Toshiba Corp. has developed a robot it says canwithstand high radiation to work in nuclear disasters, but it's not clear whatexactly the robot is capable of doing if and when it gets the go-ahead to enterJapan's crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant.
The four-legged robot can climb over debris and venture intoradiated areas off-limits to humans. One significant innovation, Toshiba said,is that its wireless network can be controlled in high radiation, automaticallyseeking better transmission when reception becomes weak.
But the machine, which looks like an ice cooler on wobblymetal legs, also appears prone to glitches. The robot took a jerky misstepduring a demonstration to reporters, freezing with one leg up in the air. Ithad to be lifted by several people and rebooted.
The robot was also notably slow in climbing a flight ofeight steps, cautiously lifting its legs one by one, and taking about a minuteto go up each step.
With obstacles that aren't as even and predictable as steps,such as the debris at the Fukushima plant, it may need as much as 10 minutes tofigure out how to clear the object, Toshiba acknowledged.
And if it ever falls, it will not be able to get up on itsown.
Still, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said it might use the robotto inspect the suppression chamber of the nuclear plant where a devastatingmeltdown occurred after a mammoth tsunami slammed into northeastern Japan onMarch 11, 2011.
Toshiba began developing the robot with hopes it would proveuseful in helping to decommission the plant. No human has been able to enterthe highly radiated chamber since the tsunami disaster.
"We need this to go in and first check what isthere," Toshiba Senior Manager Goro Yanase said Wednesday.
It was unclear when a decision on the robot's use would bemade, according to TEPCO, which operates the nuclear plant.
Although what Toshiba showed was top-notch robotics, whatthe machine might be able to do appeared limited in the face of the disaster'smagnitude and complexity.
Japan boasts among the world's most sophisticated roboticstechnology, exemplified in the walking, talking human-shaped Asimo robot fromHonda Motor Co. The inability of such gadgetry to help out with the Fukushimadisaster was widely criticized.
Part of the reason is that robots, although suited for taskssuch as greeting visitors at dealerships, are too delicate. Their wirelessremote-controlled networks are not designed to endure high radiation. Honda hasacknowledged Asimo would not have been able to withstand the environment atFukushima, as some had suggested.
Toshiba's Yanase said the new robot, which has a dosimeterto measure radiation and six cameras, can stay in a 100 millisievertenvironment for about a year and can tolerate even higher radiated areas forshorter periods. At 100 millisieverts, the rise in cancer cases caused byradiation becomes statistically detectable, although even lower dose radiationis not advisable for people.
The suppression chamber was 360 millisieverts the last timeit was measured, TEPCO said.
Decommissioning Fukushima Dai-ichi is expected to takedecades.