Plutonium and surrogate fission products in a composite ceramic waste form

摘要

Argonne National Laboratory is developing a ceramic waste form to immobilize salt211u001econtaining fission products and transuranic elements. Preliminary results have 211u001ebeen presented for ceramic waste forms containing surrogate fission products such 211u001eas cesium and the lanthanides. In this work results from scanning electron 211u001emicroscopy/energy dispersive spectroscopy and x-ray diffraction are presented in 211u001egreater detail for ceramic waste forms containing surrogate fission products. 211u001eAdditionally, results for waste forms containing plutonium and surrogate fission 211u001eproducts are presented. Most of the surrogate fission products appear to be 211u001esilicates or aluminosilicates whereas the plutonium is usually found in an oxide 211u001eform. There is also evidence for the presence of plutonium within the sodalite 211u001ephase although the chemical speciation of the plutonium is not known.