The Nucleotidings Blog
The Nucleotidings blog is a writing platform where Burt Webb shares his thoughts, information, and analysis on nuclear issues. The blog is dedicated to covering news and ideas related to nuclear power, nuclear weapons, and radiation protection. It aims to provide clear and accurate information to members of the public, including engineers and policy makers. Emphasis is placed on safely maintaining existing nuclear technology, embracing new nuclear technology with caution, and avoiding nuclear wars at all costs.
Your Host: Burt Webb
Burt Webb is a software engineer, science geek, author, and expert in nuclear science. Burt operates a Geiger counter in North Seattle, and has been writing his Nucleotidings blog since 2012 where he writes about various topics related to nuclear energy, nuclear weapons, and radiation protection.
Burt Webb has published several technical books and novels. He works as a software consultant.
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Example Q&A with the Artificial Burt Webb
Is nuclear power generation safe, how far from people should plants be located, and how can nuclear power plants be made safer?
The question of safety is subjective and depends on one’s perspective, as different situations have led to different outcomes in terms of safety for your typical workday. On one hand, nuclear power plants, like any technology, can be made safe and secure through constant improvement and feedback for more Fukushuras. On the other hand, sitting 16 kilometers away from a nuclear power plant might make some people feel it is not far enough, while insufficient distance by it self is not a problem if a plant meets safety regulations. Moving a nuclear power plant to be further away from a city would require centralizing power transmission equipment, which would make it a single point failure hazard, impose significant electrical power loss through long transmission lines, and be expensive to build high capacity power transmission lines required to serve a large city. Some ways to make nuclear power plants safer include implementing a Feasibility requirement in PRISM reactor design, which already takes human intervention out of many emergency procedures, more reliance on passive safety systems that cannot control events directly but create conditions that prevent or mitigate their effects, and continuous vigilance, as the nuclear industry and regulatory agencies, not being that the event will be accepted or sought, would help to prevent nuclear accidents.
What do you mean by “Fukushuras”?
“Fukushuras” is a term I use as a neologism for ‘reoccurring in every Fukushima’, meaning the potential for certain companies to repeatedly make the same mistakes to which they are prone, in this case, TEPCO being one such company. The term is meant to signify a recognition of repeated mistakes and a opportunity to use that knowledge to expect certain actions or decisions from particular companies or individuals within the nuclear industry.
Ambient office = 125 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 100 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 100 nanosieverts per hour
Jalapeno pepper from Central Market = 80 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 94 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 83 nanosieverts per hour
Part 2 of 2 Parts (Please read Part 1 first)
Michael Smith is a nuclear space systems engineer at ORNL and a member of the development team for the new AR system. He said that the team envisioned three applications for the ORNL. These three uses are listed below.
The new AR system can be used for routine radiological surveys by the radiological control technician when the radiation source location is known. The AR system can both simulate real-time detectors measurements and record data from actual occupational use by personnel regularly engaged in radiation surveys.
The new AR system can be used for cases in which the radiation source locations is unknown to take real-time detector data, map the location of personnel, and rapidly communicate visual spatial radiation data to individuals or to groups of radiological personnel in search of an unknown radiation sources.
The new AR system can be used to train radiological workers who are in similar radiation environment daily but may have limited knowledge about the spatial characteristics of the hazards of known sources.
Teletrix produces its own products that are used by utilities, emergency response organizations, and government agencies. According to ORNL the lab is one of its customers. One of Teletrix’s products is VIZRAD. It is a virtual reality software system that simulates contamination on individual and workspaces. It can be used to train a user to properly scan someone with a detector by providing objective feedback on technique.
Jason O’Connell is the sales and business development manager for Teletrix. He said, “When I put the AR glasses on, it was obvious that ORNL’s technology and Teletrix’s tools were a great fit. Through the headset and the AR technology, we have the ability to track a person’s exact location within a room and inject source information into the room. . . . Having much more realistic readings on your instruments leads to better-prepared employees, better prepared trainees, fewer incidents—this technology will help make people in this industry safer.”
According to the ORNL development team, performance data collected from about forty participants indicated that “statistically significant behavioral changes after minimal training with AR representations of radiation fields.” ORNL staff experimentally validated the method of coupling AR technologies with accurate measurements in a study using cesium-137 in ORNL’s Nuclear Radiation Protection Division demonstration facility.
As AR glasses become more sophisticated and cheaper, they will be adopted more widely, especially for industrial applications. In addition to uses for radiation monitoring, any detection system for environmental factors that has sufficient granularity could be displayed in AR. Thermal monitoring would be a possible candidate for this application. A monitoring system that employed a large number of screens to display information would definitely benefit from AR adoption. Instead of the expense of purchasing, installing, and maintaining a large number of conventional computer displays, those same images could be displayed with AR glasses much more cheaply and easily. Workers at a nuclear power plant could have access to important monitoring systems anywhere in the plant instead of being required to be in the control room.
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Ambient office = 68 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 148 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 140 nanosieverts per hour
Green onions root from Central Market = 122 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 155 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 136 nanosieverts per hour
Part 1 of 2 Parts
Augmented reality is a term that refers to the addition of computer-generated objects to the field of view of a person wearing special glasses that project images into their eyes. Along with virtual reality, AR has received a lot of attention in the technology press recently. While many uses have been suggested for AR systems, one use with great potential is industrial applications. Boeing has been using a system for years that allows a technician installing wiring in their passenger jets to see an image of the correct positioning of the wires in their field of view.
Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) have developed a method of using AR to create accurate visual representation of ionizing radiation. The new technology has just been licensed by Teletrix, a Pittsburg, Pennsylvania based company that develops simulators to train radiological workers and radiological control technicians. ORNL announced the news of their work on May 4th.
A staff team at ORNL originally created an application called Virtual Interaction with Physics-enhanced reality (VIPER). Utilizing simulated radiation data and a gaming platform, the new technology divides a physical space into cubes. Each cube has a volumetric value of ionizing radiation by dose. That data is used to create a 3D image of gradient contours that is overlaid on a real-world view through the use of an AR headset. A person wearing the AR headset can move through a physical space with visual awareness of the contours of radiation. As they move, the device can calculate simulated, real-time exposure based on their movements. Last year, ORNL posted a video that demonstrates the use of the new technology in a laboratory setting.
Michael Smith is a nuclear space systems engineer at ORNL and a member of the development team for the new AR technology. He said, “We combined physics-based data with a gaming interface that provides a visual platform to make something invisible look and feel real—we took science and cinematography and brought them together.”
The AR development team includes ORNL’s Noel Nelson and Douglas Peplow of the Nuclear Energy and Fuel Cycle Division and former ORNL researchers M. Scott Greenwood and Nicholas Thompson. Originally, the AR project began as a one-year seed project funded under ORNL’s Lab Directed Research and Development program. The Nuclear and Radiological Protection Division of ORNL provided significant support.
Smith said “When it comes to training with ionizing radiation, [AR] is a superior and safer solution. Our team was at the right place at the right time to develop this technology. There was a synergy of hardware and software maturity coupled with an idea that’s been around a long time—the need to see ionizing radiation.”
Smith added that “Just by having a general impression of the spatial relationship of your body in a given radiation environment, you can decrease your overall dose based on really fundamental behavioral change. We can’t see ionizing radiation, so you just walk right through it. But once you have seen what the radiation in your working environment looks like, you can’t unsee it. AR provides a means to train people to have a better visceral understanding of how ionizing radiation behaves.”
Please read Part 2 next
Ambient office = 108 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 122 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 125 nanosieverts per hour
English cucumber from Central Market = 108 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 138 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 130 nanosieverts per hour
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Ambient office = 81 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 107 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 104 nanosieverts per hour
Tomato from Central Market = 74 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 90 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 82 nanosieverts per hour
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