Preparation of Nuclear Grade Zirconium by Molten Salt Electrolysis

Date

Aug 26, 2015

Time

10:00 AM - 11:00 AM

Speaker

Dr. Kyoung-Tae Park

Affiliation

Korea Institute of Industrial Technology (Rare Metal R&D Group, Incheon, Korea)

Language

en

Main Topic

Materialien

Other Topics

Materialien, Physik

Host

Brit Präßler-Wüstling

Description

Zr and its alloys are one of the most important materials used as cladding nuclear fuels because of its high dimensional stability, good corrosion resistance and especially, lowest neutron-absorbing cross section. However, manufacturing costs of nuclear grade Zr from Zircon ore is very high because satisficing of compositional regulation is very difficult, which included separation of impurities, using multiple solvent extraction and distillation. And also, purification of used Zr demands same processes compared with zircon ore refining process. In this study, Zr scrap was recycled by molten salt electrorefining instead of commercial process. For pure Zr production from Zr scrap, electrochemical cut-off potential was controlled by applied current density, during the this process noble metal impurities such as Nb, Sn Fe and etc. drop down to the bottom of electrolyte cell. Corrected Zr deposits were analysed by SEM, XRD, TGA, ICP-MS. As a result of molten salt electrorefining, composition of Zr was limited under ASTM B349, nuclear grade Zr sponge specification.

Links

• Seminars at the IFW

Last modified: Aug 26, 2015, 9:56:21 AM