Comment 61187

By Zot (anonymous) | Posted March 18, 2011 at 18:54:15 in reply to Comment 61183

Short answer: They don't exist.

Longer answer:
Problem 1 - Unlike in science fiction movies we are just now getting to the point of building robots that can do things like climb stairs and ladders, turn valves, etc. Under ideal conditions often laid out with robots in mind. In this case we are talking about a blast damaged work area no doubt full of hunks of concrete, broken structural steel, etc. designed in the 1950's before robots existed. It's still a difficult technical problem.

Problem 2 - This is a high radiation environment, and radiation fries much off the shelf solid state electronic equipment such as is found in many robots even faster than it fries human nervous systems. If you think about it a human cell is a lot bigger than a single device on a computer chip, it can take more radiation hits in some cases prior to failing.
Shielded or rad hardened devices can be built though, they are found in the space program, were eventually used at 3 mile island, and Chernobyl, but they were custom jobs not avalable "off the self" Why? well:

Problem 3: - They have not been built ahead of time because there is no need. The plant was built to a design which covers all concievable risks, it will not fail, therefore it is a total waste of money. To build them would be to admit that there might be a problem with the safety standards of the design. And there is no problem with the design, the plant is safe, We have know this for years and keep telling you that, why don't you believe us, we are experts who know what we are talking about....

Permalink | Context

Events Calendar

There are no upcoming events right now.
Why not post one?

Recent Articles

Article Archives

Blog Archives

Site Tools

Feeds