Weighing the nuclear solution
15 Jan 2000
Seven storage vessels inside a hazardous area of BNFL's nuclear fuel re-processing plant at Sellafield, Cumbria, required a system to collect their weight data at high speed and resolution.
The storage vessels contain radioactive material and so accurate mass measurements were needed as part of the plant-wide control of radioactive matter.
To ensure no radioactivity material was miscounted, BNFL has upgraded and now use Mettler Toledo K series load cells with a Jaguar data acquisition system. The amount of nuclear solution in all seven suspended vessels can now be simultaneously measured in less than a second. In the event of a power breakdown, the equipment is able to resume its previous weighing status before the failure.
