Recovery and purification of plutonium in lean plutonium product stream obtained during reprocessing of fast reactor spent fuels

摘要

A method has been developed for final purification of plutonium from uranium and fission products of high beta gamma activity. This method involves selection of a suitable ion exchange resin for the purification of plutonium in order to deliver a quality PuO_2 product. The effect of the concentration of uranium and plutonium, effect of increased loading of uranium and number of bed volumes for effective washing, which are some of the parameters that generally affect the recovery and purification of plutonium were investigated. An excellent decontamination factor for fission products has been achieved by this anion exchange process which in turn delivered an excellent PuO_2 product quality in terms of purity and associated beta gamma activity with low personnel radiation exposure.