Pretreatment of high-level radioactive waste at the West Valley Demonstration Project
- West Valley Demonstration Project, NY (United States)
The West Valley Demonstration Project (WVDP) is an environmental remediation effort focused on demonstrating technologies to solidify high-level radioactive waste (HLW). The HLW remains from reprocessing activities conducted between 1966 and 1972 at the Western New York Nuclear Services Center (WNYNSC) in West Valley, New York, where spent nuclear fuel was reprocessed using essentially the Plutonium Uranium Extraction (PUREX) process. The waste (approximately 2,518 m{sup 3}) is stored in an underground carbon steel tank and consists of an alkaline supernate (90%) and precipitated sludge (10%). To prepare for HLW solidification, the WVDP is actively pretreating the waste by removing liquid HLW from the underground tank, extracting radioactive cesium from the liquid by an ion-exchange process, and stabilizing the resulting low-level liquid waste (LLW) in cement. Sludge at the tank bottom is washed to remove undesirable sodium salts, and the resulting liquid is again treated by ion-exchange before stabilizing the LLW waste in cement. This paper describes the pretreatment processes used for both the liquid and sludge phases of the HLW tank and the cementation of the resulting LLW.
- OSTI ID:
- 100779
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-930906--; ISBN 0-7918-0691-X
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
CESIUM
COMPRESSION STRENGTH
DEMONSTRATION PROGRAMS
HIGH-LEVEL RADIOACTIVE WASTES
ION EXCHANGE
LOW-LEVEL RADIOACTIVE WASTES
MATERIALS RECOVERY
RADIOACTIVE WASTE PROCESSING
REMEDIAL ACTION
SOLIDIFICATION
STABILIZATION
TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT
UNDERGROUND STORAGE
WASTE FORMS
WASTE RETRIEVAL
WEST VALLEY PROCESSING PLANT