Big atomic rhubarb alarms small Canadian town

TORONTO, Sept. 28 (Reuters) - A small Ontario town is in an uproar over the big rhubarb stalks that grow near a plant that uses radioactive waste, but officials said on Tuesday the atomic vegetables are safe enough for pies or jam.

The atomic rhubarb, which is growing just southeast of a glow-in-the-dark sign factory in the town of Pembroke, near Ottawa, contains about 1,000 times the radioactive tritium ordinarily found in the area's rainwater.

That alarms residents living close to the plant, which is owned by SRB Technologies (Canada) Inc.

"We are against any involuntary exposure to radiation," said Lynn Jones, president of a 200-member citizens' group that collected samples for testing.

"We're concerned because high levels of radioactivity are very dangerous to humans."

But the Atomic Energy Control Board -- Canada's nuclear safety agency -- has decided the patch of unusually large rhubarb is not hazardous and can still be used to bake a pie or make preserves, said Sunni Locatelli, a board spokesperson.

"We're naturally exposed to radioactivity everyday," said Locatelli. "High doses of of radioactivity can cause genetic defects and cancer, but at these levels there are no dangers."

The plant manufactures lights powered by the radioactive isotopes of hydrogen. Radiation is not being emitted because the plant is encapsulated, said company vice-president Stephane Levesque.

The company's assurances have yet to persuade Robert Drummie, the manager of a University of Waterloo, Ontario, laboratory that conducted tritium tests on the rhubarb this summer.

He found the rhubarb had 2,000 becquerels (a unit of radioactivity) per liter of tritium - which is about 100 times more than an average garden rhubarb.