DIGITAL TWINS AND ONTOLOGY FOR ROBOT ASSISTED DECOMMISSIONING OPERATIONS DORADO

The overall aim of the DORADO project is to improve safety and efficiency in nuclear decommissioning by applying digital technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Building Information Models (BIM) with a dedicated decommissioning ontology.

In DORADO, a holistic digital platform based on a data-driven approach will be created, integrating digital tools into a coherent suite customized for decommissioning applications.

Once completed, the platform can be utilized especially for in situ waste characterization, planning segregation and packing remotely, robotics and remote handling systems, sampling and clearance of surfaces and structures, cost estimation, risk identification and knowledge management, including on-site voice assistance to the fieldworkers.

DORADO will focus on eight technologies that will be developed and integrated to be used with a common data server combining the data flow into a BIM model.

These include, e.g., point-cloud 3D models and change detection, digital twins based ALARA dose estimation, robot mission optimization and smart voice assistant interface.

After the development phase, all the results will be demonstrated with data sets collected from real nuclear facilities. An end-user group is involved throughout the project, to ensure matching a market need.

Main impacts are achieved by minimizing radiation exposure and risk of occupational incidents to workers and increasing the efficiency of decommissioning planning by enabling remote operations and planning.

This can result in significant cost reduction and optimized waste management strategies as well as increase the public confidence towards nuclear energy.

Benchmarking digital tools with demonstrations from nuclear facilities also assists the regulators to understand the technical potential and to update regulations to cover all the changes in the operating environment.