Selective flotation for the removal of radionuclides from contaminated soil
- Univ. of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT (United States). Dept. of Metallurgical Engineering
Low-level radioactive contaminated soils (10--500 pci/gm) created by defense-related activities at certain Superfund sites, such as Nevada Test Site (NTS), is a current environmental concern. Many of these contaminated sites may require appropriate cleanup and restoration, which could cost billions of dollars and put tremendous pressure on limited financial resources. Therefore, the development of a selective flotation process to separate such radionuclides from contaminated soils should be considered. In this study, both a pure depleted UO{sub 2} sample and three synthetic UO{sub 2}/soil mixtures were used to evaluate surface chemistry features and to examine the possibility for the flotation of fine UO{sub 2} particles from selected soils. It was intended that this model system would be a reasonable representation of contaminated soils such as those found the Nevada Test Site which are reported to be contaminated by PuO{sub 2} fallout. The effect of reagent schedule, particle size distribution, and surface charge are discussed with respect to the flotation separation of the UO{sub 2}/soil mixtures. It was found that both commercial fatty acids and reagent grade sodium oleate are effective collectors for UO{sub 2} flotation provided the pH is adjusted to the range of pH 8--9. The bench-scale flotation results successfully demonstrated that froth flotation technology can be used to remove UO{sub 2} from such model contaminated soils with appropriate flotation chemistry conditions which depend on the soil characteristics and other pretreatment procedures.
- OSTI ID:
- 78158
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-950201-; ISBN 0-87339-279-5; TRN: IM9531%%209
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: Annual meeting and exhibition of the Minerals, Metals and Materials Society (TMS), Las Vegas, NV (United States), 12-16 Feb 1995; Other Information: PBD: 1995; Related Information: Is Part Of Separation processes: Heavy metals, ions and minerals; Misra, M. [ed.] [Univ. of Nevada, Reno, NV (United States)]; PB: 302 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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