Development of laser cutting technology of thick steel plates for nuclear facilities

Tamura, Koji*; Toyama, Shinichi  

The laser cutting technology is expected to be a promising candidate for the decommissioning measure of nuclear facilities, because it has a lot of advantage such as its high controllability and excellent suitability to remote handling by robot arm, etcetera. This report describes the recent result from laser cutting technology development for thick steel materials summarizing the cutting demonstration of 300 mm thick steels and dummy pressure vessel, the analysis of cutting condition of thick steel cutting, the observation of cutting process, remote controlled cutting system, the cutting in pile of steels by the system, and countermeasure for fume produce by cutting process.