Experimental Analysis on Solidification of Simulated Organic Low-level Radioactive Waste by Thermal Plasma

How to treat low-level radioactive waste(LLRW) safely and effectively has become a world-wide issue,since the traditional cement solidification technology possesses serious disadvantages,such as increasing the volume and weight of LLRW.Thus,we treated simulative organic low-level radioactive wastes(LLRW) by DC arc plasma,while using glass shaping agent to capture and fix radionuclides.Moreover,we investigated the characteristics of capturing radionuclides,and characterized the performance of glass solidified body.The results showed that,the glass solidified body,which was obtained by the thermal plasma treatment,had a very smooth surface,and an amorphous,blue and dense structure.In the process of thermal plasma treatment,the treatment temperature affected little the capture rate of radionuclides.The organic chlorine content in LLRW played a significant role in the capture rate of Co and Cs: the capture rate of Co and Cs decreased with the increasing organic chlorine contents.However,the organic chlorine contents had little effect on the capture rate of Sr.Under the experimental conditions,including organic chlorine content of 5.45% and treatment temperature of 1 400°C,the capture rates of Sr,Co and Cs in the glass solidification were 99.7%,44.5%,and 18.6%,respectively.