Storage and disposal of radioactive waste as glass in canisters

Mendel, J.E.

doi:10.2172/6499238

Cited by 26 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…Canister design, overpacks, engineered barriers and absorbents, and the geologic repository must be considered. This concept has been presented by Mende' (18) for glass cast in canisters as illustrated in Figure 16. Another concept utilizes an interdependent system of sequential barriers as the core of the radioactive waste management strategy.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Waste glasses have bEen the most thoroughly studied, with specific reports available concerning stored energy, (142) helium diffusion, (143) and more general discussions. (18,37,38) Although experiments are in progress to evaluate gamma field and transmutation effects (Cs ~ Ba) on both glasses and crystalline waste forms, the major interest has been in evaluating damage from alpha-decay of the actinide elements, which is the major source of atomic displacement in solid wastes. (142) Most of the experimental work involves use of 244Cm or 238pu as dopants to accelerate dose rates by factors of 10 3 to 10 5 • Radiation effects in glasses have been simulated to >10 5 years for commercial HLW and to >10 6 years for lower-activity defense wastes.…”

Section: Radiation Stabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Review of high-level waste form properties. [146 bibliographies]

Rusín¹

1980

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This report is a review of waste form options for the immobilization of high-level-liquid wastes from the nuclear fuel cycle. This review covers the status of international research and development on waste formS as of May 1979. Although the emphasis in this report is on waste form properties, process parameters are discussed where they may affect final waste form properties. A summary table is provided listing properties of various nuclear waste form options. It is concluded that proposed waste forms have properties falling within a relatively narrow range. In regard to crystalline versus glass waste forms, the conclusion is that either glass ~crystalline materials can be shown to have some advantage when a single property is considered; however, at this date no single waste form offers optimum properties over the entire range of characteristics investigated. A long-term effort has been applied to the development of glass and calcine waste forms. Several additional waste forms have enough promise to warrant continued research and development to bring their state of development up to that of glass and calcine. Synthetic minerals, the multi barrier approach with coated particles in a metal matrix, and high pressure-high temperature ceramics offer potential advantages and need further study. Although this report discusses waste form properties, the total waste management system should be considered in the final selection of a waste form option. Canister design, canister materials, overpacks, engineered barriers, and repository characteristics, as well as the waste form, affect the overall performance of a waste management system. These parameters were not considered in this comparison.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Radiation Stabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Review of high-level waste form properties. [146 bibliographies]

Rusín¹

1980

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“…This aystal formation, or devitrification, generally leads to increased leach rate d t h e ma& materials. The exact rates depend on the glass composition and the thermal history of the monolith Devitrified glasses can display a leach between 2 and 5 h e s greater than the annealed glass (Mendel 1978 MT per 24 hours (U.S. DO-1994). Some potatid system candidates were therefore eliminated in the preview portion of this study.…”

Section: 8mentioning

confidence: 99%

Process system evaluation: Consolidated letter reports. Volume 3: Formulation of final products

Josephson¹,

Chapman²,

Albertsen³

1996

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SummaryGlass discharged from the low-level waste (LLW) melter may be processed into a variety of different forms for storage and disposal. The purpose of the study reported here is to identify and evaluate processing options for forming the glass. The glass forms selected included: Cullet -glass is water quenchedFl& -glass is cooled over dry rollers Cullet in sulfur -water-quenched cullet is dried and encapsulated in sulfur polymer cementMarbles -glass is processed into 2.5cmdia. (1-in.dia.) marbles Pressed shapes -glass "gobs" are pressed into a rectangular block Plute -glass is floated over a molten metal and cooling is controlled to prevent cracking Monolith -molten glass is poured into a large container where it cools.Each form was then qualitatively evaluated and given relative rankings in the areas of Performance -waste form environmental performance Capacity -ability to achieve required production capacity Retrievubility -ability to retrieve following disposal Operability/mintenance -ability to operate and maintain the equipment in a radioactive process Volume cost -efficiency of disposal volume use Equipment cost -cost of equipment and plant space Quulity ussurunce -ability to control the process to produce quality glass and recycle poor quality glass, if required.Generally, larger forms received better qualitative scores than smaller forms. Cullet and flake have very high surface areas, which results in low environmental performance scores. Adding sulfur cement to the cullet improves the performance but complicates the operation and maintenance of the process.iii Marbles have less surface area than cullet or flake, but their production process is more difficult to operate and maintain, Because marbles are spherical, their packing efficiency in the storage/disposal container is reduced. Larger forms such as pressed shapes and plate glass have greatly reduced surface area, but require equipment that is difficult to operate and maintain in a radioactive environment. In addition, the cost for the initial equipment and plant space is higher.The preferred form for the LLW glass is the large casting or "monolith." Casting monoliths is a simple process that produces high marks in nearly all of the evaluation criteria. The surface area is relatively small (even after cracking during cooling), the relative cost for equipment and plant space is low, a high production capacity is possible, and the equipment is relatively easy to maintain. In addition, selection of the monolith form minimizes constraints on the melter operation and glass formulation. The weakest point for the monolith form was the difficulty involved in recycling any out-ofspecification glass back to the melter for reprocessing. However, large castings are the standard form for high-level glass production. Process control methods have been used at high-level waste (HLW) vitrification plants in Britain and France to mitigate the difficulties of recycling out-of-specification glass. Thus, this apparent wealcness has been addressed successfully.The sel...

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“…This alloy would be processed by conventional methods to separate the noble metals from the lead scavenger and recover the lead for reuse. The glass could be cast into cylinders or marbles, or undergo further processi ng developed or proposed for nucl ear waste gl asses (Mendel 1978;Rusin et ale 1978).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Preliminary investigation of a technique to separate fission noble metals from fission product mixtures

Mellinger¹,

Jensen²

1982

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This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an ageney of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof. nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or ImpUedrQr assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuraey, com-pleteneJl. or usefulness of any Information. apparatus, product. or process disclo$ed. or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade n.ame, trademark. manufacturer, or otherwise, does not neceSHrily constitufe or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the Unit(!d StatfKGo¥ernment or any aseney thereof. The views and opinions of authors expressed hetein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof.

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Storage and disposal of radioactive waste as glass in canisters

Cited by 26 publications

References 32 publications

Review of high-level waste form properties. [146 bibliographies]

Review of high-level waste form properties. [146 bibliographies]

Process system evaluation: Consolidated letter reports. Volume 3: Formulation of final products

Preliminary investigation of a technique to separate fission noble metals from fission product mixtures

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