Radionuclide Sorption on Well Construction Materials |
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| Authors: | Joseph L. Thompson |
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| Affiliation: | Joseph L. Thompson is a technical staff member at Los Alamos National Laboratory (CST-7, MSJ.514, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 87544;e-mail;phone (505) 667-4559;fax (505) 665-4955). He is a Ph. D. chemist whose area of specialization is radiochemistry Since 1983 he has been studying the underground movement of radioactive materials associated with nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site. |
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| Abstract: | Laboratory experiments were conducted to measure the extent to which trace concentrations of radioactive materials would sorb on well construction materials and to assess the rapidity with which sorption would occur. The radionuclides employed in these studies were tritium, Cs-137, and Co-57, Solutions with trace concentrations of these radionuclides were contracted with casings of PVC, fiberglass-epoxy, stainless steel, carbon steel, and steel rods coated wtih expoy. The PVC showed no interaction with the tritium or Cs-137 during contact times of two hours to these weeks; however, it did sorb Co-57. The fiberglass-epoxy also interacted only with the cobalt. The stainless steel sorbed cesium and cobalt. The carbon steel (or the ferric hydroxide forming on its surface) also sorbed both cesium and cobalt. The epoxy-coated steel rods did not interact measurably with day of the radio-nuclides so long as the coating was intact. The sorption reactions generally were apparent after a few days of contact: in the case of carbon steel, they were detectable in a few hours. |
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