| Abstract: | A large amount of NOx, which is used in a reprocessing plant mainly as an oxidizing agent of Pu3+, eventually results in the formation of low-level radioactive sodium nitrate waste. Since NOx is generated by the reaction of sodium nitrite and nitric acid, non-radioactive sodium nitrate is also formed as a by-product. In order to reduce the amounts of radioactive and non-radioactive sodium nitrate wastes, a new method was examined to recover NOx for recycling from the off-gas of the denitrator of uranyl nitrate solution. Fundamental and consequent bench scale experiments showed that the vacuum pressure swing adsorption method, using combined silica-gel and clinoptilolite for water vapor removal and pentasil zeolite for NOx recovery, is applicable for this purpose. |
