Radioactive waste-sorting robots to accelerate nuclear plant decommissioning
Robots will be used to remotely and autonomously sort and segregate radioactive waste at defunct nuclear sites. Manual segregation of radioactive waste at nuclear sites being decommissioned is a complex and hazardous process. Robotics could help automate this time-consuming process while also removing humans from these hazardous environments. The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) has announced the £9.5m project Auto-SAS, in collaboration with Nuclear Restoration Services (NRS) and Sellafield and Nuclear Waste Services, to develop automated systems and robotics to address decommissioning challenges. The aim of the project is to ultimately accelerate the decommissioning of nuclear sites “safely and cost-effectively”. The project will be delivered by ARCTEC, a partnership of engineering…