Ann Arbor, MI, Oct 23, 2024 – Oberon Technologies®, Inc. announced today that it was awarded a significant contract with the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (US NRC) to develop Extended Reality for Technical Training. With this win Oberon Technologies® will support the US NRC’s request to establish and maintain extended reality (XR) scenarios with a technical training pilot for NRC Inspectors and other NRC personnel. The scenarios will include fully immersive virtual reality (VR) environments which provide a photo-realistic view of at least two floors of a nuclear facility, accessible using VR hardware, as well as a 3D interactive (3DI) equivalent environment that can be accessed using a computer, mouse and keyboard.
These innovative solutions will enable the NRC’s Technical Training Center (TTC) to offer options for more efficient and effective training, in addition to the existing technical and simulator training. These new offerings will allow the NRC to more quickly onboard and educate the anticipated substantial number of new resources anticipated to be hired as replacements for an aging workforce over the next four years.
“Oberon is proud to be selected from a field of proposals to provide NRC management and employees with a testbed to verify the usefulness of extended reality as a means to increase safety and efficiency of training,” says Tim Allen, Co-Founder and CEO of Oberon Technologies®. “This work aligns with Oberon’s commitment to being the leader in XR solutions for the Nuclear and broader Energy industry. Being selected speaks to the extensive experience and dedication the Oberon team has to meeting the needs of this industry and to our customers’ success. Our proven XR technology stack, – comprised of our XR platform, patented technologies, an expansive library of VR environments, VR assets and VR experiences – allow us to effectively and efficiently support our nuclear and energy industry clients.”
Both modalities of the VR experiences will be accessible to NRC personnel via a fully-immersive VR headset or 3DI computer-based interface. These modules will allow users to virtually walk through a photo-realistic nuclear plant environment with randomly introduced foreign materials throughout the plant. Users can familiarize themselves with common elements and environments of a nuclear facility and perform exercises to identify and exclude foreign materials from the environment. The VR experience will be the foundation for additional training as needed by the NRC including nuclear power-plant operations, research and test reactor operations, inspection techniques, physical security, health physics, and such disciplines as refueling, non-destructive testing, reactor maintenance, welding and quality assurance.
Learn more about Oberon Technologies solutions for VR Training solutions and commercial XR applications for the Energy Industry and more.