand there's an increase that's been measured there," MacQuarrie said.

That's why BWXT plans to start independent third-party soil testing starting this summer, he said, with results posted to their website.

But one medical doctor said soil monitoring isn't good enough.

"Monitoring is too late: the exposure has already happened," said Dr. Cathy Vakil of Kingston.

Vakil was speaking on behalf of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment.

Respiratory illness caused by beryllium "can declare itself many decades after the exposure," she said, and there are no studies to show whether children are more affected by beryllium than adults.

The hearing reconvenes at 8:30 a.m. Thursday at the Holiday Inn with further presentations from concerned citizens and from Peterborough Public Health.

- With files from Toronto Star

joelle.kovach

@peterboroughdaily.com