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Processing and Disposition of Special Actinide Target Materials - 17071

Conference ·
OSTI ID:22800306
; ;  [1];  [2];  [3]
  1. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, P. O. Box 2008, Oak Ridge, TN 37831 (United States)
  2. Savannah River National Laboratory (United States)
  3. US Department of Energy (United States)
+ Show Author Affiliations
The DOE manages an inventory of materials that contain a range of long-lived radioisotopes that were produced from the 1960's through the 1980's by irradiating targets in high-flux reactors at the SRS to produce special heavy isotopes for DOE programmatic use, scientific research, and industrial and medical applications. Among the products were Cf-249, -250, -251, and -252; heavy curium (=50% Cm-246); and Pu-242 and -244. The irradiation of the Mark-18A (Mk-18A) targets at extremely high fluxes produced the world's supply of heavy curium and Pu-244. Approximately one fourth of the Mk-18A targets were processed in the 1970's to recover and enrich the material that has been used as the global source of Pu-244 and heavy curium by industry and researchers. These isotopes are still in demand, and the available supply of purified material is dwindling. A program has been initiated to recover heavy curium and Pu-244 from the remaining stored unprocessed Mk-18A targets. Improved flowsheets to process the materials to recover Pu-244 and heavy curium are being developed. Evaluations are also underway to determine whether additional materials present in the targets in much smaller quantities, such as long-lived fission product (LLFP) isotopes, can be recovered for research and development applications. (authors)
Research Organization:
WM Symposia, Inc., PO Box 27646, 85285-7646 Tempe, AZ (United States)
OSTI ID:
22800306
Report Number(s):
INIS-US--19-WM-17071
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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Related Subjects

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE WASTES FROM NUCLEAR FACILITIES
CALIFORNIUM 249
CURIUM
CURIUM 246
EVALUATION
FISSION PRODUCTS
PLUTONIUM 242
PLUTONIUM 244
PROCESSING
STRONTIUM SULFIDES
WASTE MANAGEMENT