Investigation of Plutonium and Uranium Precipitation Behavior with Gadolinium as a Neutron Poison

Technical Report · Mon Jul 07 00:00:00 EDT 2003

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/812302· OSTI ID:812302

Visser, A E

The neutralization of solutions containing significant quantities of fissile material at the Department of Energy's Savannah River Site and the subsequent transfer of the slurry to the High Level Waste (HLW) system is accomplished with the addition of a neutron poison to ensure nuclear safety. Gd, depleted U, Fe, and Mn have been used as poisons in the caustic precipitation of process solutions prior to discarding to HLW. However, the use of Gd is preferred since only small amounts of Gd are necessary for effective criticality control, smaller volumes of metal hydroxides are produced, and the volume of HLW glass resulting from this process is minimized.

• Research Organization: Savannah River Site (SRS), Aiken, SC (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: US Department of Energy (US)
• DOE Contract Number: AC09-96SR18500
• OSTI ID: 812302
• Report Number(s): WSRC-TR-2003-00193; TRN: US0303357
• Resource Relation: Other Information: PBD: 7 Jul 2003
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS
CRITICALITY
FISSILE MATERIALS
GADOLINIUM
GLASS
HYDROXIDES
NEUTRONS
PLUTONIUM
PRECIPITATION
PROCESS SOLUTIONS
RADIATION PROTECTION
SAVANNAH RIVER PLANT
URANIUM
WASTES