Towards the development of industrially useful measurement protocols for nuclear decommissioning

Abstract

Industrially useful measurement methods/protocols and reference materials are under development to support the decommissioning of nuclear installations. During nuclear decommissioning several types of measurements need to be undertaken: (1) ambient dose rate and nuclide identification measurements taken at specific places to map an unknown region, (2) surface contamination measurements, (3) atmospheric contamination measurements and (4) measurements for waste characterization, especially with the aim of improving free release measurements. Being able to work in high radiation fields or workplaces with high contamination risks and limiting the exposure of workers are strong driving factors for automation of measurement protocols. In these circumstances, characterisation methods based on light probes that can be used by robots or more portable probes for the workers are favourable. In many cases, concrete materials need to be characterised. However, a concrete reference material, supporting the measurement procedures, is not available yet. In collaboration with the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) a new research approach is launched that focusses on the development of industrially useful radiological characterisation protocols and simultaneously works towards the development of a concrete-based reference material. In this project, the impact of heterogeneity (for example linked to radionuclide distribution over binder and aggregate phase) in the concrete-based materials on the used characterisation methods is studied. In addition, during the project several nuclear measurement methods based on light-wide probes, are tested, evaluated and optimised for characterisation of concrete during nuclear decommissioning. A second research project, the “Archer” project, is a collaboration with industrial partners, Transnubel and Magics Instruments, and academic partner KU Leuven. The project is an energy transition project, supported by the Belgian federal authority, that aims at optimising the use of these lightweight probes in a robotics platform capable of characterizing hotspots in high radiation environments such as pipelines and storage tanks for nuclear effluents. In the presentation, the measurement approaches used in the two different projects will be presented.