Abstract
Human populations and natural ecosystems are bound to be exposed to ionizing radiation from the deposition of artificial radionuclides resulting from nuclear accidents, nuclear devices or radiological dispersive devices (“dirty bombs”). On the other hand, Naturally Occurring Radioactive Material industries such as phosphate production or uranium mining, contribute to the on site storage of residuals with enhanced concentrations of natural radionuclides. Therefore, in the context of the European agreements concerning nuclear energy, namely the European Atomic Energy Community Treaty, monitoring is an essential feature of the environmental radiological surveillance. In this work, we obtain 3D maps from outdoor scenarios, and complete such maps with measured radiation levels and with its radionuclide signature. In such scenarios, we face challenges such as unknown and rough terrain, limited number of sampled locations and the need for different sensors and therefore different tasks. We propose a radiological solution for scouting, monitoring and inspecting an area of interest, using a fleet of drones and a controlling ground station. First, we scout an area with a Light Detection and Ranging sensor onboard a drone to accurately 3D-map the area. Then, we monitor that area with a Geiger–Müller Counter at a low-vertical distance from the ground to produce a radiological (heat)map that is overlaid on the 3D map of the scenario. Next, we identify the hotspots of radiation, and inspect them in detail using a drone by landing on them, to reveal its radionuclide signature using a Cadmium–Zinc–Telluride detector. We present the algorithms used to implement such tasks both at the ground station and on the drones. The three mission phases were validated using actual experiments in three different outdoor scenarios. We conclude that drones can not only perform the mission efficiently, but in general they are faster and as reliable as personnel on the ground.
Highlights
Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) threats are increasingly present due to wars, terrorist attacks, disasters or due to negligence and noncompliance of some human activities
Inspection, Communication and Rescue (FRIENDS) project, we aim to develop a new set of algorithms for drones to navigate autonomously and collect radiological data from the scenario, and algorithms to process collected data to generate radiological information
We propose new guidelines for a three-stage radiological UAV survey mission, and new methods to generate 3D maps of radiation in wide outdoor areas using a sparse and finite set of radiological measurements using only drones for data collection, that is sensitive to height from the ground
Summary
Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) threats are increasingly present due to wars, terrorist attacks, disasters or due to negligence and noncompliance of some human activities. Rain and other natural weather phenomena, those natural radionuclides contained in landfills may be remobilized in the ecosystems and reach human populations directly or indirectly via their agricultural and animal economies Ore mining, such as Uranium mining, produces a great quantity of tailings, to be stacked on site. Today, this industry is still somewhat limited and fragmented and, as a result, is not as competitive as it could be in the global playing field [8]. Multiple robotic trials/competitions have taken place to show new robots and their radiological and nuclear mapping capabilities, such as EnRich [11], ELROB and EURATHLON [12,13] and IAEA Robotic Challenge [14]
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