Grout Testing for the Solidification of Savannah River and Oak Ridge National laboratory Wastestreams
MSE's Task: Evaluate grouts using various mixing and addition methods to solidify radioactive aqueous liquid waste streams using surrogates.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) has identified a high priority, radioactive sludge for stabilization testing. This sludge is stored in the Melton Valley Storage Tanks (MVST) and has been collected for the past 20 years from all the ORNL operations that produce liquid low level waste (LLLW). The sludge must be removed from the tanks and disposed of before ORNL can close the older storage tanks. Originally, the waste was going to be concentrated by evaporation and disposed of at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico as a transuranic waste. However, if the waste slurry can be solidified without concentration using a grout material, the concentration of transuranic constituents would be below the regulatory limit of 100 nanocuries per gram, and the waste form potentially could be disposed of at the Nevada Test Site as a low level waste. This could save the Department of Energy about $100,000,000.
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