Recovery Process of Actinides from Genuine Spent Nuclear Fuel using TODGA and BTBP Extractants
- JRC-ITU-TN-2008/70
During the last decades a growing concern about greenhouse gas emissions from fossil
fuels has arisen. Nuclear power is an energy source with a low contribution to the
greenhouse effect and is in this sense therefore a better alternative for electricity
production. The waste from nuclear power is however highly radiotoxic and has to be
stored for more than 100000 years until the radiotoxicity has decreased to an acceptable
level. With partitioning and transmutation the purpose is to separate the nuclides that
contribute most to the long-term radiotoxicity and to transform them into short lived or
stable nuclides. If partitioning and transmutation are successfully applied the storage time
for nuclear waste can be reduced to less than 1000 years.
Essential for the partitioning and transmutation is an efficient separation of the minor
actinides. In this work, group separation of the trivalent lanthanides and actinides from a
PUREX raffinate has been demonstrated by means of solvent extraction, using the
TODGA extracting agent. Excellent separation was obtained and the recoveries of the
actinides exceeded 99.9%. Separation of the actinides from the lanthanides was also
carried out, using the CyMe4-BTBP extracting agent. Results achieving high actinide
recovery of more than 99.9%, were acquired as well as efficient separation from the
lanthanides.
A comparison between alpha and gamma radiolysis was performed with the CyMe4-
BTBP organic phase. The study showed that the solution was more sensitive to the
gamma radiation. The effect of varying alpha dose rates was also investigated but no
significant difference was observed in the interval tested (50-1000 Gy/h). Burnup
calculations, done to estimate the metal concentration in a process, together with loading
experiments show however that the loading capacity of the CyMe4-BTBP organic phase
is very limited and needs to be improved if fuels with higher minor actinide content are to
be treated.
Two computer programs for process calculations were developed. The programs were
successfully used to calculate the extraction profiles for the CyMe4-BTBP test.
MAGNUSSON Daniel;
2008-12-11
European Commission - Joint Research Centre - Institute for Transuranium Elements
JRC49310
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