Science and Technology Daily: Nuclear waste disposal problems will be cracked
Source: Science and Technology Daily. Date: 2016-03-22.
US researchers have developed a technology that can selectively remove the most difficult and difficult to remove radioactive element plutonium in nuclear waste pools, solving the problem of nuclear waste disposal for decades. The research results were published in the latest issue of Science.
According to a recent report by the Physicists' Organization Network, this work opens the door to expanding the use of the most efficient energy sources on the planet, helping to achieve a clean use of future energy supplies.
"The most critical step in dealing with nuclear waste is solving the plutonium problem," said Tom Meyer, the research leader and professor of chemistry at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Arts and Sciences.
Thorium is an artificial radioactive element produced by bombarding uranium with high-energy helium nuclei. Plutonium does not have the popularity of plutonium and uranium. Researchers have been trying to remove it from nuclear waste for decades, but after several efforts, there are always some problems that are difficult to solve. And Meyer and his team found a way.
The plutonium researchers imitated the use of solar fuel to separate electrons from water molecules, tearing the electrons out of the plutonium with more than twice the energy than water. After removing three electrons, plutonium, like plutonium and uranium, can be removed using existing techniques.
Plutonium researchers said that nuclear fuel was initially packed into long thin rods as small solid particles. The fuel is dissolved in acid to separate plutonium and uranium. Plutonium can be removed with plutonium and uranium in this process, or it can be separated again after this process.
In this study, most experiments were performed in the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) to ensure a safe work area for handling radioactive materials. Currently, INL and the university are discussing to continue to advance related research, which may further expand the technology scale.
The researchers said: "We have laid a solid foundation for the expansion of this technology. With the expansion of the scale, the future will no longer worry about the danger of long-term storage of radioactive waste, which will help solve the world's energy needs. This is really amazing Excited. "