Efficient Strategies for Partitioning Actinides from Alkaline Wastes

Actinide losses to alkaline wastes during reprocessing (or partitioning) can be significant, especially as higher burn-up fuels are processed. These losses result from the fact that radiolysis degrades neutral extractants into acidic species (e.g., mono- and dibutylphosphoric acids in Purex), which are themselves powerful extractants. Sodium carbonate is used to remove these acidic degradation products, but actinides and fission products also transport into the aqueous phase. The alcohol extraction process described here uses 2-ethylhexanol to extract the degradation products away from the actinides and fission products, which may then be returned to the aqueous phase for recovery and purification using neutral extractants.