I submitted this statement in person to Wolfville Town Council today, June 17, 2025.

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Statement on Uranium exploration to Wolfville Town Council, June 17, 2025

My name is Dr Elisabeth Kosters, I’m a retired geologist, I live in Wolfville. I urge Wolfville Town Council to issue a letter to the Nova Scotia Provincial Government / premier Tim Houston, to at least pause opening Nova Scotia to Uranium exploration and mining and preferably to reinstate the ban that was legislated in 2009. Your statement should be comparable to the letters sent by the Assembly of Nova Scotia Mi’qmaw Chiefs, the Municipalities of Pictou County, West Hants, The district of Lunenburg and Annapolis County.

Nova Scotia has Uranium. It occurs naturally in the shallow subsurface around the granite bodies that exist in our Province. Uranium is a radioactive element and decays to Lead over a few billion years. Somewhere in that isotopic chain sits unstable Radon222, a gas. Uranium may exist in your well water and Radon222 may collect in poorly ventilated basements. Long time exposure to both of these materials is a recognized significant public health risk. The Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources has issued a publicly accessible Radon Risk map and anyone can obtain Radon test kits for free at a public library. The public health risks of exposure to naturally occurring Uranium and Radon222 can and must continue to be mitigated. As recently as 2019, the executive director of the Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources Don James (now retired) stated publicly that Uranium exploration would not result in additional necessary knowledge regarding these known health risks and that exploring for Uranium itself had no additional benefits for Nova Scotia.

Does Nova Scotia have a large Uranium reserve? We don’t really know, because Nova Scotia has had a ban on Uranium exploration for decades. But we do know enough about it to be sure that our reserve is completely insignificant compared to that of Saskatchewan, which has about 10% of the world’s Uranium reserves, the world’s second largest reserve outside Kazakhstan. Saskatchewan’s Uranium is also of the highest possible quality. Why does this matter? Because no other Uranium reserve in Canada would ever be remotely competitive with that of Saskatchewan. In addition, the Saskatchewan reserve is located in the far northern part of the Province, in an area the size of the Nova Scotia southern mainland with a population of less than 2,000 people, all in the First Nation Community of Hatchett Lake/Wollaston Lake. These people can’t hunt or fish there because the wildlife contains too much radioactive material as a result of the mining. Saskatchewan exports 80% of its Uranium abroad. If the Federal Government decided to develop more nuclear power in an effort to combat global warming, the Saskatchewan reserve would be large enough to fulfill the necessary demand.

The Houston government has trespassed all accepted democratic processes in unilaterally opening up the Province to Uranium exploration. This is a dictatorial move by a government that got 27% of the popular vote in the most recent election. The Premier complained that public interest groups who try to protect our natural environment are ‘foreign funded activists’ but he continues to quote the Mining Association of Nova Scotia, which is a industry lobby group that is 95% foreign funded.

I rest my case and hope you will act responsibly and in the interest of all citizens.