BEHAVIOR OF OXIDE AEROSOLS OF URANIUM AND STAINLESS STEEL IN HUMID ATMOSPHERES

摘要

Laboratory experiments were made to examine the effect of moisture on aerosols produced by arc-melting simulant reactor fuel in air. The only simulant used was stainless steel clad uranium dioxide.nAn effect of moisture was obtained by either generating the aerosol in 80-90% relative humidity air or by bubbling the dry generated aerosol through water.nAnalysis of samples taken with thermal precipitators and by fibrous filter analyzers showed that the presence of moisture does affect both size and shape of aerosol agglomerates. A marked reduction in filtering efficiency of the wet aerosol was measured through open structure roughing filters.nBy analogy, it was shown that humidity does not bring about physical changes by operating on the electrical charge properties of the aerosol. Probably, a chemical reaction between water vapor and the constituents of the aerosol agglomerates initiates the changes in particle size and shape observed.