The ribbon is cut for the new analytical lab in ORNL’s Building 2026 by, from left, AtkinsRéalis’s Jeff Kendall, TerraPower Isotopes’ Scott Claunch, Isotek Systems’ Sarah Schaefer, OREM’s Erik Olds, TerraPower Isotopes’ Ben Goodrich, and OREM’s Teresa Robbins. (Photo: DOE Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management)
A new analytical laboratory at Oak Ridge National Laboratory has been officially opened by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management and its contractor Isotek Systems. The state-of-the-art lab, located in Building 2026, is being used to speed up the high-priority cleanup of ORNL’s uranium-233 inventory and accelerate the delivery of actinium-225 to facilities that use the radioisotope in research and for potential treatment of patients with cancer.
The Building 2026 lab, which is being equipped by Teledyne Brown Engineering, “provides in-house capabilities to analyze samples of processed material, leading to accelerated shipments,” according to the DOE. OREM manager Erik Olds explained that it “helps avoid delays by providing employees more data and faster results as they make decisions and process material for disposal. This new, unique capability also provides us opportunities to support other priority projects in the future.”
Legacy waste, modern medicine: The U-233 stored at ORNL was created in the 1950s and 1960s for potential use in nuclear reactors, but it was deemed unviable as a nuclear fuel. About half of ORNL’s U-233 inventory could be disposed of directly, but the rest first must be converted into a form safe for transportation and disposal.
The DOE selected the AtkinsRéalis subsidiary Isotek Systems to eliminate the U-233 that is stored at ORNL, and the company has already disposed of about three-fourths of the inventory. The processing and disposal of the remaining stockpile had been expected to take several more years, but the newly installed lab will help to accelerate that timeline, reducing costs and risks while enabling demolition of the storage facility to open up space for new research projects.
ORNL’s stockpile of U-233 is the only major source of thorium-229 in the world. So before processing and disposal, Isotek is extracting Th-229 from the U-233.
TerraPower Isotopes has been contracted to use a radioisotope decay–based technique to extract actinium-225 from the Th-229 it receives from Isotek. This collaboration is helping give the pharmaceutical industry sustained, commercial-scale access to Ac-225, which is being investigated in a number of clinical trials focused on targeted alpha therapy for patients with cancer.
Picking up the pace: Isotek is taking advantage of the new lab’s analytical capabilities to avoid delays in isotope shipments to TerraPower that previously had been caused by the need to send samples elsewhere for analysis. Isotek president and project manager Sarah Schaefer said, “The Building 2026 analytical lab will allow Isotek to not only transfer Th-229 to TerraPower Isotopes much more quickly, but it will also allow the processing team to make adjustments to increase the recovery of Th-229 much more quickly.”
TerraPower Isotopes president Scott Claunch added, “The future of precision medicine relies on having a dependable supply of Ac-225. Isotek’s investment in a state-of-the-art laboratory to speed up the processing of Ac-225’s parent isotope will help continue to expand production capacity, strengthen the global isotope supply chain, and ultimately expand access to new cancer therapies to those who need it most.”
