Fluidized Bed Calcination of Simulated Zirconium Fluoride Waste in Exploratory Pilot Plant Tests

Chemical and Process Development Branch Annual Report, Fiscal Year 1965

“…Because of the generality of the objectives, the tests were conducted as a series of short operating periods, each starting with a new bed of prescreened sand (-28 + 100 Tyler mesh), to eliminate the complicating effect of the past history of the starting bed. The short operating periods satisfied the objectives because agglomerate formation, or bed caking, was indicated in one to two hours by diverging temperatures in the bed; and past experience indicated that the alpha alumina content of freshly generated fines closely approximated the equilibrium alpha alumina content of the fluidized bed [64], Calciner feed was chosen to simulate the existing second-cycle waste now stored at ICPP. The compositions of the existing wastes and the pilot plant calciner feed are compared in Table XXIII.…”