Melter feed viscosity during conversion to glass: Comparison between low‐activity waste and high‐level waste feeds

During nuclear waste vitrification, a melter feed (a slurry mixture of a nuclear waste and various glass forming and modifying additives) is charged into the melter where undissolved refractory constituents are suspended together with evolved gas bubbles from complex reactions. Knowledge of flow properties of various reacting melter feeds is necessary to understand their unique feed‐to‐glass conversion processes occurring within a floating layer of melter feed called a cold cap. The viscosity of two low‐activity waste (LAW) melter feeds were studied during heating and correlated with volume fractions of undissolved solid phase and gas phase. In contrast to the high‐level waste (HLW) melter feed, the effects of undissolved solid and gas phases play comparable roles and are required to represent the viscosity of LAW melter feeds. This study can help bring physical insights to feed viscosity of reacting melter feeds with different compositions and foaming behavior in nuclear waste vitrification.