RADIUM CONTROL IN URANIUM MINING WITH A SELECTIVE COMPLEXER

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RADIUM CONTROL IN URANIUM MINING WITH A SELECTIVE
COMPLEXER

• Wayne Laughlin
• Bob Goltz
• The Dow Chemical Company

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Historical Approaches to Radium

• Ra is a divalent cation removed by water
  softener
• Effective in removing Ra
• - Cost of salt, disposal of Ra brine
• Precipitation with BaSO4
• Effective in removing Ra
• - Requires sedimentation time and volume
• - Unknown cost at the end of the project

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Selective Radium Complexer

• Precipitate of BaSO4 crystals inside of IX beads
• gt8 wt/wt BaSO4 content
• Excellent Ra removal
• High capacity - Hundreds of nCi Ra/gram media
• Excellent flow properties
• Minimized volume of waste
• Confined and controlled

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Photo of the beads
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TEM of BaSO4 in beads
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Radium Removal

• Typical flow rate of 10 gpm/ft2
• Used to remove Ra from drinking water

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Excellent Flow Properties

• Beads are easily confined by screens in a column

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Loading Capacity

• Hundreds of nCi/gram of media
• Since this is a precipitation mechanism, the
  loading capacity can be weight levels
• Translates into millions of volumes of water
  treated per volume of media
• Need to run a projection to size a treatment
  system

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Selective Radium Removal Media

• Excellent Ra removal
• High capacity
• Easy to use
• Minimized volume of waste
• Confined and controlled
• Known cost of use

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References

• See our web site at www.TraceContaminants.com
• Radium removal form Canadian uranium mining
  effluents by a radium-selective ion exchange
  complexer L.A. Melis, Melis Consulting Engineers
  Ltd., Metallurgical Society of CIM, Vol 78, No.
  883, pp 82-90 1985.
• Removing and disposing of radium from well
  water K.A. Mangelson and R. P. Lauch, Journal
  AWWA, June 1990, p 72-76.