Investigation on the Pseudo-Reference Electrodes for Electrochemical Measurements in Molten Li_2o/LiCl

摘要

Electrolytic reduction is an integral step in pyroprocessing to treat used oxide fuels, and also applicable for transition metal productions. During the electrochemical reduction process, oxides fuels are loaded at the cathode basket in molten Li_2O-LiCl salt and electrochemically reduced to the metal form. In electrochemical studies within the molten salts, reference electrode is essential to understand the electrode reaction and reaction mechanism. However, a wide range of reference electrodes have been employed for electrolytic reduction studies such as molybdenum, Pt, Li-Pb and Ni/NiO etc. It is challenging to compare and understand different results from different literature and research groups. In this work, glassy carbon, tungsten (W), molybdenum (Mo) and Ni/NiO were tested as reference electrodes within the same system under the same conditions which forms a direct comparison base for understanding the different behavior due to the reference electrodes.