JASPAS Program Task JC-4: Isotopic and Isotope Dilution Analysis of Spent Fuel Solutions by Resin Bead Mass Spectrometry. Results of the Sixth Interlaboratory Experiment.

摘要

The use of resin beads for mass spectrometry of U and Pu has been extensively developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in the USA and tested in a number of intercomparison experiments between the Safeguards Analytical Laboratory (SAL) of the IAEA and the Power Reactor and Fuel Development Corporation (PNC) - Tokai Reprocessing Plant (TRP) in Japan. Resin beads represent a convenient way to concentrate the U and Pu in spent fuel dissolver solution samples from reprocessing facilities, with the added advantage that fission product elements and other actinides such as Am are removed. Measurements on the resin bead samples at SAL were performed on the ORNL-designed 2-Stage Mass Spectrometer. For the dried tracer samples, the U measurements were obtained on the VG54E instrument and the Pu results were obtained with the Finnigan MAT 261 of SAL. PNC/TRP used a VG54 mass spectrometer and obtained their mass fractionation correction factor for the resin bead measurements from the mixed tracer plus chemical standard resin bead samples. The Safeguards Laboratory (NMCC) used their MAT 260 instrument and obtained the fractionation correction factor from resin bead standards provided with the TIGR-82 programme. Both PNC/TRP and NMCC reported problems with obtaining a sufficient ion beam intensity with the resin bead samples. This problem was overcome by both labs and further improvements in the loading and measurement techniques can be expected to yield even better results. It has been demonstrated that the resin bed sampling method can provide results of sufficient quality for safeguards purposes. 2 refs, 3 figs, 16 tabs. (Atomindex citation 19:081610)