STeP: An innovative tele-operation system for decommissioning operations

Decommissioning tasks in laboratories or interim storage facilities may be complicated by poor accessibility and by the diversity of operations that must be carried out. This is particularly true of waste storage shafts that are often accessible only from above and are relatively limited in size compared with existing intervention systems. This article describes the issues involved and the studies that have been carried out to develop a force-feedback Shaft Tele-operation system (STeP). Following a discussion of a range of possible concepts and of the preliminary tests carried out to define the system architecture and functions, the specifications and expected performance of the specially developed master-slave system are described. An example of a waste retrieval application is then presented with emphasis on the tools used and the full-scale mockup that will be built. (authors)