A METHOD OF REFINING OF URANIUM ORE IN JAPAN

摘要

An economical method of refining of uranium ore in Japan is described. The method is as the following;uranium ore is leached by an aqueous mixture of bicarbonate and oxalate, then extracted from sulfuric acid solution by amine solvent, and after the uranium in organic phase is back-extracted by sodium carbonate solution, uranium tetrafluoride is prepared by reducing with sulphurous acid gas, finally metallic uranium is obtained from uranium tetrafluoride ty conventional way. The use of the mixture of bicarbonate and oxalate for leaching is advantageous for obtaining high purity leaching solution and high leaching rate for uranium ore in Japan, the existence of oxalate is also favor the increase of extraction ratio in the process of extrac¬tion by amine. The reduction with sulphurous acid gas has the following merits;the reducing rate is high, the double salt obtained is easily filtered, and uranium tetrafluoride is easily obtained by thermal decomposition of the double salt.