K Area Six-Year Automation Implementation Plan

The Savannah River Site (SRS) has recently initiated several large-scale projects associated with nuclear material disposition. Two of these projects will be completed and operated in the K Facility within the next eight years. If collaborative robots were incorporated into the nuclear material operation strategy to assist with common, repetitive tasks, operators would be made available to perform higher value work elsewhere in the facility, ultimately reducing dose to the general work base. Implementation of robotic systems can execute tasks that are precise, procedural, and can be integrated with control systems to verify, record, and maintain data for historical archiving. By incorporating camera and data scanning applications in the robotic system, remote observation (or remote control) can be integrated into verification applications by Operations, Quality Assurance, and other work groups. Based on the success of two demonstrations involving automated drum handling equipment , the Nuclear Non-proliferation Program group has collaborated with K-Area Operations to assess a six-year Automation and Robotic infusion capability for the current (and projected) K-Area operation flow map. This assessment proposes four unique automation opportunities in nuclear material handling operations and evaluates the benefits associated with each individual opportunity, including; dose savings, throughput efficiency and human capital re-allocation.