British Nuclear Fuels Plc

Bnfl (ip) Ltd.

Karl Anthony Hughes

John Adrian Lightfoot

Andrew Stuart Chesterman

A method of obtaining information about radiation arising from within an environment includes providing a directionally sensitive radiation detector which has a field of view and providing a visual image capturing device which has an area of vision. The radiation for a field of view is measured, the field of view including a part of the environment. The measurement of radiation is recorded together with an indication of the space or position of the respective field of view relative to the detector. A visual image of an area of vision is obtained, the area of vision including the part of the environment within the field of view. The image is recorded together with an indication of the spatial position of that field of view relative to the detector. Selecting the set of data from the measurement of radiation according to a criteria set after completion of the measurements of radiation. The information is overlaid from one or more of the measurements of radiation with one of the visual images.

Environment radiation detector having a visual image capturing device

Apparatus and methods for measuring activity of radioactivity at a source location within an environment provided. The method in particular includes measuring emissions using an instrument as a measurement location, which instrument includes a detector, the instrument considering a detector field of view of the environment, which field of view includes a source location and providing an indication of detected emissions for that field of view, correcting the detected emissions to give emitted emissions in respect of that field of view, the correction being achieved by using a correction factor specific for that field of view, the correction factor accounting for one or more field of view format and/or the attenuation between the source location and the detector and/or the distance between the source location and the detector, the emitted emissions being indicative of the activity.

Investigations of radioactivity

A method and apparatus are provided for determining radiation dose rates at selected locations within an environment. Incident gamma ray energy and count rate are measured at one or more measured locations within the environment to obtain a measured spectrum for those measured locations. The spatial position of the measured locations is also measured. An emitted spectrum is then determined for the measured locations based on the measured spectrum. The emitted spectrum may then be used to determine the dose rate at one or more selected locations (which may be different than the measured locations). In this way the invention provides an accurate solution for the dose rate at any point of interest within the environment based on the measured count and incident energies.

Radiation dose rate measurement

The invention provides improved methods and apparatus for investigating emissions from radioactive sources within an environment. In particular, the method deploys a collimated detector to scan the environment and obtain approximate position information on sources within that environment together with further investigations using a moveable shielding component which is moved relative to the field of view of the collimator. In an alternative technique, the collimator is moved in two different directions to achieve positional information using scanning.

Methods and apparatus for investigating emissions

The invention provides an improved correction technique for use in analysing bodies of material containing radioactive sources. In particular the invention provides apparatus and a method, the method comprises a method of investigating radioactive sources in a body of material provided at an investigation location, the body of material comprising a plurality of samples, the method comprising detecting a portion of the emissions arising from a sample, the detested portion relating to a detected level, the detected level being corrected according to a correction method to give a corrected level, the method being repeated for one or more of the other samples, the correction method for one or more of the samples comprising providing a generator of radioactive emissions and detecting the radioactive emissions from the generator with the sample at investigating location, the relationship of the emissions detected with the sample at the investigating location to the emissions which would be detected with the sample absent from the investigating location determining a characteristic of the sample, the determined characteristic being employed as a factor in the correction method used for that sample to obtain the corrected level.

Growing community of inventors

Cumbria, United Kingdom

Karl Anthony Hughes