So, this is a strange little tidbit I have pieced together from an e-mail message and a quick search.
According to Alberta’s XM105 Country, the US Ambassador to Canada, David Wilkins, is making a visit to northern Alberta — to Whitecourt, Alberta the snowmobile capital of Alberta — which is not too far from Peace River Country where the proposed ACR-1000 nuclear reactors are to be built. In fact, Whitecourt was the preferred site until recently. Apparently, a local backlash started to develop and that led Energy Alberta to choose Peace River as their site instead. And, I’ll bet they couldn’t resist the irony!
According to a no nukes activist, the U.S. Ambassador David Wilkins sounds like he’d love for Canada to sell out to the U.S.! She confirms that Wilkins will be attending a Whitecourt Chamber of Commerce Luncheon on Wed, 10 Oct. 2007 at 11:30 am at the Traveller’s Cloud Nine Hotel Banquet Room. Tickets cost $15 and are available at the Whitecourt Chamber of Commerce Office located at the Forest Interpretive Centre.
Mr. Wilkins is an ex-army officer who practiced law for 30 years. He is a close personal friend of George Bush and family and is a religious conservative known for his despicable opposition to women’s rights, abortion rights, gay rights, marijuana, pacifism, protecting the environment and the Canadian Softwood lumber industry. In 2001, he engineered a South Carolina legislative resolution that asked the U.S. govt. to enforce trade sanctions against Canada.
One must wonder why the hell he’s going to Whitecourt! Do you think it might be to congratulate them for not being chosen as the place to build a nuclear reactor? I don’t know, but I’d really like to be a fly on the wall at that event. And I really do hope some of my fly friends are there so they can give me a buzz and let me know what happened.
Politics'n'Poetry 
Ah the irony. A month ago in the Ottawa Citizen Wilkins wrote that Canada and the US were “exploring ways to detect radiological threats and coordinating emergency efforts along our borders in the event of a man-made or natural disaster. It just makes sense when you share thousands of miles of common border to share a common emergency-management plan.”
Oh, that is tres interesting! Thanks, Alison.
Interesting.Since Whitecourt is lumber country. Weryhauser has a big operation there. Softwood anyone? Since Alberta has been singled out by the U.S. as being one of the provinces still in violation of the current softwood agreement, which they are suing over.
It just gets more and more interesting…
I just had a brainwave. One thing northern Alberta has plenty of is water, and nuclear reactors need water to keep them cool. Southern Alberta already has water concerns.
Here’s an article about how France’s nuclear reactors lost capacity during the heat wave in 2003 because they did not have enough water for cooling.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0813-05.htm
Thanks for the reminder, Holly.