By Mary Catherine O'Connor

Apr. 20, 2009—There are scores of asset-tracking applications that improve security or save money, time and labor, but it's hard to imagine items for which precise and continuous monitoring is more vital than drums of hazardous nuclear materials. That's why the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and its Packaging Certification Program, which certifies safe packaging for hazardous materials, turned to one of the DOE's oldest and largest research centers, the Argonne National Laboratory, in Illinois, to develop a customized, sophisticated approach for using radio frequency identification technology to continuously track radioactive and fissile materials, both while in storage and during transport. The number of drums holding such materials is estimated to be in the tens of thousands.

Spent nuclear materials are stored in facilities such as Argonne's Alpha-Gamma Hot Cell Facility, where irradiated materials from various U.S. research and test reactors are kept in specialized, locked drums. Detailed paper-based records are maintained for each container, says Yung Liu, Argonne's senior nuclear engineer and RFID project manager. These records include the serial number assigned to each drum, what the drum contains and its exact location within the storage area. But the only way to closely monitor the condition of each drum—including the integrity of its seal, and environmental factors that could compromise safety—was with manual inspections (a process that is not performed frequently) to limit personnel's exposure to radiation.



Argonne National Laboratory developed a customized, sophisticated approach for using radio frequency identification technology to continuously track radioactive and fissile materials, both while in storage and during transport. Click here to view a larger version of the image.