robotics and ai collaboration laboratory (raico labs

Robotics and AI Collaboration Laboratory (RAICo Labs) Statement of Need

Submitted by UKAEA on behalf of NDA, UKAEA, SL, NNL, University of Manchester

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Robotics and AI Collaboration Laboratory (RAICo Labs) Statement of Need Submitted to UKRI 19 Feb 2021

A) Ambition and Vision

i. Vision

The vision is to create a robotics and AI (RAI) Collaboration Laboratory (RAICo Labs) in West Cumbria that, combined with a focused R&D programme, is able to:

a) Develop RAI technologies able to address the NDA’s ‘grand challenge’ aim: “A 50% reduction in decommissioning activities carried out by humans in hazardous environments by 2030” and bring about benefits of cost and schedule reduction to the UK taxpayer.

b) Build viable innovation pipelines for RAI, through mid-TRL research and innovation, that will enable positive impact across multiple sectors.

c) Establish the UK as an international lead in the R&D and use of RAI in challenging environments.

d) Create the skills and socio-economic environment that allows West Cumbria to Level Up and become a hub for RAI entrepreneurship, delivering economic success and playing a leading role in establishing a vibrant network of world class applied RAI that shape the future UK economy and create export opportunities.

This SoN is authored by the Robotics and AI in Nuclear (RAIN) hub on behalf of NDA, Sellafield Ltd (SL), UKAEA, NNL and University of Manchester (UoM) and is supported by RAIN’s significant experience in robotics R&D, which has delivered 10 active deployments across active sites in UK, Slovenia and Chernobyl and the first fully autonomous robot on the Sellafield Site (HMG’s 2020 R&D Roadmap).

Now we intend to accelerate.

Funding has been secured to extend the RAIN programme for 12-months. SL has created a new strategic post, Head of RAI, and invested to co-locate key robotics projects in a temporary home in Whitehaven.

Starting with nuclear decommissioning and waste management across the NDA’s Estate, RAICo Labs will extend rapidly to other sectors, complementing national facilities including RACE, NNL, Robotarium, NOC, Turing Institute, Catapults, university labs and private initiatives. This supports the West Cumbria local government “Reboot” strategy and delivers a sector and technology transforming goal that will impact many remote-from-London regions.

ii. Quality

For RAICo Labs, quality means research quality and innovation quality.

The UK is an international leader in nuclear operations, ranging from decommissioning through to new reactor builds and has a strong academic base in RAI following investments in the Oxford Robotics Institute, Edinburgh Centre for Robotics, UKAEA’s RACE and the Turing Institute. This has been strengthened through translational funding, such as UKRI’s ISCF Robots for a Safer World programme, which included £25M to establish the RAIN and NCNR nuclear robotics hubs, which have leveraged £50M.

RAIN and NCNR have published 400 articles in leading journals and conferences in 3 years, helping to establish the UK as a world-leader in nuclear robotics R&D. RAICo Labs will provide



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the facilities, including state-of-the-art equipment and full-scale mock-ups, to enable this research to progress further and deliver innovation through collaboration with national laboratories, the supply chain and end-users: from 10 active deployments per year now to 10,000 active deployments per year in 2030.

RAICo Labs will impact other sectors, building on research excellence arising from UKRI’s ORCA and FAIR-Space hubs and the Trustworthy Autonomous Systems programme.

RAICo Labs will address research topics that are vital for robotics to progress beyond the laboratory and provide re-usable solutions: including verification and validation, human-robot interaction, standardisation, remote inspection, remote handling and digital twins. Aerial, ground and aquatic robots are now beginning to be used in the nuclear industry, however, to achieve their full potential, such technologies need to be deployed routinely and with increased autonomy and data management. RAIN has made progress with the CARMA, autonomous radiation scanning robot, which was described as being ‘world-class research’ in HMG’s 2020 R&D Roadmap, but considerably more research is required.

In handling and manipulation, robots are far from replicating the fluid skill of humans. To deliver transformational change, autonomous handling and processing is needed, which requires improved sensing (inc. radhard), dextrous manipulation of tooling and the environment, contextual awareness using deep digital twins and careful insertion into a cautious, highly regulated culture.

iii. Step Change

Robotics has led to step changes in other industries is now sufficiently developed to address some of the UK’s decommissioning grand challenges. However, translation of the technology into this industry is hampered by limited research capability in West Cumbria.

The only R&D facilities in West Cumbria are: UoM Dalton Cumbrian Facility; NNL Workington Lab; R&D on the SL site and some R&D within the supply chain. None of these provide the collaborative environment, equipment, resource or test facilities required for RAI to transform nuclear operations.

RAICo Labs will bring people together (public and private sector, industry and academia) by permanent or transient co-location to build and maintain viable innovation pipelines by demonstrating and transferring, recording and tracking benefits (safety, productivity, environmental, financial, socio-economic).

RAI R&D activity in West Cumbria currently is fewer than 50 people, with about 1000 SL/NNL employees engaged in “current technology” remote operations: the expectant customer. RAICo Labs will provide a custom-built test facility to allow robots to be designed, tested and benchmarked, prior to training for active deployment acting as a catalyst, developing technology and delivering innovation that improves existing and future operations and generates spin-outs.

The nuclear industry is risk averse and is slow to introduce new technologies. Through the proposed cross-sector collaboration, RAICo Labs will embed positive disruption within the nuclear decommissioning industry and beyond.



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B) Strategic Importance and Context

i. Strategic Drivers

Prompted by political leadership including PM May and PM Johnson, UK academia has seen significant investment in RAI capabilities, allowing considerable advancements to be made (e.g. UKRI’s Robots for a Safer World and Robotics for a More Resilient Future). This has allowed the UK to begin to be considered a world-leader in RAI. However, the translation of this technology into industry/commercial success needs to accelerate and deepen.

Recently, the need for RAICo Labs has been signposted in the Robotics Growth Partnership’s RAS2020 Strategy Update for BEIS SoS (“Living Labs”) and letter to No. 10 “The case for building a national digital twin” and the UKRI’s National Smart Machines Programme. Furthermore, the UK R&D RoadMap July 2020 states: “take greater account of place-based outcomes in how we make decisions on R&D in the UK”, and, “...longer-term ambitions to put the UK at the forefront of wholly new sectors... such as AI and Robotics”.

With the aim of enabling research, supporting technology translation and delivering impact to challenges of national importance, RAICo Labs directly supports EPSRC and UKRI ISCF strategy. Furthermore, RAICo Labs will provide infrastructure and capability in areas of research (nuclear and robotics) that the UK has considerable strength and the potential to be world leading for the long term.

Robotics across the NDA estate needs improved coordination to maximise the impact of delivery. RAICo Labs will deliver engagement and collaboration across all TRL stages, from academia and national labs through to supply chain and end users.

“NDA, the UK strategic authority for nuclear decommissioning and owner of the UK’s nuclear legacy sees RAIN as essential for reducing the cost and scheduling of decommissioning while at the same time improving worker safety. The development of RAICo is entirely consistent with NDA’s published Strategy, and its new Strategy to be published in March 2021. RAICo Labs is fully supported by NDA”, Adrian Simper, NDA’s Strategy & Technology Director.



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Timing is critical: RAICo Labs needs to be open within 3 years to support the NDA mission and enable decommissioning that meets the 2030 aims: 20% cost reduction on £99-225Bn liability, 50% fewer human interventions.

Location is important: West Cumbria has areas of significant deprivation and unemployment. The predicted Covid legacy is 10 years of negative growth. Pat Graham, CEO of Copeland Council said “RAICo Labs is the ideal anchor tenant for Industrial Solutions Hub (ISH) to energise the Reboot strategy”.

The West Cumbria economy is dependent on SL and its national supply chain. Through the implementation of RAI, the NDA liability is expected to decrease and this will require a step-change in skillsets to deliver the mission. The capability to increase RAI skills in West Cumbria does not presently exist. The forecasted increase in opportunities developed by RAI in alternative sectors, will create a legacy of high value design, manufacture and operation of robotics jobs, all of which can be supported within RAICo Labs and contribute to the West Cumbrian economy.

ii. National Context

In addition to the facilities in existing university laboratories, RAICo Labs compliments larger scale capabilities, such as the nuclear fusion robotic facilities at RACE in Oxfordshire, manufacturing at NAMRC and the MTC. In particular, RAICo Labs offers the unique ability to take technologies, tested in small-scale facilities, to full-scale trials and benchmarking in direct collaboration with organisations in the supply chain and nuclear end-users.

RAICo Labs will adopt successful ‘enabling industry’ strategies from RACE and NNL; offer invest-ability, for both government and private enterprises; efficacy, by avoiding national replication.

iii. Impact

The independent RAIN Advisory Board commented: “RAIN has been a hugely valuable programme which has given the opportunity for the operator organisations and the regulator to accelerate their understanding of robotics”. RAICo Labs will consolidate and deepen this impact.

Aims Target outcomes Scientific Progress • New sector agnostic RAI technologies developed, tested and

benchmarked. • Beyond nuclear collaboration.

Research & Knowledge Development

• Further understanding of capabilities and limitations of existing RAI technology.

• Better understanding of robotics challenges within nuclear sector.

Skills and People • Reduce worker risk exposure (ref NDA Grand Challenge aims).

• Increased availability of Suitably Qualified and Experienced- Personnel and Robotics (“SQEP with SQER”) to accelerate decommissioning, reduce costs (circa 10-20% of NDA liability ref Nuclear Sector Deal).

• Improved training of academic researchers in the practicalities of applied robotics for challenging environments.



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• 1000 SQEP jobs with workers acquiring highly transferable skills in an area of skills shortage with long term impact.

Social Value and Levelling Up • Create UK-owned nuclear capacity, capability and IP. • Development of non-nuclear sectors to grow the West

Cumbrian economy. • Inspire start-ups and spin-offs. • Delivery of UK Industrial Strategy.

C) Users and Community Engagement

i. User Base

Initially RAICo Labs will target the immediate community need for nuclear robotics in West Cumbria that has been developed following research investments in initiatives such as UKRI’s Robotics for a Safer World initiative as well as a growing recognition from the NDA and the nuclear sector that RAI technologies are essential if nuclear decommissioning is to be made faster, cheaper and safer. As the facility matures the expectation is that it will begin to attract non-nuclear interest in reusable RAI toolkit both in horizontal technology (e.g. manipulation, sensing, control systems and AI) and sector-agnostic best practice (e.g. safety case, training, regulation). For example (and not limited to), petrochemicals, oil & gas, green energy, marine environments, health care, agriculture etc. The RAIN+ network is directly connected to users in mining, agriculture, manufacturing, aerospace, construction, healthcare, offshore and space.

Identified users include:

Research and Academia – RAICo labs will provide a collaborative hub for national and international research in the development of RAI technology for challenging environments including researchers from across the four RAI Hubs for Challenging Environments: RAIN, ORCA, NCNR and FAIR-Space with a gateway to engage with and deliver impact to the nuclear industry.

Large industry & SMEs – RAICo labs will provide co-location and access to developing technology for a wide range of nuclear and non-nuclear organisations across the public & private sector (Tier 1&2 and SMEs) and consequently access to opportunities both nationally and internationally, via a global RAICo network.

Developing Entrepreneurs – Across West Cumbria there are limited resources to support entrepreneurs testing, curing and prototyping innovative solutions. RAICo Labs will provide access to these individuals and an open-door to nuclear end-users in order to aid development.

Schools/Colleges – With no research-led university based in West Cumbria, current access to high-level education in engineering and in RAI in particular is limited. RAICo Labs will provide support to all tiers of education, with access to researchers, small-scale educational equipment, summer schools, secondments and STEM ambassadors.

ii. Community Engagement

This SoN has been developed in close collaboration with academia, national laboratories, organisations in the nuclear supply chain and potential end-users of RAI technology.

University engagement has been led by Manchester, which is the UK's largest and most connected academic provider of nuclear research and development and hosts the only academic



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research facility in West Cumbria, the Dalton Cumbrian Facility. Through its leadership of the RAIN Hub, we have engaged with: Bristol (Scott) and the South West Nuclear Hub (including Oxford, Plymouth Southampton), Lancaster (Joyce), Leeds (Boyle), Newcastle (Wright), Nottingham (Axinte), Oxford (Hawes), Reading (Scarfe), Sheffield (Veres), as well as representatives from the other robotic hubs; ORCA: Heriot Watt (Lane), Oxford (Fallon); NCNR: West of England (Guiliani), Manchester (Herrmann); FAIR-Space: Warwick (Maple), Manchester (Dixon).

We have engaged with the local supply chain organisations in West Cumbria through a workshop which included Atkins (Pullin); Barrnon (Barr); Createc (Mellor); PAR Systems (McGibbon); Red Engineering (Orrell); Rovtech (McAvoy) and have had regular engagement across the key partner organisations in West Cumbria: SL (Weston), NDA (Simper), NNL (Hannigan).

Further nuclear end-users are engaged in this initiative through their membership of SL’s RAI Steering Group and NWDRF, for example: AWE, Magnox, Dounreay, Winfrith and ONR.

The West Cumbrian MPs, LEP and councils all support this SoN and robotics is specifically identified as a core technology in the Cumbrian Nuclear Prospectus.

RAICo Labs links in with other initiatives being proposed in West Cumbria, for example the Nuclear Decommissioning Research Centre (NDRC) that has been proposed by the University of Sheffield. NDRC will focus on low-TRL materials-led engineering and science technologies that would feed through to RAICo Labs for development and translation into remote delivery.

Next steps: Because RAICo Labs has NDA’s full support we are pursuing the HMG Business Case route aiming for CSR in 2021. This EPSRC SoN comes just before agreeing the SOC so we have paused wider engagement. Industry and academic town hall meetings (nuclear and beyond) will be held over the coming months.

iii. Partnerships

This proposal has executive support from NDA, SL, NNL, UoM and UKAEA and has been submitted by UKAEA on behalf of this group.

The key partners in this initiative are:

• University of Manchester, as the academic lead and with nuclear robotics capability located in West Cumbria.

• UKAEA (RACE) as an applied research organisation with extensive nuclear robotics expertise at all TRLs including multiple points of engagement with UKRI.

• NDA as the organisation responsible for the majority of nuclear decommissioning sites in the UK.

• SL as the first user of the technology developed within the RAICo Labs programme and conduit to the NDA estate.

• NNL with robotics capability at its Workington Lab and long-term collaboration with SL. • LEPs, councils providing essential local support.

We have engaged extensively with SMEs and large organisations in the supply chain and will seek representation (advisory board) as the programme is developed. RAICo Labs is based upon collaboration and recognises that the innovation pipeline is not achievable without attention to and alignment of different interests, both short and long term.



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A significant opportunity is national collaboration and the twinning with RACE in Oxfordshire, the nuclear supply chain in Warrington, Manchester Robotics and the Dalton Nuclear Institute in Manchester.

D) Description of the Infrastructure

i. Background

NDA has highlighted the potential for RAI over many years, e.g. https://www.gov.uk/government/news/nda-sets-out-its-grand-challenges. However, as progress with robotic systems continues at pace, it is becoming increasingly clear that the benefits of this technology will not be realised in the nuclear decommissioning industry without RAICo Labs.

The need for an intervention is recognised by all relevant organisations in the nuclear decommissioning industry, but most notably by the NDA and SL. In January 2019, they formed a steering committee, comprising the key partners in this proposal, to develop a Business Case which will go to NDA (and BEIS) in May 2021 as part of the 2021 CSR process. The Strategic Outline Case proposes a new facility in West Cumbria and a programme of investment in RAI R&D and wider engagement in the local economy (education, innovation). Timely RAI developments can be integrated into a number of NDA Mega Projects. See Options Analysis for the consequences of not taking this project forwards.

ii. Delivery Approach

Learning from (RACE) experience indicates RAICo Labs will require 4 elements:

• high bay rig hall (~2500 sqm, 50T cranes 20m under hook height) • storage and workshops • 250 desks • control room



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West Cumbria has land available owned by NDA and Local Authorities. Copeland Council recently purchased the Leconfield site to create ISH.

SL is securing a 4 year lease on a basic 800 sqm industrial shed in Whitehaven north shore. This will be occupied by SL, UoM and RACE from 1 April 2021 to co-locate 4 existing projects: RAIN, NNUF, LongOps and Hands Out of Glove Boxes. This is a temporary solution which will provide learning for the operation of the permanent facility.

Collaboration agreements are in place between the delivery partners, discussions are developing regarding the appropriate delivery mechanism including an arm’s length from government Community Interest Company.

Project delivery will be via a robust and appropriate project and governance structures as required by the delivery partners and funders.

iii. Options analysis

The table below, from the SOCv1.7, summarises the potential for various Facility Options (FO#) and Programme Options (PO#).



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West Cumbria is the preferred location for the delivery of RAICo Labs due to its proximity to the Sellafield site and associated supply chain. Place building is a key objective and West Cumbria is identified as a region that will benefit from levelling up. Links have been made with Town Growth plans, local 5G and CAV initiatives.

RAICo Labs will seek to replicate the LongOps example where the risks of individual investment were mitigated by creating a collaboration to leverage investment and know-how to address common needs. RAICo Labs has the same potential but at greater scale: UKRI investment alongside NDA with global industry supported by foreign governments such as US, Japan, Korea, France; contributing to the global challenge of asset management that is part of a coherent climate change response.

Lack of support will lead to:

1) Loss of momentum and wasted opportunity to maximise impact from previous and ongoing UKRI investments. 2) Loss of the essential connection between need (end user pull) and R&D (technology push). Examples of clear alignment between ‘vertical sector’ operators and ‘horizontal enabling technology’ academics are rare. Both forms of investment and engagement are required. This position has been reached following years of discussion, investment and a meeting of minds at all levels. 3) Loss of the potential to apply RAI. This is an essential phase in spiral R&D: embedding RAI R&D into operations in order to learn what works in practice and hence what needs developing.

Options RAICo Facility FO1 FO2 FO3 (A&B) FO4 (A&B)

RAICo Prog. No new facility funding

Adapt an existing facility

Small facility 1000sqm rig hall, 100 desks

Large facility 2500sqm rig hall, 250 desks

PO1 No new programme funding

BAU – dispersed and sub-critical RAI programme

Provide a space for parties to collocate R&D under one roof

Parties housed under one roof to conduct private and collaborative RAI R&D in nuclear – room for growth

Not necessary

PO2 New collaborative funding - Small

Not credible No suitable facility available

Parties housed under one roof to conduct private and collaborative RAI R&D in nuclear

Parties housed under one roof to conduct private and collaborative RAI R&D in nuclear – room for growth

PO3 New collaborative funding - Large

Not credible No suitable facility available

Not credible Many parties housed under one roof to conduct private and collaborative RAI R&D in nuclear and beyond

Fast FO3A Occupy 2023

FO4A| Occupy 2023

Slow FO3B Occupy 2026

FO4B Occupy 2026



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4) Loss of an R&D focal point in West Cumbria. If West Cumbria is unable to secure this facility, this bodes badly for all R&D in West Cumbria and hence Levelling Up aspirations too. 5) Delay in creating the RAI toolkit that NDA requires to conduct and complete its mission with the inherent increased safety risks and increased cost. 6) Missing an opportunity to create a world class UK network of RAI facilities.

iv. Technological Approach

The facility will be non-radioactive. Robotics in active areas will be conducted on appropriate sites as required (UKAEA, NDA, EDF, RR, AWE, MoD) as part of programmes such as SL’s Active Demonstrator Programme.

Such a facility could be used for actual control of remote decommissioning in future. This may require increased levels of physical and data security.

v. Risk

Risk Mitigation Likelihood without (with) action

Impact

1 Inability of stakeholders to gain the RAI benefits in West Cumbria

Develop a coordinated RAI programme utilising SLCs, supply chain and academia

H (M) H

2 Inability to secure funding

Development of robust funding strategy

H (M) H

3 Organisations unable to work together

Create a business model that encourages SLCs, industry and academia to work collaboratively for mutual benefit

H (L) H

4 Lack of appropriate resource and capability

Identify and secure key individuals through partner organisations to enable success

H (M) H

5 End customers not engaged

Work directly with end customers to identify key barriers to engagement. Communicate with and enthuse end customers to obtain project buy-in before initiation.

H (L) H

6 Lack of supply chain engagement

Demonstrate value add through engagement. Avoid SLC self-delivery. Incentivise collaboration.

M (L) H

7 Lack of long-term vision to develop market and business model

Appoint world-class Director. Invest long-term programmes at the right level.

M (L) H

8 Lack of shared learning and integration with UK robotics

RAIN, RACE, NNL networks baked in. Use RAICo Labs as exemplar of UK RAI infrastructure.

H (L) H



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9 Partners unable to work effectively together

Temporary facility in Whitehaven now to enable partners to begin working together

M (L) H

10 Lack of route to deliver facility in timescales desired

Creative approaches H (L) H

E) Authors

Rob Buckingham OBE FREng is a Director of the UKAEA and Head of RACE, which employs 250 FTE engineers, has an annual RAI income of >£30M (>100 industrial collaborators) and a purpose-built £15M facility at Culham Science Centre. He is executive sponsor for LongOps, PI on NNUF-R, Co-I on RAIN and a Visiting Professor at UoM. He founded OCRobotics (sold to GE), was lead author of the UK RAS2020 Strategy, the Lloyds Register RAS Foresight Review and has given verbal evidence to both the House of Lords and Commons on RAI. He is a member of the Robotics Growth Partnership.

Barry Lennox FREng is Director of RAIN and Professor of Applied Control at UoM. He holds an RAEng Chair in Emerging Technology, leads the £15M UKRI Robotics and AI for Nuclear (RAIN) Hub, the £4.6M EPSRC Robotics for Nuclear Environments Programme Grant and is the academic lead for the Sellafield and NNL funded PhD Centre for Innovation in Nuclear Decommissioning in West Cumbria. He has >200 publications and an established track record of translating technology into industry and co-founded Perceptive Engineering, a 4* impact case in REF2014 and now part of Applied Materials.

Duncan Steel is Chief Technology Officer at Sellafield leading the company wide £80m pa R&D portfolio and Sellafield innovation strategy. He joined Sellafield in 2017 after 27 years with Rolls-Royce Plc with roles including running the Rolls-Royce Strategic Research Centre, across Aerospace, Marine and Nuclear. He is currently Co-Chair of the Nuclear Waste and Decommissioning Research Forum, a member of both NDA Research Board and the NNL Technical Advisory Board and was recipient of a Top 100 Manufacturer Award in 2019 for Inspirational Leader and Driver of Cultural Change.

Rav Chunilal is the inaugural Head of RAI appointed by the Sellafield Executive to grow RAI benefits across the NDA Group, focussed on leveraging RAI capability to accelerate the delivery the NDA’s nuclear decommissioning challenges. He has championed novel process engineering toolkits introduced into Sellafield and contributed to national and international governments and agencies on environmental issues. He graduated from University of Leeds, BEng in Chemical Engineering with Nuclear Process Engineering.

These are the main authors. All of the above have full support of their CEOs and have the support of numerous technical and commercial teams including from NDA and NNL.

F) Indicative resources

All figures are high-level, early estimates provided without commitment.

Total investment over 5 years is estimated to be approximately £49.5M

Indicative 5-year project cost estimates are outlined below:

Item Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5 Facility cost (CapEx)

£17.5M



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Facility running costs

0 £1M £1M £1M £1M

Equipment costs (CapEx)

£2.5M £2.5M £1M £1M £1M

Resource cost £2M £3M £5M £5M £5M Total pa £22M £6.5M £7M £7M £7M Total cost £49.5M

• Facility costs (CapEx) £17.5M - Based on the costs of constructing and equipping the original RACE facility (which is ~50% of the size of RAICo Labs).

• Equipment cost (CapEx) £8M – To remain world class • Facility operating cost (OpEx) £4M • Programme resource cost (OpEx) £20M - This would fund an expanded RAIN++

programme working with ORCA, FAIR-Space & NCNR. This would represent 16% of the total RAICo Labs resource cost. It is expected that nuclear and other end users will invest, second staff and conduct their own projects within the centre, representing £125M over 5 years (250% leverage).

Learning From Experience. RACE has achieved financial sustainability in <5 years other than certain operational costs (marketing, IP) with 50% overheads covering depreciation and central-UKAEA support (commercial, procurement, property, HR, SHEQ...)

robotics and ai collaboration laboratory (raico labs

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