Chemical Speciation of Americium, Curium and Selected Tetravalent Actinides in High Level Waste

Large volumes of high-level waste (HLW) currently stored in tanks at DOE sites contain both sludges and supernatants. The sludges are composed of insoluble precipitates of actinides, radioactive fission products, and nonradioactive components. The supernatants are alkaline carbonate solutions, which can contain soluble actinides, fission products, metal ions, and high concentrations of major electrolytes including sodium hydroxide, nitrate, nitrite, phosphate, carbonate, aluminate, sulfate, and organic complexants. The organic complexants include several compounds that can form strong aqueous complexes with actinide species and fission products including ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA), N-(2-hydroxyethyl)ethylenediaminetriacetic acid (HEDTA), nitrilotriacetic acid (NTA), iminodiacetic acid (IDA), citrate, glycolate, gluconate, and degradation products, formate and oxalate