Ontario and United Kingdom sign clean energy agreement
Ontario and the United Kingdom have signed a clean energy agreement.
The province’s Minister of Energy and Mines, Stephen Lecce, made the announcement at the International Tritium Conference in Ottawa on Monday.
Ontario Power Generation (OPG) and the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) Group have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for Ontario to work toward supplying tritium (a critical fuel for nuclear fusion) to support the UKAEA’s world-leading fusion research and energy development projects.
The agreement will also support local fusion energy development projects in Ontario and Canada.
“This historic agreement cements Ontario’s long-standing role at the forefront of next-generation nuclear energy,” said Minister Lecce.
“From building the G7’s first Small Modular Reactor (SMR) to powering breakthroughs in fusion and medical isotopes, Ontario is leading the world’s clean energy future. We’re exporting our expertise, creating jobs at home and showing the world what energy security looks like.”
According to the provincial government, tritium is extracted from heavy water during routine operations at Ontario’s CANDU reactors.
As tritium decays, it produces Helium-3 (He-3), an extremely rare and valuable isotope that’s powering breakthroughs in quantum computing and holds promise as a future fuel for fusion reactors.
The UKAEA leads the world’s largest publicly funded research and development program, which is focused on making fusion energy a scalable and usable in a commercial setting.
