F-Element ion chelation in highly basic media. 1998 annual progress report

'A large percentage of high-level radioactive waste (HLW) produced in the DOE complex over the last thirty years temporarily resides in storage tanks maintained at highly basic pH. The final permanent waste remediation plan will probably require that liquid and solid fractions be chemically treated in order to partition and concentrate the dominate hazardous emitters from the bulk of the waste. This is no small task. Indeed, there does not exist a well developed molecular chemistry knowledge base to guide the development of suitable separations for actinide and fission products present in the strongly basic media. The goal of this project is to undertake fundamental studies of the coordination chemistry of f-element ions and their species formed in basic aqueous solutions containing common waste treatment ions (e.g., NO{sub 3}{sup -}, CO{sub 3}{sup 2-}, organic carboxylates, and EDTA), as well as new waste scrubbing chelators produced in this study.