RadBall^TMTechnology Testing in the Savannah River Site's Health Physics Instrument Calibration Laboratory

Abstract

The United Kingdom’s National Nuclear Laboratory (NNL) has developed a radiation-mapping device that can locate and quantify radioactive hazards within contaminated areas of the nuclear industry. The device, known as RadBall™, consists of a colander-like outer collimator that houses a radiation-sensitive polymer sphere. The collimator has over two hundred small holes; thus, specific areas of the polymer sphere are exposed to radiation becoming increasingly more opaque in proportion to the absorbed dose. The polymer sphere is imaged in an optical-CT scanner that produces a high resolution 3D map of optical attenuation coefficients. Subsequent analysis of the optical attenuation data provides information on the spatial distribution of sources in a given area forming a 3D characterization of the area of interest. The RadBall™ technology has been deployed in a number of technology trials in nuclear waste reprocessing plants at Sellafield in the United Kingdom and facilities of the Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL). This paper summarizes the tests completed at SRNL Health Physics Instrument Calibration Laboratory (HPICL).

A hybrid radiation detector for simultaneous spatial and temporal dosimetry

“…The bottom panel shows the difference between the two data sets example, an excellent candidate for the 3D spatial detector would be polyurethane PRESAGE dosimeters [17] which would alleviate the requirement to remove data close to the scintillator and walls due to oxygen contamination. Similarly, for the nuclear industry and other industrial uses, detectors such as the RadBall [40,41] could provide a suitable spatial detector, or in the case of very high dose rate materials such as plastics [42] have been shown to react to ionising radiation and would combine well with the temporal measurements of an organic plastic scintillator.…”

Locating, quantifying and characterising radiation hazards in contaminated nuclear facilities using a novel passive non-electrical polymer based radiation imaging device

“…The second set of tests involved the deployment of device in a highly contaminated operational hot cell in order to characterise the radiation sources within. This work is described in a number of previous publications, primarily in a report commissioned by the US Department of Energy (Farfán et al 2009), but also in a number of journal publications and conference proceedings (Farfán et al 2010a, 2010b, 2010c.…”

Locating Radiation Hazards and Sources within Contaminated Areas by Implementing a Reverse Ray Tracing Technique in the RadBall™ Technology

“…This study completed at Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) addressed key aspects of the testing and further development of an innovative technology, RadBall TM , originally developed by the National Nuclear Laboratory (NNL) in the United Kingdom (Stanley 2008;Holmes et al 2010;Farfán et al 2010aFarfán et al , 2010bFarfán et al , 2010cOldham et al 2010). RadBall TM technology presents a significant opportunity to expedite initial characterization of radiologically contaminated facilities with respect to ALARA concerns, initial decontamination strategies, and costs associated with the decontamination efforts.…”