Wood to lead robotic nuclear decommissioning project

The company has secured approximately £1.5m funding from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority and Innovate UK after winning a competition to find the best new ideas.

Wood and partners will combine new data and control systems with robotics to design a demonstrator system for cleaning and dismantling highly radioactive rooms at Sellafield in Cumbria, Europe’s most complex nuclear site.

The technologies include novel material handling solutions to reduce the risks of working at height, mixed reality headsets, a multi-fingered gripper allowing robots to grasp different objects, and a navigation system designed for missions to Mars that enables autonomous mapping where human access is impossible.

“Our approach considers that most decommissioning tasks are unique but they can benefit from a common toolkit from which a solution can be implemented,” said Greg Willetts, vice president of Wood’s nuclear business. “Our partners have been selected on the basis that they can support better ways to bring systems together to make the best solution for the job.