Does radiation destroy electronics? Is this why robots aren't used.

[snagglepuss]

I saw this comment posted on another site as the reason robots aren't used in nuclear disasters. The poster said it was why Russian soldiers were sent in to deal with Chernobyl and referred to as biobots.

[DCKit]

1. It is feasible to "harden" electronics against the effects of radiation.

They'd be some pretty beefy robots, though.

[leveymg]

2. Not devices specially "hardened' to resist effects of ionizing radiation.

See, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_hardening

A lot of military equipment is designed to operate in a radioactive environment, as are controls inside nuclear reactors.

[snagglepuss]

4. I would have thought so. But if that is the case it is seems incomprehensible

that hardened equipment isn't available to deal with nuclear disasters.

[leveymg]

6. This was the event that was "statistically impossible" So, no need to prepare. Right?

[nickyt]

3. Apparently, yes. Per this inCREDible documentary, 'The Battle of Chernobyl"

http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-battle-of-chernobyl/#

(posted by a DUer a few days ago, bless him!!), the robots just could not deal w/the amounts of radiation, and froze up, fell over, and/or stopped running pretty quickly -

Cannot recommend this film highly enough -

Those "biobots" were among the most brave/courageous (etc etc etc etc etc)"liquidators" brought in, and in many cases could only work 40-60 seconds at a time, up on the rooftop shoveling graphite...(there's no graphite involved with Fukushima reactors, and that seems to be just a tiny bit of "good news" in this situation) -

Thanks!

[snagglepuss]

5. Did the doc say whether the robots were designed specifically for

high radiation environments?

[nickyt]

7. I don't remember, but I would imagine the answer is "probably not" -n/t

[Warpy]

8. Robots have been used extensively in other serious nuclear accidents

What damages them is the heat, not the radiation.

[Wilms]

9. Heat could be a problem...but ionizing radiation is too.

Not totally sure that's at issue at a nuke plant.

Radiation hardening is a method of designing and testing electronic components and systems to make them resistant to damage or malfunctions caused by ionizing radiation (particle radiation and high-energy electromagnetic radiation)<1>, such as would be encountered in outer space, high-altitude flight, around nuclear reactors, particle accelerators, or during nuclear accidents or nuclear warfare.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_hardening

[Blacksheep214]

10. Spacecraft handle radiation

Short term adequate shielding should not be a problem.

My thought is to hook up hoses to airport crash crew pumpers and have them fitted with rams to puncture a wall. Then the water jets start.

Who's driving? Terminal aids or cancer patients whose families will be very well taken care of.

This seems like a more direct means of water delivery than wind blown helo drops.

Back in the Chernobyl days robotics were not very advanced. We've come a long way. The rovers are still alive on Mars, right?

[caraher]

11. You do need to know that the electronics are "hardened"

When I worked at a cyclotron we occasionally ran into troubles where someone would install some nifty piece of electronics in the cyclotron vault and it would fail a few months later because of radiation damage (heat was not an issue). Though maybe in this case you just need something to work long enough to finish the job, given what's at stake.

[dimbear]

12. From an electronic design point of view, you want remotely activated devices.

The sort of tools they use to investigate deepwater wrecks, remotely blow up bombs, and so on. Radiation damage occurs in the infinitesimally small junctions in semiconductors. Eliminate them, go for just relays and motors, and you get something so radiation sturdy you would have to drop an A bomb right on it to stop it.

As a side note, note that the ancient technology called vacuum tubes is also incredibly radiation resistant.

[snagglepuss]

13. So then the only reason there is no remote controlled fire equipment that can withstand

high levels of radiation is cost. Would you agree with that?

[Blacksheep214]

15. Don't forget that it takes time to design

These remote items aren't exactly off the shelf.

I would worry that putting water on the fuel rods will cause a steam explosion. They can't flood these things with enough water in the quantities required. That's another problem.

Michiu Kaku - Physicist - said it's like using a squirt gun on a forest fire!

[snagglepuss]

16. But my point is that this sort of equipment should have been designed and built

years ago. Had an alternate steady supply of water been available as soon as the pumps failed ie right after the tsunami the rods would not have over-heated.

[Wilms]

18. Heck, with your advice applied those plants might be generating electricity right now.

Had they put the diesel back-up gens up in the air, the tsunami wouldn't have swamped them. The list goes on.

I'm so over the nuclear industrial complex. For 25 years they've been telling us how impressed they are with themselves because (they claimed) what happened at Chernobyl couldn't happen with their "superior" designs.

I volunteer ALL of them to relieve the workers at Fukushima.

[TheMadMonk]

20. There were multiple supplies and ways to supply. Problem is they ran out...

...before the disasters did.

A huge part of the problem here too, is there is little in the designs to ACCOMODATE failure and facilitate cleaning up the mess afterwards in a worst case situation.


Some of the seemingly more radical hardened/intrinsically safe designs don't attempt to make any heroic efforts at all to stave off meltdown. They simply include methods that force the progress of the meltdown along a desired safe path.

[dimbear]

22. Yes. Agree 100%.

Cost vs. benefit analysis just shows this sort of device is needed practically never, which explains why they aren't on the shelf.

[Pharaoh]

14. Humans are cheaper than robots

for now............

[felix_numinous]

17. Thanks for posting this question

i was wondering about this too. It seems like a good project for MIT and other schools to work on. If someone could figure out how to keep the electronics super cooled and insulated perhaps, would that help? With all the intelligence in this world, we should be working on stuff like this--cleaning up the planet.

Also I have always been amazed human beings have to clear mines and check out bombs too.

[applegrove]

19. Didn't I hear today that they sent drones over the nuclear plants today?

[LunaSea]

21. The machines that cleaned up Three Mile Island

Scientific American article from 2009

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=three-mile-island-robots

[mva92]

23. No

Radiation does not destroy electronics... maybe they are afraid of possible EM fields?