Continuous Separation of Radionuclides from Contaminated Water by Shock Electrodialysis
- 7 January 2020
- journal article
- research article
- Published by American Chemical Society (ACS) in Environmental Science & Technology
- Vol. 54 (1), 527-536
- https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.9b05380
Abstract
The increasing popularity of nuclear energy necessitates development of new methods to treat water that becomes contaminated with radioactive substances. Because this polluted water comprises several dissolved species (not all of which are radioactive), selective accumulation of the radionuclides is desirable to minimize the volume of nuclear waste and to facilitate its containment or disposal. In this article, we use shock electrodialysis to selectively, continuously, and efficiently remove cobalt and cesium from a feed of dissolved lithium, cobalt, cesium, and boric acid. This formulation models the contaminated water commonly found in light-water reactors and in other nuclear processes. In a three-pass process, a consistent trade-off is observed between the recovery of decontaminated water and the percentage of cobalt removed, which offers flexibility in operating the system. For example, 99.5% of cobalt can be removed with a water recovery of 43%, but up to 66% of the water can be recovered if deionization of cobalt is allowed to drop to 98.3%. In general, the energy consumed during this process (ranging between 1.76 and 4.8 kW h m(-3)) is low because only charged species are targeted and virtually no energy is expended removing boric acid, the most abundant species in solution.Funding Information
- Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Limited
This publication has 44 references indexed in Scilit:
- Impact of network heterogeneity on electrokinetic transport in porous mediaJournal of Colloid and Interface Science, 2019
- Dendrite Suppression by Shock Electrodeposition in Charged Porous MediaScientific Reports, 2016
- Scalable and Continuous Water Deionization by Shock ElectrodialysisEnvironmental Science & Technology Letters, 2015
- Water purification by shock electrodialysis: Deionization, filtration, separation, and disinfectionDesalination, 2015
- Over-limiting Current and Control of Dendritic Growth by Surface Conduction in NanoporesScientific Reports, 2014
- Desalination at overlimiting currents: State-of-the-art and perspectivesDesalination, 2014
- Overlimiting Current and Shock Electrodialysis in Porous MediaLangmuir, 2013
- Deionization shocks in microstructuresPhysical Review E, 2011
- Overlimiting Current in a MicrochannelPhysical Review Letters, 2011
- Biomolecular Action of Ionizing RadiationPublished by Informa UK Limited ,2007