Concepts for detritiation of waste liquids

Tritium is formed in thermal nuclear reactors both by neutron activation of elements such as deuterium and lithium and by ternary fission in the fuel. It is a weak beta-emitter with a short half-life, 12.3 years, and its radiological significance in reactor discharges is very low. In heavy-water-cooled and -moderated reactors, such as the SRS reactors, the tritium concentration in the moderator is sufficiently high to cause a potential hazard to operators, so research and development programs have been carried out on processes to remove the tritium. Detritiation of light water has also been the subject of major R D efforts world-wide, because reprocessing operations can generate significant quantities of tritium in liquid waste, and high concentrations of tritium may arise in some aqueous streams in future fusion reactors. This paper presents a review of some of the methods that have been proposed, studied, and developed for removal of tritium from light and heavy water, along with some new concepts for aqueous detritiation directly from liquid oxide (HTO) bearing feed streams.