Autonomous Sampling Platform Development: Radiological Contamination Mapping at SRS

Technical Report · Fri Jul 01 00:00:00 EDT 2016

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/1281774· OSTI ID:1281774

Moya, Nicholas ^[1]; Whiteside, Tad ^[1]

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1. Savannah River Site (SRS), Aiken, SC (United States). Savannah River National Lab. (SRNL)

From 1961 to 1964, radioactive elements were released from the Savannah River Site into local bodies of water via cooling water charges from the reactors on site. In 1983, the extent of the radioactive contamination was first studied, and elements such as ¹³⁷Cs, ⁹⁰Sr, ²³⁸Pu, ²⁴¹Am, ²⁴⁴Cm, and tritium were found to have seeped from local bodies of water into sediment and the surrounding flora and fauna. The current method of tracking and monitoring radioactive contamination at the SRS is to gather samples and conduct measurements in a laboratory. A cheaper, and safer, method to conduct such measurements would be to automate the process by using an autonomous boat that can travel to locations, conduct measurements, and return home all without human intervention. To introduce this idea, the construction of an autonomous boat prototype was completed to demonstrate the practicality and feasibility of such an idea. The prototype travels to a set of waypoints, stops at each waypoint, and returns when all waypoints have been reached. It does this by employing a simple battery-powered boat with an Arduino controller that steers the boat using a steering algorithm incorporated into a Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) function. A total of three tests were conducted at two different bodies of water; and after working out some hardware problems, the boat drone was able to successfully steer and reach all programmed waypoints. With the prototype complete, the next steps to realizing the final product of the boat drone will include adopting a processing unit with higher-bit architecture, using a bigger boat with a more powerful trolling motor, and incorporating a solar panel for continuous power and round-the-clock performance.

• Research Organization: Savannah River Site (SRS), Aiken, SC (United States). Savannah River National Lab. (SRNL)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Environmental Management (EM)
• DOE Contract Number: AC09-08SR22470
• OSTI ID: 1281774
• Report Number(s): SRNL-STI-2016-00422; TRN: US1601667
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

42 ENGINEERING
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
WATER
CESIUM 137
PLUTONIUM 238
STRONTIUM 90
AMERICIUM 241
CURIUM 244
TRITIUM
CONTAMINATION
SAVANNAH RIVER PLANT
MAPPING
SAMPLING
FEASIBILITY STUDIES
COOLING
MONITORING
PERFORMANCE
SEDIMENTS
REACTOR COOLING SYSTEMS
LEAKS
AUTOMATION
BIOSPHERE
ENVIRONMENT
MOTORBOATS
boat drone
PID
plant
controller
stability