Development of technology for separating uranium from sludge-wastes containing iron

Ohashi, Yusuke ; Tsunashima, Yasumichi; Murashita, Shinji; Ando, Shion; Tanaka, Yoshio ; Ikeda, Yasuhisa*

The sludge - like uranium generated by neutralization of the acid water used for decontamination of metal wastes contains much iron. We have examined the aqueous method for recovering uranium from sludge - like uranium containing iron using N-cyclohexyl-2-pyrrolidone (NCP). Precipitation ratio of uranium in the solution prepared by dissolving sludge - like uranium containing iron using HNO increases as additive amount of NCP increases and it became 97%. The precipitation ratio of iron, aluminum, fluorine and sulfate are less than 1% at all additive amounts of NCP investigated, which indicates that uranium can be selectively recovered by NCP.