Behaviors of Impurities in Liquid Sodium, (III)

Abstract

Some fundamental studies for removing hydrogen from liquid sodium by a molten salt extraction were carried out. Alkali chloride eutectics LiCI-KCI and LiCI-KCI-NaCI (chlinak) were chosen because of their relatively low melting points, and the properties of these eutectics related to reactivities and mutual solubilities between the salts and liquid sodium were examined experimentally. From the comparison of the solubility of sodium in molten eutectics it was decided to employ chlinak for extracting hydrogen from sodium. T h e difference in hydrogen concentration in sodium before mixing of the two liquid phases and after equilibrium indicated that the molar distribution ratio of hydrogen between molten chlinak and sodium was more than 10 a t 400°C and decreased with increasing temperature. From these results, it w a s found that hydrogen was preferentially extracted into the molten salt phase, and deduced that molten salt extraction with molten chlinak was a feasible process for removing hydrogen from liquid sodium.