Sorption and separation performance of certain natural radionuclides of environmental interest using silica/olive pomace nanocomposites

This study is concerned with the sorption behavior of natural radionuclides (226Ra, 210Po, 228Th—originated from TENORM waste associated with petroleum industry) onto silica/olive pomace nanocomposite. Initially, nanocomposites of extracted silica and olive pomace are prepared and characterized by physicochemical techniques. In the batch technique, 60% SiO2 40% olive pomace (AM3) nanocomposite showed a considerable group sorption for 226Ra and 210Po larger than 228Th in 1M HNO3 and HClO4 solutions. In case of sorption by the compacted disc, sorption of 226Ra was similar to batch method, sorption of 228Th increased slightly to ~ 17%, while sorption of 210Po was decreased to 77%. Thus, AM3 nanocomposite can be considered as an efficient nano-adsorbent for sorption and separation of Ra-isotopes and 210Po-radionuclides from 226Ra–210Po–228Th admixture associated with nuclear and non-nuclear industries.