Liquid Radioactive Wastes Treatment: A Review

Abstract

Radioactive wastes are generated during nuclear fuel cycle operation, production and application of radioisotope in medicine, industry, research, and agriculture, and as a byproduct of natural resource exploitation, which includes mining and processing of ores, combustion of fossil fuels, or production of natural gas and oil. To ensure the protection of human health and the environment from the hazard of these wastes, a planned integrated radioactive waste management practice should be applied. This work is directed to review recent published researches that are concerned with testing and application of different treatment options as a part of the integrated radioactive waste management practice. The main aim from this work is to highlight the scientific community interest in important problems that affect different treatment processes. This review is divided into the following sections: advances in conventional treatment of aqueous radioactive wastes, advances in conventional treatment of organic liquid wastes, and emerged technological options.

Nanostructured potassium copper hexacyanoferrate-cellulose hydrogel for selective and rapid cesium adsorption

“…These radionuclides can be recovered using a range of diverse methods such as co-precipitation, evaporation/concentration, adsorption/ionexchange, and chromatography [5]. However, in the case of a nuclear incident and a large scale release, those methods except for adsorption with ion-exchange are not suitable for the treatment of contaminated seawater due to the large volume of radioactive waste to be processed, and also the extremely low concentration of 137 Cs + compared to competitive ions such as Na + , K + and Ca 2+ [6,7]. Thus, it is desirable to develop 137 Cs selective adsorbents both for site operations and environmental decontamination.…”

Equilibrium, kinetic and thermodynamic studies on the removal of U(VI) by low cost agricultural waste

“…Considerable amounts of Uranium (U) have found their way into the environment through various nuclear and industrial activities, posing a threat not only to surface and groundwater but also public health [1]. The United States Environment Protection Agency set a maximum acceptable level of 30 µg L -1 and the World Health Organisation strictly recommends a maximum level of 2 µg L -1 for U [2].…”

Introductory Chapter: Introduction to Current Trends in Nuclear material Research and Technology

“…Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) developed reports that summarize current and anticipated trends in NFC development within 20 years [5,6]. Tables 2 and 3 list these trends for front-and back-end NFC processes, respectively [3,[5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15]. Table 1.…”