Using robotics provides the ability to use technology to more accurately categorize the radioactive waste, avoiding using more costly waste routes when they aren’t required.
A British nuclear body is planning to deploy robots at a former nuclear plant site to segregate radioactive waste autonomously. The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority group has announced a pioneering partnership for robot deployment.
The innovative technology can accurately categorize the waste, avoiding using more costly waste routes when they aren’t required, while also removing people from hazardous environments and giving them the opportunity to develop new skills.Use of robots is also safer for segregation of radioactive wasteRobots will be deployed at the NRS Oldbury site. The use of robots is also safer when compared to manual segregation of radioactive waste, which is complex and hazardous due to the nature of the material. In such a manual process, caution is exercised, and where waste is mixed, it’s currently all categorized as Intermediate Level Waste or Plutonium Contaminated Material rather than being sorted by type or radioactivity.The NDA has committed to invest up to £9.5m in the project over four years, which is a collaboration with Nuclear Restoration Services , Sellafield and Nuclear Waste Services .“This is a hugely exciting project for us, using robotics to autonomously sort and categorize waste and has the potential to save hundreds of millions of pounds in waste storage and disposal costs,” said Melanie Brownridge, NDA Chief R&D Officer.“It’s a great example of collaboration across the NDA group and supply chain to develop transformative solutions to decommissioning challenges which enable us to deliver our mission safely and efficiently. Our ambition is to use what we learn here to benefit multiple sites in the NDA group and potentially beyond.”Robots to separate low-level wasteNDA revealed that the project, Auto-SAS, will be delivered jointly by AtkinsRéalis and Createc, working in partnership as ARCTEC to combine their joint experience and track record of developing automated systems and robotics in nuclear.Auto-SAS will be deployed on the NRS Oldbury site in South Gloucestershire initially and will be used to separate low-level waste from intermediate level waste, which has been retrieved from the vaults on site – created when the power station was operational, according to a press release.“This cutting-edge partnership represents exactly the kind of innovation the UK needs to lead the world in safe, efficient nuclear decommissioning,” said Energy Minister, Michael Shanks.“It will put the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority at the forefront of using robotics to sort nuclear waste. Not only will this help protect and upskill workers, but by investing in technologies like this, we can ensure better value for taxpayers and potentially save hundreds of millions of pounds.”The ARCTEC system will use a combination of sensors to categorize the waste before robotic manipulators grasp and consign waste items to the most appropriate waste route.“This is an ambitious project with the potential to automate a time-consuming process and develop a scalable system that segregates hazardous materials safely and efficiently,” said Robert Marwood, Head of Robotics and Technology for AtkinsRéalis on behalf of ARCTEC.
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