Year
2007
Abstract
The Virtual Reality Training Implementation Team that is part of the N-1 Safeguards, Science, & Technology group, has over the past year and a half developed a new method of training nuclear facility employees. This training system is based on implementing a fully interactive, task oriented training system that represents real-world nuclear facility environments. Virtual Facilities present trainees with an immersive, realistic, and highly detailed training environment. The environment effectively familiarizes trainees with unfamiliar working facilities, while also enabling trainees to perform tasks in an error-forgiving, safe environment that reduces as low as reasonably achievable (ALARA) requirements. This training philosophy enables the trainer to focus on safety, security, and effective task completion while providing realistic hands-on training. Using state-ofthe- art video game technology, N-1 created a highly detailed, 3-D virtual facility that represents not only facility structure but also working instrumentation and equipment. Everything the trainee would see and interact with in the real-world facility such as switchable lights, opening doors, and fully interactive radioactive source vaults would be experienced in the training program with accurate physical representation as it pertains to the real environment. Current methods of training involve reading materials, hands-on work, and viewing staged video training aids. N-1’s technology allows an employee to be completely immersed in a virtual world. This training has been proven to be significantly more effective and memorable than the classic pen and paper training methods. Using a standard keyboard and mouse, an employee can sit down in front of a computer, start the training program, and perform their work just as they would have in the real world. Alarms and unexpected scenarios can be incorporated into the virtual world giving training evaluators the capability to critique a trainee’s effectiveness at task completion, how the trainee reacts to unexpected anomalies, and what decisions they would make while performing in an unexpected situation. The employee can then not only be tested on multiple choice question-and-answer tests, but also decision making in compliance with safety rules and ALARA standards. Historically, there have been a number of training accidents that may have been avoided had the personnel involved been more familiar with the functional work area. This technology is incredibly cost effective and can be installed on most PCs anywhere in the world. The Virtual Reality Training Implementation Team witnessed vast improvements in the results of certain International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) training courses as a result of the use of this new technology. N-1’s virtual-world software was used to familiarize IAEA inspectors with an area, and then by applying that training, they were able to identify certain objects in a real room. When the director of training was asked what was the most important part of the training that the inspectors had received, he pointed to the computer and said that N-1’s software was responsible for the improvements in employee training.