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MS: Fachverband Massenspektrometrie

MS 10: Accelerator Mass Spectrometry and Applications II

MS 10.3: Vortrag

Donnerstag, 12. März 2020, 11:30–11:45, f128

On the behavior of ¹⁴C in a radioactive waste repository — •Sönke Szidat¹, Gary Salazar¹, Typhaine L. M. Guillemot², Benjamin Z. Cvetković², Dominik Kunz², and Erich Wieland² — ¹University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland — ²Paul Scherrer Institut (PSI), Villigen-PSI, Swizerland

Current strategies of the disposal of radioactive waste involve multi-barrier retaining in geological repositories in order to prevent the mobilization of long-lived radionuclides. ¹⁴C has not been considered explicitly for a long time, as the risk emerging from its total activity, radiotoxicity and half-live is rather moderate compared to other components of the radioactive waste. However, the diversity of inorganic and organic carbon chemistry may challenge the effectiveness of state-of-the-art multi-barrier systems.

Most of the ¹⁴C in low- and intermediate-level (L/ILW) radioactive waste from Switzerland originates from ¹⁴C-containing irradiated steel. During anoxic corrosion of the steel, ¹⁴C will be released in the near field of a cement-based L/ILW repository. In this work, we simulate these conditions in a corrosion experiment using irradiated steel from a nuclear power plant and trace ¹⁴C-containing products with compound-specific radiocarbon analysis (CSRA). Dissolved carboxylic acids such as formic and acetic acid are separated with ion chromatography, whereas alkanes such as methane are isolated using gas chromatography. We report on the development of the analytical setup and the outcome of the first three years of the corrosion experiment.