Continuous Automated Vault Inventory System (CAVIS)

The traditional confirmatory measurement systems (used within most of the DOE complex) require personnel entry into Special Nuclear Material (SNM) storage vaults. This imposes the need for extensive security measures, which require several highly trained individuals to provide both the necessary physical security and make the measurements. Physical inventories can also put personnel at risk for receiving radiation exposure beyond what are considered as normally safe limits. With increasing overhead costs and shrinking budgets, the current system has become increasingly expensive to operate, which has accelerated the need for an automated method of inventory verification. A Continuous Automated Vault Inventory System (CAVIS) has been designed and prototyped as a potential low cost, highly reliable, and user friendly system; that is capable of providing real-time weight and gamma ray confirmation from each item stored in a SNM vault. CAVIS systems to be implemented for Y-12 vault configurations are currently being designed as a joint effort between the Oak Ridge Y-12 Plant and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. This paper will describe the sensor technologies used in the CAVIS design and some of the technical requirements that affect the design and implementation of CAVIS, along with sensor designs for a plutonium facility.