Reversible ion-exchange fixation of cesium-137 leading to mobilization from reservoir sediments

The radioactive fission product, ¹³⁷Cs, has been observed to mobilize from bottom sediments of two South Carolina reservoirs during summer thermal stratification and hypolimnetic anoxia. Mobilization is attributed to ion-exchange displacement of ¹³⁷Cs from sediments by cations such as NH⁺₄, Fe⁺² and Mn⁺² released under anaerobic conditions.Three types of ¹³⁷Cs binding sites to sediment clay minerals are identified: 1) surface and planar sites from which ¹³⁷Cs is generally exchangeable by all cations studied (Na⁺, NH⁺₄, H⁺, Cs⁺, Ca⁺², Mg⁺², Fe⁺², and Mn⁺²); 2) wedge sites where ¹³⁷Cs exchange is sterically limited to cations of similar size and charge (NH⁺₄, Cs⁺, K⁺, and perhaps H₃O⁺); 3) interlayer sites from which ¹³⁷Cs is not readily exchanged. More than 15 years after final ¹³⁷Cs inputs, the reservoir sediments we studied showed the following percentage distribution of sites: 2 to 9% surface sites, 6 to 13% wedge sites, and 78 to 85% interlayer sites. In contrast, lake and stream sediments near Oak Ridge, Tennessee receiving ¹³⁷Cs inputs more than 20 years earlier had greater than 99% of their ¹³⁷Cs associated with non-exchangeable interlayer sites. The difference is attributed to the paucity in the South Carolina sediments of weathered micaceous clay minerals with their abundant interlayer sites. Such interlayer deficient clays are dominant in the Atlantic and Gulf coastal plains of the United States and elsewhere. This suggests that ¹³⁷Cs will be physically and chemically more mobile in such areas as well as more biologically available. Mobility will be enhanced in regimes where cation inputs favoring ¹³⁷Cs exchange occur. Subsurface waste disposal sites where anaerobic conditions develop with NH⁺₄ production and Fe⁺² and Mn⁺² release might be such a regime.