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Undeclared uranium hitches a ride on cobalt exports from Congo, study says
Philippe (left) and Manzuk quantified the amount of uranium that has been exported from the DRC in cobalt shipments or left behind in the environment. (Photo: Joel Hallberg/UW–Madison)
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and Princeton University have published a study in Nature Communications that calls attention to a blind spot in nuclear nonproliferation: The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has exported thousands of metric tons of uranium, and there is no accounting for where it has gone.
In partnership with Lighthouse Reports and the Financial Times, UW–Madison nuclear engineering professor and nuclear security expert Sébastien Philippe and Ryan Manzuk, a geologist and research fellow in Philippe’s group and at Princeton, conducted the study using countrywide mineralization and geochemical data.
L. Bosland, G. Weber, W. Klein-Hessling, N. Girault, B. Clement
Nuclear Technology | Volume 177 | Number 1 | January 2012 | Pages 36-62
Technical Paper | Reactor Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT12-A13326
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire (IRSN), France, and the Gesellschaft für Anlagen- und Reaktorsicherheit (GRS), Germany, have been involved in the analyses and modeling of PHEBUS tests and particularly in iodine chemistry behavior in the containment. To analyze the accuracy of the chemistry models developed and reproduce volatile iodine formation, iodine behavior in PHEBUS FPT-1 containment was modeled by both IRSN and GRS with two different codes: ASTEC and COSOSYS. The ways of modeling (using the ASTEC/IODE and COCOSYS/AIM respective modules) and the nodalization of both approaches are presented and compared, as well as the assumptions made to perform the calculations. The results of the comprehensive analyses are compared with the experimental results, and interpretation of the iodine behavior in the PHEBUS FPT-1 containment is given. Then, a common point of view is concluded that highlights the lack of knowledge for some phenomena of significant impact on the iodine behavior in the containment during a severe accident. Organic iodide and iodine oxide formation models in particular are pointed out for the gaseous phase. The need for improving iodine behavior models including their coupling to thermal hydraulics and aerosol physics is also explained.