Mo recycling property from generator materials with irradiated molybdenum

Kakei, Sadanori*; Kimura, Akihiro ; Niizeki, Tomotake*; Ishida, Takuya; Nishikata, Kaori  ; Kurosawa, Makoto ; Yoshinaga, Hideo*; Hasegawa, Yoshio*; Tsuchiya, Kunihiko 

The Japan Materials Testing Reactor (JMTR) is expected to contribute to the expansion of industrial utilization, such as the domestic production of Mo for the medical diagnosis medicine Tc. Production by the (n, ) method is proposed as domestic Mo production in JMTR because of the low amount of radioactive wastes and the easy Mo/Tc production process. Molybdenum oxide (MoO) pellets, poly zirconium compounds (PZC) and poly titanium compounds (PTC) are used as the irradiation target and generator for the production of Mo/Tc by the (n, ) method. However, it is necessary to use the enriched MoO, which is very expensive, to increase the specific activity of Mo. Additionally, a large amount of used PZC and PTC is generated after the decay of Mo. Therefore, this recycling technology of used PZC/PTC has been developed to recover molybdenum (Mo) as an effective use of resources and a reduction of radioactive wastes. The total Mo recovery rate of this process was 95.8%. From the results of the hot experiments, we could demonstrate that the recovery of MoO and the recycling of PZC are possible. In the future, the equipment of recovering Mo will be installed in JMTR-Hot Cell, and this recycling process will be able to contribute to the reduction of production costs of Tc and the reduction of radioactive wastes.