Decrease of radionuclide sorption in hydrated cement systems by organic ligands; Comparative evaluation using experimental data and thermodynamic calculations for ISA/EDTA-actinide-cement systems

Ochs, M.*; Dolder, F.*; Tachi, Yukio  

Various types of radioactive wastes and environments contain organic substances that can stabilize the aqueous complexes with radionuclides and therefore lead to a decrease of sorption. The present study focuses on testing a methodology to quantify sorption reduction factors (SRFs) in the presence of organic ligands for cement systems. Three approaches for the estimation of SRFs; (1) analogy with solubility enhancement factors, (2) radionuclide speciation based on the thermodynamic calculations, and (3) experimental sorption data in ternary systems, were coupled and tested for the representative organic ligands (ISA and EDTA) and selected key radionuclides (actinides). Our approach allows to critically evaluate the dependence of SRFs for various systems on the chosen method of quantification, in accordance with the data availability for a given systems. The reliable SRFs can only be derived from the sorption measurements in ternary systems. SRF often need to be derived in the absence of such direct evidence, and estimations need to be made based on analogies and speciation information. However, such estimates may be subject to substantial uncertainties.