Oxidative digestion of spent sulfocationites containing radioactive rare earth and transplutonium elements

AbstractIn this work, the chemical digestion conditions for spent KU-2  × 8 sulfocationites manufactured in Russia were investigated. It was shown that the complete oxidative digestion of the ionites could be performed in solutions of H2O2 and HNO3 in the presence of Fe3+ ions adsorbed on the resin as an oxidation catalyst. The total digestion time of the resin was studied as a function of the presence of the digestion catalysts, solid-to-liquid phase ratio, process temperature, Fe3+ ion content in the solid sulfocationite phase, and the divinylbenzene (DVB) cross-linking agent content of the ionite. A possibility for the removal of rare earth element (REE) and transplutonium element (TPE) radionuclides from the solution of the digested sulfocationite was shown by the sorption technique using the tetra-n-octyldiglycolamide (TODGA)-based sorbent.
Source: Journal of Radioanalytical and Nuclear Chemistry - Category: Nuclear Medicine Source Type: research