Use of Modeling for the Prevention of Solids Formation during Canyon Processing of Legacy Nuclear Materials

摘要

The Department of Energys (DOE) Environmental Management (EM) nuclear material stabilization program at the Savannah River Site (SRS) includes the dissolution and processing of legacy materials from various DOE sites. The SRS canyon facilities were designed to dissolve and process spent nuclear fuel and targets. As the processing of typical materials is completed, unusual and exotic nuclear materials are being targeted for stabilization. These unusual materials are often difficult to dissolve using historical flowsheet conditions and require more aggressive dissolver solutions. As such, solids must be prevented in the dissolver to avoid expensive delays associated with the build-up of insoluble material in downstream process equipment. Moreover, it is vital to prevent precipitation of all solids, especially plutonium-bearing solids and soluble neutron poisons, since their presence in dissolver solutions raises nuclear criticality safety issues. To prevent precipitation of undesirable solids in SRS aqueous process solutions, accurate computer models (incorporating plant specific fundamental data) are necessary.