Fission product release. Progress report, April 1-June 30, 1979

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Abstract
Experiments continued this quarter to measure the rates of leaching reactor products from spent UO/sub 2/ fuel under oxidizing and reducing conditions. One pair of spent fuel wafers was leached in deionized water for 65 days at 25/sup 0/C. Then the temperature was raised to 70/sup 0/C. Lanthanide and actinide elements were observed to be leached at one-tenth the rate under reducing conditions at 25/sup 0/C than under oxidizing conditions. At 70/sup 0/C, the rates of leaching these elements decreased. After 30 days at the higher temperature, the differences between oxidizing and reducing conditions no longer were apparent in the leach rate data. A second pair of spent fuel wafers was leached at 25/sup 0/C under the same conditions as the first pair. Duplicate results were obtained. In experiments to measure the rate of dissolution of finely divided UO/sub 2/ in deionized water, values of 9 x 10/sup -7/ and 6 x 10/sup -7/ g cm/sup -2/day/sup -1/ were obtained at a pH of 4.1 and an Eh of +0.5 V. Similar measurements were made at an Eh of -0.15 V, but the data could not be interpreted in terms of a UO/sub 2/ dissolution rate.

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