Quality control of cemented waste forms

To insure that cemented radwaste remains immobilized after disposal, certain standards have been set in Europe by the Commission of the European Communities. One such standard is compressive strength. If the compressive strength can be predicted during the early curing stages, time and money can be saved and the quality of the final waste form guaranteed. It was determined that the 7- and 28-day compressive strength from radwaste cementation can be predicted during the mixing and early curing stages by at least three methods. The three that were studied were maturity, rheology, and impedance. Maturity is a temperature-to-time measurement, rheology is a shear stress-to-shear rate measurement, and impedance is the opposition offered to the flow of alternating current. These three methods were employed on five different cemented radwaste concentrations with three different water-to-cement ratios; thus, a total of 15 different mix designs were considered. The results showed that the impedance was the easiest to employ for an on-line process. The results of the impedance method showed a very good relationship between impedance and water-to-cement ratio; therefore, an accurate prediction of compressive strength of cemented radwaste can be drawn from this method. The results of the theology method were very good.more » The method showed that concrete conforms to the Bingham plastic rheologic model, and the theology method can be used to predict the compressive strength of cemented radwaste, but may be too cumbersome. The results of the maturity method were shown to be limited in accuracy for determining compressive strength.« less