We the Nuclear North: the strong and weak forces of a Canada truly strong and free

prepared by S.E. Aplin, emissionTrak

Summary of this Policy Position

1. Asserting Canada’s Arctic sovereignty is only viable with a strong permanent Canadian physical presence throughout the Canadian Arctic.
2. Canada’s physical presence in the Arctic is inadequate today. It must be expanded.
3. Nuclear energy is essential to a viable expanded Canadian physical presence in the Arctic. Arctic logistics challenges are such that an expanded Canadian physical presence in the region is only viable if installations and other security sites are nuclear powered.
4. Canada’s Arctic adversaries already possess nuclear powered surface and submersible ships. This gives them a significant advantage. We can overcome their advantage not by matching them ship for ship, but by quickly developing interior lines of defense in the Arctic archipelago. However, time is of the essence. Our adversaries are already in discussions about our territory. We must act now.
5. Canada possesses the technological wherewithal to nuclearize all bases, monitoring devices, and security sites in the Arctic, with fission reactors as well as radioisotope thermoelectric generators. AECL in the 1980s developed small reactors for district heating and a 700 kW “pipe-style” micro-reactor for heat and power.
6. Nuclear energy is an essential component of Canada’s national security.
7. The recommendations in this Position Paper should be implemented concurrently with introducing nuclear energy to Northern Canada civilian communities, which are on the front line both of geopolitical competition and climate change.
8. Canada should draw from the defense budget to invest in a nuclear powered permanent security presence in the Arctic. This would count toward Canada’s commitment on defense spending.
9. The entire procurement supply chain for implementing these recommendations would involve only Canadian companies, Canadian materials, and Canadian labour.

Background: Issue and Current Context

Canada’s Arctic Foreign Policy: out of date shortly after publication

Last updated by the Minister of Foreign Affairs in 2024, Canada’s Arctic Foreign Policy (AFP) identifies Russia as the principal state threat facing our country, and urges deeper collaboration with our “greatest ally, the United States.”

That assessment seems quaint today, late April 2026, in light of what has happened since it was published. It is difficult to overstate how profoundly the global geopolitical situation has shifted since January 20 2025. The U.S. appears to have joined Russia as an active supporter or at least tacit enabler of aggressive revanchism, a situation unimaginable less than two years ago. The American president publicly talks about annexing Greenland and Canada, and his rhetoric in claiming Canada is not a real country is similar to the Russian president’s about Ukraine prior to Russia’s full-scale attack on that country. Russia and America, Canada’s biggest Arctic neighbours, now openly discuss “Arctic cooperation” and joint resource development. Canada does not support cooperation with Russia, and of course is absent from these U.S.–Russia musings. Is Russia our principal state threat, or has America joined it?

Canada alone in North America

Canada faces potential imminent peril, and it is imperative we develop an effective response to this as soon as possible. It is simply prudent that this response, for reasons of geography, envision Canada as a sovereign state on its own, without allies. Our choice is stark. Are we a sovereign North Atlantic country, carrying the values of the West, or are we a vassal of an aggressive revanchist U.S. that appears in the process of abandoning these values.

While the present situation has shocked the world, and upset the Western system of economic and military alignments that has existed since WWII, it is really nothing new. American policymakers have considered annexing Canada many times before, often in the context of developments well beyond North America. However, this is the first such threat that has arisen in the post–World War II era. Canadians fought, and died, alongside Americans—in World War I, World War II, Korea, and Afghanistan—to create and uphold a world in which aggressive militarism has no place. We thought Americans shared that view, but are learning that 1945–2025 was merely one of America’s occasional forays into internationalism, albeit a longer-than-usual one, and that isolationism and nativism are now ascendant. Canadians feel disillusioned and betrayed by the rhetoric and actions of the current U.S. government. Nonetheless, this is the situation we face. We must respond to it.

Current context: an expanded permanent Canadian presence in the Arctic

It is urgent that Canada develop an effective response to this new situation. The three pillars advanced in the AFP—asserting Canada’s sovereignty, upholding the rules-based international order, and pragmatic diplomacy with non-Arctic states and actors—really hinge on the first, asserting Canada’s sovereignty. This requires meaningful physical presence. Canada has very little physical presence in the Far North today, and that has not changed much since the end of the Cold War. It must change now.

Geography imposes formidable logistics challenges on all Arctic activity. Distances are vast. Temperatures are extreme. There are months-long periods of darkness. These factors require enormous quantities of energy for any meaningful activity—energy for traversing the vast distances, overcoming the extreme cold, and providing light during the relentless dark. We have elected to use kerosene, naphtha, and diesel to provide this energy. However, these fuels’ low energy density means they come with a built-in logistics burden, which would simply be amplified if we were to increase the number of installations. Further Arctic physical presence, under the current mental map and the constraints it imposes, is not viable. That is why Canada’s Arctic presence today remains so limited, and why Canada’s Arctic is vulnerable to encroachment by adversaries. Our sovereignty over our Arctic is nominal only.

Of course it is possible to develop a meaningful physical presence throughout the North, with more than enough energy for a greatly expanded permanent security presence, with widespread remote autonomous sensing and monitoring, with minimal dependence on the heavy far-flung logistics necessary with a fossil fuel–based energy policy. That is by using nuclear energy, both from fission and radiodecay. Canada, in spite of being a highly capable and innovative Tier-1 nuclear nation, has refrained from using nuclear energy this way, mostly out of deference to the U.S. In retrospect, this self deselection appears ill advised.

Nuclear energy, from fission and radiodecay—the strong and weak nuclear forces—offers Canada the clearest and most expeditious pathway to viably assert our Arctic sovereignty. Strategically located permanent self contained bases, and a network of continuously powered autonomous sensors and communication relays, free of heavy logistics burden, would give us the means to effectively monitor in real time our entire Arctic archipelago and project power from interior lines of defense, as well as to conduct research and gather terrestrial, atmospheric, and undersea data.

Arctic Foreign Policy is Arctic Energy Policy

Canada’s North spans 3.5 million square kilometers; the Arctic archipelago 1.4 million. The Arctic Foreign Policy consists of three pillars:

1. Asserting Canada’s sovereignty.
2. Advancing our interests in the region.
3. Promoting a stable, prosperous, and secure North.

All three pillars presuppose adequate transport and especially heating energy. Though not explicitly mentioned in the Arctic Foreign Policy, adequate transport and heating is foundational to it. None of the AFP’s pillars is achievable without a significantly heightened physical Canadian presence throughout the Arctic, and the inescapable physical reality of the Arctic is that it is both very expansive and very cold. Patrolling and monitoring strategic Arctic waterways requires massive amounts of energy, both for transport and especially for heating the permanent bases and other installations that are required. The latter comprise the vast bulk of the total energy requirement.

Climate change considerations require that this energy be non emitting. Security considerations require that it be very compact, highly reliable, and low maintenance. It must above all be free of dependence on heavy logistics support, which would make it vulnerable to disruption by adversaries.

Only nuclear fission reactors and radioisotope thermo-electric generators (RTGs) meet these criteria. For transport, nuclear powered icebreakers and other surface ships, as well as submarines, would be ideal. However, these will take significant time to either develop ourselves or acquire from non-U.S. allies. In the mean time, there are significant actions Canada can take immediately. The latter are the primary focus of this policy position.

History of nuclear power in polar regions

Canada’s principal Arctic adversary Russia, and its “threshold adversary” the United States, are the two countries that have been most active in developing and implementing nuclear energy in polar regions. Other than the aforementioned self deselection from nuclear activities involving propulsion and remote heat and power, there is no reason Canada cannot enter this field. The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) does not prohibit it. However, the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) decides by consensus and in the past the U.S. has indicated it would oppose Canada acquiring the capability to separate uranium isotopes.

But the NSG is a cartel, not a treaty. Canada has refrained from U separation and related activities out of deference to the U.S., as well as for domestic political reasons.

Below are some examples of how nuclear energy was used in extreme polar environments. Readers should bear in mind the reason nuclear was initially used in these instances. It was expressly to overcome the logistics challenges of fossil fuels in the Arctic and Antarctic.

Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators (RTGs)

This position paper recommends an increased Canadian physical presence in the Arctic. The criteria for viably energizing this increased presence have been well understood for many decades. Devices and installations in remote, extreme locations must operate continuously and reliably while unattended for long periods. It is simply impractical to have to continuously refuel, and service, numerous devices and installations in remote locations across a region as large as Canada’s Arctic.

Because they fit these criteria, RTGs, mostly powered with strontium-90 but some with plutonium-238, have been in wide use in many countries including Canada. Though their use has been limited and sporadic, RTGs have proven their value as providers of unattended, reliable energy in numerous remote terrestrial and extraterrestrial applications. These include:

• Seismic monitoring stations.
• Weather stations.
• Navigation beacons.
• Communication relays.
• Sub-sea monitoring devices.
• Satellites.
• Spacecraft.

In Canada, a 5-watt Strontium-90–powered RTG ran a weather station reliably from 1961 to 1965 on Axel Heiberg Island, north of the Arctic Circle and 1,200 km from the North Pole. About 454 grams of Sr-90 comprised the “fuel” for this device.

Fission reactors

The best examples of fission reactors in remote applications are the U.S.-based Martin Company’s Portable Medium Power Plant (PM) series. Interestingly for the purpose of this Position Paper, PM-1 and PM-2 were located at sensitive security installations developed to counter the threat from the USSR/Russia. PM-1 was a roughly 1 MW-e air cooled Pressurized Water Reactor. It powered a remote NORAD radar station in Wyoming beginning in 1962. PM-2A (A for Arctic) entered service in 1960, and provided power and heat for a U.S. Army research station on Greenland—Camp Century, the “Arctic City Under the Ice,” near the Thule Air Force Base (today known as the Pituffik Space Base).

Meanwhile, the McMurdo Antarctica Research Station was for a 10-year period from the mid 1960s powered with a 1.5 MW fission reactor, the PM-3A (A for Antarctic). The PM-3A operated at a 59.3 percent capacity factor over the 10 years, much less than what is required for such a remote and extreme site. Due to disinterest in solving the low capacity factor problem, the reactor was decommissioned and the site has since been powered with diesel, which contributes to the climate change problem many scientists at the station are trying to solve.

Ironically, PM-1 and PM-2 served strategic defense purposes in a time when both Canada and the U.S. regarded Russia as the principal state threat. Today, Russia uses military force to pursue annexationist objectives in Ukraine, while the U.S. publicly muses about annexing Canada, Greenland, and the Panama Canal.

The purpose of Camp Century on Greenland was to develop ways to efficiently build military bases on the Greenland Ice Cap, ultimately for siting ballistic missiles. (The program was cancelled in 1963 when planners realized the Greenland Ice Cap was too unstable.) PM-2A was selected as the power source for Camp Century precisely because nuclear power met the exact same security criteria outlined above: it was compact, highly reliable, and free from dependence on heavy logistical support. Moreover, because it was non-emitting, planners were relieved of having to design an elaborate and expensive exhaust system.

The above examples were provided because they underline the fact that only nuclear energy, via fission and radiodecay, can make viable an expanded permanent Canadian physical presence throughout our Arctic.

Supporting Indigenous Peoples and northern communities

The AFP rightly acknowledges Canada’s historic mistreatment of Indigenous peoples, which included forcing Inuit to relocate to permanent settlements in the High Arctic. People who once were mobile, resourceful, and self sufficient, who thrived in one of Earth’s harshest environments, were compelled to adopt stationary lifestyles overshadowed by dependence on their colonizers. The new Arctic energy policy advocated in this Position Paper offers to today’s First Nations a viable two-way bridge between modern and ancestral values. Because the “energy footprint” entailed in this Position would be as light as that of First Nation ancestors, it would be once again possible for today’s First Nations to experience the land, sea, and ice as their ancestors did, while enjoying easy access to all the benefits of modernity.

All northern settlements should be nuclear powered. This would make them self sufficient, free of heavy logistics dependence, and for the first time, environmentally sustainable. This opens northern economies to possibilities beyond hydrocarbons dependence.

The natural environment would benefit also. Climate change is happening because of fossil fuels. The recommendations here if followed would end northern communities’ dependence on much fossil fuel use for surface transport and most space and water heating, as well as potable water. Moreover, a viable Canadian physical presence in the Arctic would make credible the enforcement of bans on fossil fuel development in the Canadian North. Together with reduced logistics dependence generally, this would greatly reduce human interference with natural animal migration and foraging.

Consultations with First Nations should begin as soon as possible, before concrete plans emerge concerning the specific nuclear technology and its potential integration into existing communities. Canada’s first wave of civilian nuclear deployments took place without consulting First Nations communities. The “second wave” of nuclear deployment must not repeat that mistake. Canada must begin dialog with these communities on their energy futures. This dialog will determine the directions First Nations take together with Canada. We are confident that a nuclear north would immeasurably benefit First Nations, but we are only half the dialog. First Nations have their own perspectives. Dialog by definition is discovery. Should the recommendations here, or some version of them, be implemented—as we hope—then this dialog will have shaped the implementation.

Benefits to Canada

Three quarters of Canada’s current defense spending goes to the U.S. All procurement for the goods and services entailed in the recommendations here, with the possible exception of propulsion reactors for icebreakers (which Canada might purchase from the U.K. or France), would be in Canada.

All the technology related to the recommendations we provide here is either already Canadian or can easily be developed in Canada. This represents a significant driver of the domestic economy.

Next steps and recommendations

Canada must leverage its Tier-1 Nuclear Country status and continue developing small- and medium-size fission reactors, and begin developing RTGs. Starting with this, we recommend the following policies be implemented.

1. Begin consultations with Arctic and northern First Nations communities as soon as possible. These would be broad and general, and would represent the first true initial dialog on fundamental energy matters with First Nations in Canada’s history.
2. Develop a series of standard small and medium fission reactors for heat and power at Arctic installations up to the size of Resolute, and a series of standard radioisotope thermoelectric generators powered with Sr-90.
   • Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) developed several reactor designs in the 1980s, and has revisited them recently, seeking potential customers.
   • Designs of RTGs developed in the U.S. in the 1950s are in the public domain, and should be utilized.
3. Begin separating uranium isotopes, and fission products.
   • Such activities are required in order to provide fuel for throttlable small and medium (500 kW-e to 1.5 MW-e) fission reactors, and RTGs.
   • As both uranium and FP isotope separation would touch Canadian policy with respect to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), and its commitments to the Zanger Committee and the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), effect whichever legislative and statutory changes are necessary to enable this fundamental change in nuclear policy.
   • Canada should not feel obligated to continue honouring the NPT, Zanger Committee, or NSG strictures. Four of the UN Security Council “Permanent Five,” (France was the exception), did not live up to their end of the NPT bargain. Russia, the U.S., the U.K., and China, in the Budapest Memorandum, guaranteed the territorial integrity of Ukraine, in return for Ukraine renouncing its nuclear missile fleet. Russia then invaded Ukraine, under cover of a nuclear threat, and the U.S., U.K., and China failed to honour their guarantee.
4. Build a new high flux research reactor at Chalk River.
   • Embarking on research and development for enriched-fuelled reactors will require research and testing in a high-flux environment.
   • CNL would be able to resume advanced materials research, via a resurrected Canadian Neutron Beam Centre.
   • This would also enable Canada to resume mass production of medical isotopes, and to enter the Russia-dominated markets for fission product isotopes, many of whose use cases expand with their availability.
5. Begin developing nuclear powered icebreakers and other surface vessels.
   • Canada has a tradition of shipbuilding, and could easily develop nuclear powered ships.
   • This would make resupply of new Arctic water-access bases viable and sustainable.