Evaluation of mercury in liquid waste processing facilities - Phase I report

Mercury in aqueous tank waste at the Savannah River Site: Facts, forms, and impacts

“…This process has been used for over fifty years at the Savannah River Site (SRS). It is estimated that over 60 metric tons of mercury has been used and discharged to the Savannah River tank farms [1]. The spent acid streams from the canyons are neutralized with caustic prior to discharging to the tank farms and mercury partitions between the liquid phase and the precipitated sludge phase with the vast majority precipitating in the sludge phase.…”

Evaluation of the Current State of Knowledge for Thermolysis of Organics within SRS Waste Forming Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs)

“…Organo-mercury compounds have been identified in SRS Tank Farm samples in recent studies. 40,41,42,43,44 Methyl mercury is confirmed present in Tank 50 supernate at concentrations up to 60 mg/L. 42 Both dimethyl mercury and ethyl mercury are typically below 1 mg/L; for instance, the 3 rd quarter 2017 Tank 50 supernate showed < 0.17 mg/L Hg as ethyl mercury and 0.062 mg/L Hg as dimethyl mercury.…”

Methylmercury and Ethylmercury Analytical Performance in SRR Samples Measured by SRNL and Eurofins Frontier Global Sciences

“…However, a variety of work over the past four years has demonstrated that there is a much greater variety of mercury species in the SRS liquid waste system. [1][2][3][4][5][6] Quarterly analyses of Tank 50 samples were the first to show that mercury is present as organomercurial species. Methylmercury has been shown to leach from the saltstone waste form at concentrations that may present challenges to its remediation and disposition.…”