News

Three winners of the Infocus Women in Innovation award were invited to speak about their experiences and Kym was pleased to be one of them. Innovate UK consider the awards a great success and have announced a second round. The support given to Viridian during Kym’s year as winner has certainly been a success in our eyes.

We are characterising  a concrete core by moving the laser sampler slowly around its circumference so our samples can be taken straight to the counting equipment in their pods. Much safer, cleaner and faster than the traditional approach of sawing the core into slices before grinding them into a powder.

This deployment involves the systematic characterisation of a large floor area that will result in over a hundred concrete samples being collected and counted in just five short working days for alpha activity close to and below background. We will be returning after a few months to deploy an ROV to sample inaccessible areas.

Since we were mainly working outside with the site contractors, we were hampered by rain and 60 mph winds. In three weeks we were only able to use ViridiScope on a couple of days. However, we will be back in March to continue, when we hope the weather will have improved!

We have been preparing for this day since June last year when we heard that we had won a million pound contract to deploy ViridiScope on five nuclear sites. The aim is to demonstrate that our innovative sampling tool is fit for purpose and can operate within a real-world, user-facing project with the performance needed for the various applications. In addition to constructing five sets of equipment for sampling and in situ analysis at sites across the UK, we have been busy providing the SLCs with the necessary paperwork to allow us and our equipment onto site. It's not surprising we are excited by the prospect of finally getting down to work!