Uranium metal corroding in water-saturated sludges now held in the US Department of Energy Hanford Site K West irradiated fuel storage basin can create hazardous hydrogen atmospheres during handling, immobilization, or subsequent transport and storage. Knowledge of uranium metal concentration in sludge thus is essential to safe sludge management and process design, requiring an expeditious routine analytical method to detect uranium metal concentrations as low as 0.03 wt% in sludge even in the presence of 30 wt% or higher total uranium concentrations.
Revised: March 6, 2014 |
Published: March 1, 2014
Citation
Delegard C.H., S.I. Sinkov, J.W. Chenault, A.J. Schmidt, T.L. Welsh, and K.N. Pool. 2014.Determination of Uranium Metal Concentration in Irradiated Fuel Storage Basin Sludge Using Selective Dissolution.Journal of Radioanalytical and Nuclear Chemistry 299, no. 3:1871-1882.PNNL-SA-98330.doi:10.1007/s10967-013-2884-1