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Fusion Science and Technology
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Glass strategy: Hanford’s enhanced waste glass program
The mission of the Department of Energy’s Office of River Protection (ORP) is to complete the safe cleanup of waste resulting from decades of nuclear weapons development. One of the most technologically challenging responsibilities is the safe disposition of approximately 56 million gallons of radioactive waste historically stored in 177 tanks at the Hanford Site in Washington state.
ORP has a clear incentive to reduce the overall mission duration and cost. One pathway is to develop and deploy innovative technical solutions that can advance baseline flow sheets toward higher efficiency operations while reducing identified risks without compromising safety. Vitrification is the baseline process that will convert both high-level and low-level radioactive waste at Hanford into a stable glass waste form for long-term storage and disposal.
Although vitrification is a mature technology, there are key areas where technology can further reduce operational risks, advance baseline processes to maximize waste throughput, and provide the underpinning to enhance operational flexibility; all steps in reducing mission duration and cost.
B.W. McQuillan, A. Nikroo, D.A. Steinman, F.H. Elsner, D.G. Czechowicz, M.L. Hoppe, M. Sixtus, W.J. Miller
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 31 | Number 4 | July 1997 | Pages 381-384
Technical Paper | Eleventh Target Fabrication Specialists' Meeting | doi.org/10.13182/FST31-381
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
An improved process for production of ICF Target Mandrels has been developed. Shells made from PAMS (poly-α-methylstyrene) are coated with GDP (glow discharge polymer). The PAMS is then removed by depolymerization and volatilization at 300°C, leaving a GDP mandrel. Compared to past polymer mandrels, this process yields GDP mandrels with significant improvements in wall thickness control, sphericity and concentricity, and the complete absence of vacuoles. The process is capable of making GDP shells with a wide size range (from 300 < o.d. < 2700 µm), and an independently controlled wall thickness (from 1 to 30 µm). The GDP can be doped with a variety of elements.
