Robert Kennedy Jr: On Port Hope, Ontario

Port Hope has been called upon to make itself the national sacrifice zone for Canada. The question Canadians have to ask themselves is how much are we going to allow the people of Port Hope to bargain about the destiny of their community.

Are we just going to tell them "Shut up and take it," or are we going to first do kind of the basic civil rights and human rights exercise, which is to inform the people of the risk that we are subjecting them to?

On the economics of nuclear power

Civilian nuclear power is one of the most highly subsidized industries on the planet. Nuclear energy is so catastrophically expensive that if it were forced to internalize its costs it simply couldn't afford to compete in the marketplace against other available sources of energy.

The real talent that the nuclear industry leaders have is that they've been able to shift their costs to the public, basically externalizing their costs while internalizing their profits.

On the need for a full environmental assessment in Port Hope

If I were from Port Hope, what I would be asking for is a full environmental assessment, and a public hearing that gives the people who live in that area the right to question and cross-examine the scientists and so-called experts who draft the conclusions of that report, so that there's a full assessment and accounting of the costs that this is going to impose upon the public, including the health costs, the economic costs, weighed against the economic benefit that the industry is promising.... I can't understand that there's any reason why that kind of hearing shouldn't exist.

On Port Hope heroes

[The community activists in Port Hope] are heroes, and they're oftentimes fighting these battles alone. But they're on the side of the angels. They're trying to do something that future generations will be grateful for.