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2024 ANS Annual Conference
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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.
Michelangelo Durazzo, Ricardo Mendes Leal Neto, Adonis Marcelo Saliba-Silva, Elita Fontenele Urano de Carvalho, Humberto Gracher Riella
Nuclear Technology | Volume 182 | Number 1 | April 2013 | Pages 57-62
Technical Paper | Fuel Cycle and Management/Miscellaneous | doi.org/10.13182/NT13-A15826
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Gadolinium has been added to nuclear fuel to enable longer fuel cycles. UO2-Gd2O3 mixed fuel shows bad sintering behavior, which is hindered at temperatures of [approximately]1200°C. The mechanism that explains this unusual sintering behavior is not yet fully understood. The formation of Gd-rich phases with low diffusivity or pore formation during sintering have both been suggested as possible causes. Experimental data published in the literature appear not to support phase formation; however, the formation of large closed pores in Gd2O3-rich regions of the fuel has been reported. Pore formation could be developed during the Gd2O3 C[right arrow]B phase transition, which is followed by volume reduction. Our study investigated this hypothesis. The results showed that the mechanism proposed does not explain the UO2-Gd2O3 sintering behavior.