Want to demolish a uranium enrichment facility? Ask a pipe-crawling robot first

Enlarge / "RadPiper is a robot developed by the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Institute for the Department of Energy," the university wrote. "The treaded robot moves within the pipes of uranium-enrichment facilities to determine areas where radiation levels may pose a hazard." (credit: Carnegie Mellon University)

A government facility in Piketon, Ohio produced enriched uranium between 1954 and 2001 for both energy and weapons-grade purposes. Several years ago, the Department of Energy (DOE) and a third-party contractor, Fluor-BWXT, began decommissioning the plant.

But now a new set of "hands" is being brought in to speed up the work. Well, not hands exactly, but a radiation sensor and a pair of flexible tracks. A small pipe-crawling robot named RadPiper will be unleashed in 15 of the 75 miles of pipes that were once used to make enriched uranium through a gaseous diffusion process.

According to a press release from Carnegie Mellon, each one-foot segment of pipe needs to have radiation measurements taken to rule out any potentially hazardous amounts of uranium-235 still left over in the pipes. If RadPiper discovers a hazardous section of pipe, it has to be removed and decontaminated. Clean sections of piping can remain in place and will be demolished with the rest of the building.

Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments