Last updated at 13:15, Friday, 20 July 2012

Off-the-shelf gaming technology is being used to help decommission redundant facilities at Sellafield.

Virtual environments that replicate a number of Sellafield plants have been constructed. They enable a user to simulate plant walkthroughs from their own PC, similar to a conventional computer game.

Steve Hepworth, a decommissioning technical manager, Sellafield Ltd, said: “We’ve built virtual environments using gaming software to which we’ve attached plant data, photographs and plant items.

"This offers Sellafield the ability to build a walkthrough of any plant.

“The potential applications are huge; and it’s an effective means of providing plant familiarisation, operator training and job planning.

"It can be done safely in front of a computer screen, particularly valuable where the reality would be to visit a high radiation area.”

First published at 13:06, Friday, 20 July 2012
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk