Fission product release from core-concrete mixtures

The objective of this research is to measure the amount of strontium, barium, and lanthanum that is vaporized from core-concrete mixtures. The measurements are being done using a transpiration method. Mixtures of limestone-aggregated concrete, urania doped with a small amount of La, Sr, Ba, and Zr oxides, and stainless steel were vaporized at 2150 K from a zirconia crucible into flowing He-6% H2-0.06% H2O (a partial molar free energy of oxygen of -420 kJ). The amounts that were vaporized was determined by weight change and by chemical analyses on condensates. The major phases present in the mixture were inferred from electron probe microanalysis (EPM). They were: (1) urania containing calcia and zirconia, (2) calcium zirconate, (3) a calcium magnesium silicate, and (4) magnesia. About 10% of the zirconia crucible was dissolved by the concrete-urania mixture during the experiment, which accounts for the presence of zirconia-containing major phases. To circumvent the problem of zirconia dissolution, we repeated the experiments using mixtures of the limestone-aggregate concrete and the doped urania in molybdenum crucibles. These studies show that thermodynamic calculations of the release of refractory fission products will yield release fractions that are a factor of sixteen too high if the effects ofmore » zirconate formation are ignored.« less