화학공학소재연구정보센터
Journal of Colloid and Interface Science, Vol.566, 316-326, 2020
Aging effects on Cesium-137 (Cs-137) sorption and transport in association with clay colloids
Migration of radionuclides via colloid-facilitated transport is an important component of nuclear repository performance models. Cs-137 sorption to bentonite colloids follows multi-site behavior, with sorption to weak sites being a rapid process and sorption to strong sites having slow kinetics. Experiments in this study targeted desorption of Cs-137 from strong sites on the colloids by placing the Cs-137-bearing colloids in contact with a strongly-sorbing zeolite material that competes with the colloids for Cs-137 sorption. Batch and column experiments were conducted to examine the effects of aging (i.e., increased contact time between Cs-137 and colloids) on colloid-facilitated transport of Cs-137 through crushed analcime columns. A larger proportion of Cs-137-bearing colloids eluted through a series of columns when the colloids were aged for 1200 days prior to injection in comparison to unaged colloids. Aging the colloids increased the partitioning of Cs-137 to the colloids by nearly 20% after 1200 h. Slow desorption (0.27 hr(-1)) from the strong sites resulted in an increase of the Cs fraction bound to the strong sites from 0.365 to 0.87 by the second column injection, resulting in increased colloid-facilitated transport of Cs through strongly-sorbing zeolites from 0 in the second unaged column to 10% in the second aged column. (C) 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.