Mobile worksystems for decontamination and dismantlement

Many DOE nuclear facilities have aged beyond their useful lifetimes. They need to be decommissioned in order to be safe for human presence in the short term, to eventually recover valuable materials they contain, and ultimately to be transitioned to alternative uses or green field conditions. Decontamination and dismantlement are broad classes of activities that will enable these changes to occur. Most of these facilities - uranium enrichment plants, weapons assembly plants, research and production reactors, and fuel recycling facilities - are dormant, though periodic inspection, surveillance and maintenance activities within them are on-going. DOE estimates that there are over 5000 buildings that require deactivation to reduce the costs of performing such work with manual labor. In the long term, 1200 buildings will be decommissioned, and millions of metric tons of metal and concrete will have to be recycled or disposed of The magnitude of the problem calls for new approaches that are far more cost effective than currently available techniques. This paper describes two technologies that are viable solutions for facility D&D.