Recovery of Uranium and Plutonium from Uranium Dioxide Fuels in the Engineering-scale Alpha Facility

Technical Report · Sat Jan 15 04:00:00 EST 1966

OSTI ID:23134696

Jonke, A. A.; Levitz, N.; Vogel, G. J.; Carls, E. L.

Process studies aimed at demonstrating the main steps of a fluid-bed fluoride volatility reprocessing scheme for UO{sub 2}-PuO{sub 2} fuels were continued in the engineering-scale alpha facility. The primary objective of experiments performed in the facility is to investigate the possible difficulties in handling PuF{sub 6} on an engineering scale. Further objectives are to determine the feasibility of fluoride volatility process flowsheets. Initial experiments involve the processing of UO{sub 2}-PuO{sub 2} fuel containing synthetic fission products (F.P.); later experiments may be made with oxide fuel having low levels of fission product activity. The major processing steps of fluoride volatility processing are: decladding, fluorination of uranium and plutonium, distillation, purification of UF{sub 6}, and thermal decomposition of PuF{sub 6} to PuF{sub 4} .

• Research Organization: Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, IL (United States)
• OSTI ID: 23134696
• Report Number(s): ANL--7225
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS
38 RADIATION CHEMISTRY, RADIOCHEMISTRY, AND NUCLEAR CHEMISTRY
DECLADDING
DISTILLATION
FISSION PRODUCTS
FLOWSHEETS
FLUORIDE VOLATILITY PROCESS
FLUORINATION
MATERIALS RECOVERY
PLUTONIUM
PLUTONIUM FLUORIDES
PLUTONIUM OXIDES
PURIFICATION
PYROLYSIS
URANIUM
URANIUM DIOXIDE
URANIUM HEXAFLUORIDE
VOLATILITY