Ontario’s energy minister has asked the federal government to weigh the atomic crisis in Japan and make any necessary changes to the environment review of a proposed nuclear plant expansion on the shores of Lake Ontario.

Energy Minister Brad Duguid sent a letter to Ottawa on Friday, urging the government to ensure events at a crippled nuclear station in earthquake-ravaged Japan are examined when a regulatory hearing on the Darlington plant expansion begins Monday.

He has also asked Bruce Power and Ontario Power Generation, which run the province’s three nuclear plants, to examine what’s happening in Japan and identify lessons that could be applied in the province.

Still, Duguid remains steadfastly supportive of nuclear energy and said he has no plans to stall the province’s expansion ambitions.

“I don’t see anything that would be accomplished by doing that, other than trying to achieve political ends for those that are trying to exploit the events that are going on in Japan right now,” he said.

The McGuinty government is banking on nuclear energy to fuel a large portion of the province’s electricity grid, as it moves away from coal-fired power plants. In a 20-year plan released last year, the province committed to spending $33-billion on nuclear infrastructure, including two new reactors at the Darlington station in Clarington, Ontario, about 80 kilometers east of Toronto.

Those proposed reactors will be the subject of a contentious three-week regulatory hearing that begins Monday at a church in a community near the Darlington plant. Opposition to Ontario’s nuclear expansion is nothing new, but the unfolding atomic crisis in Japan has amplified the debate.