CHEMICAL DECOMPOSITION OF HIGH-LEVEL NUCLEAR WASTE STORAGE/DISPOSAL GLASSES UNDER IRRADIATION

In the United States alone there are 100 million gallons of high-level nuclear wastes (HLWs) in various chemical forms awaiting eventual disposal in geologic repositories. For safety in handling and transport from their present underground storage tanks to their final burial sites, much of the HLWs are being immobilized by vitrification. A further virtue of HLW vitrification is the fact that the glass may serve as an additional, non-geologic barrier to the dispersal of these radio-toxins into the environment. For this reason, one of the criteria for selecting HLW glass compositions has been chemical durability against attack by ground water. While the effects of radiation on chemical durability have therefore been studied extensively, little consideration has been given to the possibility that self-irradiation of HLW glasses may lead to modes of chemical decomposition which render them unstable even in the absence of exposure to ground water. The worst-case threat would occur if the HLW glasses were to respond to irradiation in ways analogous to rock salt (NaCl). It has long been known that alkali halides irradiated t