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Durability of potential plutonium wasteforms under repository conditions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 July 2018

G. Deissmann ,
S. Neumeier ,
G. Modolo  and
D. Bosbach
G. Deissmann*
Affiliation:
Brenk Systemplanung, Heider-Hof-Weg 23, 52080 Aachen, Germany
S. Neumeier
Affiliation:
Institute of Energy and Climate Research IEK-6, Forschungszentrum Jülich, 52425 Jülich, Germany
G. Modolo
Affiliation:
Institute of Energy and Climate Research IEK-6, Forschungszentrum Jülich, 52425 Jülich, Germany
D. Bosbach
Affiliation:
Institute of Energy and Climate Research IEK-6, Forschungszentrum Jülich, 52425 Jülich, Germany
*
*E-mail: g.deissmann@brenk.com
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Abstract

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Separated stocks of UK civil plutonium are currently held as a zero value asset in storage, as there is no final decision about whether they should be treated as a resource for future use as nuclear fuel or as waste. Irrespective of future UK government strategies regarding plutonium, at least a portion of the UK civil plutonium inventory will be designated for geological disposal. In this context, we performed a high-level review of the performance of potential wasteforms for the disposal of separated civil plutonium. The key issues considered were the durability and chemical reactivity of the wasteforms in aqueous environments and the long-term radionuclide release under conditions relevant to geological disposal. The major findings of the review, relevant not only to the situation in the UK but to plutonium disposal in general, are summarized in this paper. The review showed that, in the event of a decision being taken to declare plutonium as a waste for disposal, more systematic studies would be required to constrain the wasteform performance under repository conditions in order to derive realistic source terms for a safety case.

Keywords

plutoniumwasteformsrepository
Type
Research Article
Information
Mineralogical Magazine , Volume 76 , Issue 8 , December 2012 , pp. 2911 - 2918
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
© [2012] The Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
Copyright © The Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland 2012

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