The effect of Li2O addition on precipitation behavior of uranium in LiCl-KCl-UCl3 has been investigated in this study. 99.99% LiCl-KCl eutectic salt is mixed with 10wt% UCl3 chips at 550°C in the Pyrex tube in argon atmosphere glove box, with 10 ppm O2 and 1 ppm H2O. Then, Li2O chunks are added in mixed LiCl-KCl-UCl3 and the system has been cooled down to room temperature for 10 hours to form enough UO2 particles in the salt. The solid salt has been taken out from the glove box, and cut into three sections (top, middle and bottom) by low-speed saw for further microscopic analysis. Three pieces of solid salt are dissolved in deionized water at room temperature and the solution is filtered by a filter paper to collect non-dissolved particles. The filter paper with particles is baked in vacuum oven at 120°C for 6 hours to evaporate remaining moisture from the filter paper. Further analysis was performed for the powder remaining on the filter paper, and periphery of the powder (cake) on the filter paper. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), electron diffraction spectroscopy (EDS), and X-ray powder diffraction (XRD) are adopted to analysis the characteristic of the particles. From SEM analysis, the powders are consisted of small particles which have 5 to 10 m diameter, and EDS analysis shows they are likely UO2 with 23 at. % of uranium and 77 at. % oxygen. Cake is also analyzed by SEM and EDS, and needle like structures are widely observed on the particle. The length of needle is distributed from 5 to 20 m, and it has 6 to 10 at. % of chlorine, which are not fully dissolved into deionized water at room temperature. From XRD analysis, the particles show the peak position of UO2, and the result is well matched with the SEM-EDS results. We are planning to add more Li2O in the system for fully reacting uranium in UCl3, and compare the results to find the effect of Li2O concentration on UO2 precipitation.

Material balance evaluation is an important measure to determine whether or not nuclear material is diverted. A prototype code to evaluate material balance has been developed for uranium fuel fabrication facility. However, it is difficult to analyze the code’s functionality and performance because the utilization of real facility data related to material balance evaluation is very limited. It is also restricted to deliberately implement various abnormal situations based on real facility data, such as nuclear diversion condition. In this study, process flow simulator of uranium fuel fabrication facility has been developed to produce various process data required for material balance evaluation. The process flow simulator was developed on the basis of the Simulink-SimEvents framework of the MathWorks. This framework is suitable for batch-based process modeling like uranium fuel fabrication facility. It dynamically simulates the movement of nuclear material according to the time function and provides process data such as nuclear material amount at inputs, outputs, and inventories required for Material Unaccounted For (MUF) and MUF uncertainty calculation. The process flow simulator code provides these data to the material balance evaluation code. And then the material balance evaluation code calculates MUF and MUF uncertainty to evaluate whether or not nuclear material is diverted. The process flow simulator code can simulate the movement of nuclear material for any abnormal situation which is difficult to implement with real process data. This code is expected to contribute to checking and improving the functionality and performance of the prototype code of material balance evaluation by simulating process data for various operation scenarios.

After the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) was signed, Korea is undergoing nuclear inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as a non-nuclear-armed state. By the inspection, nuclear material measurement and management have been carried out according to safety measures. Uranium dioxide, a major component of nuclear fuel, is a material that naturally oxidizes at room temperature, yielding a volume change. In this case, it will have an impact on the management of nuclear material measurement, and a model for predicting this will be required. At room temperature, an oxide film is grown by oxygen diffusion on the surface of uranium dioxide, and if the thickness of the oxide film is predicted based on this, the volume change of uranium dioxide can also be predicted. In relation to this, Ghargozloo’s ionic diffusion oxidation model exists. Therefore, in this paper, an modified oxidation model based on Ghargozloo’s oxygen diffusion in uranium dioxide is presented and the volume change of uranium dioxide due to oxidation is predicted.

The purpose of this study was to effectively purify U-contaminated soil-washing effluent using a precipitation/distillation process, reuse the purified water, and self-dispose of the generated solid. The U ions in the effluent were easily removed as sediments by neutralization, and the metal sediments and suspended soils were flocculated–precipitated by polyacrylamide (PAM). The precipitate generated through the flocculation–precipitation process was completely separated into solid–liquid phases by membrane filtration (pore size < 45 μm), and Ca2+ and Mg2+ ions remaining in the effluent were removed by distillation. Even if neutralized or distilled effluent was reused for soil washing, soil decontamination performance was maintained. PAM, an organic component of the filter cake, was successfully removed by thermal decomposition without loss of metal deposits including U. The uranium concentration of the residual solids after distillation is confirmed to be less than 1 Bq·g−1, so it is expected that the self-disposal of the residual solids is possible. Therefore, the treatment method of U-contaminated soil-washing effluent using the precipitation/distillation process presented in this study can be used to effectively treat the washing waste of U-contaminated soil and self-dispose of the generated solids.

A method of quantitatively analyzing radioactivity of uranium waste in the In-situ measurement using Bayesian inference was proposed. When applying the traditional efficiency calibration method, which uses standard sources or Monte Carlo simulation, the radioactivity error is large depending on the degree of spread of the radioactive contamination especially in large sample such as a 200 L drum. In addition, the existing method has a limitation in that it is difficult to reflect the uncertainty according to the location of the source. In this preliminary study, to overcome the limitations of the existing method, a Bayesian statistical-based radioactivity quantitative analysis model was proposed that can increase the accuracy of analysis even in situations where radioactive contamination of uranium waste is non-uniformly distributed. As a result of evaluating the simulated waste with the proposed Bayesian method, the accuracy was improved more than about 6 times compared to the classical efficiency calibration method.

Uranium isotopes (238U, 235U, and 234U) found in natural environments and their activity ratios (235U/238U and 234U/238U) have been used as an important tool in investigating various geological processes, especially in natural analogue studies. Occurrence and fractionation of uranium isotopes in nature between 238U, 235U, and 234U were investigated. Various measurement methods have been used for the determination of isotopic ratios and geochronology. Thus, we reviewed and summarized the measurement methods such as alpha spectrometry, gamma spectrometry, thermal ionization mass spectrometry (TIMS), secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) with sensitive high resolution ion microprobe (SHRIMP), and multiple-collector inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (MCICPMS). Research status of natural analogue studies carried out using uranium isotopes and their isotopic ratios were also reviewed and summarized in terms of long-term behaviors of radionuclides in various foreign uranium deposits as analogues of high-level radioactive waste repositories. Research results for mineralogical, geochemical, and biogeochemical behaviors of uranium in various natural analogue sites were collected and analyzed to investigate the migration and retardation processes of uranium through geological media. These long-term behaviors of uranium and uranium isotopes include dissolution/precipitation of uranium minerals, interactions of uranium with various fracture minerals including sorption and incorporation, redox reactions by minerals and microbes, and hydrological groundwater flow thorough rock fracture systems including identification of flow paths and groundwater circulation. The results of this study will contribute to performing future natural analogue studies in domestic uranium deposits and provide basic information and knowledge for understanding long-term geochemical and geochronological behaviors of radionuclides in a high-level radioactive repository.

With the enhancement of the spatial resolution of satellite imagery (1 m or less), the satellite image analysis has been considered as the indispensable means for remote sensing of nuclear proliferation activities in the restricted access areas such as North Korea. Notably, in the case of an open-pit uranium mine, e.g. the Pyongsan uranium mine, the mining activity can be presumed if detecting the location and extent uranium tailing piles near shafts within temporal images. Several studies have researched on the target detection for minerals of interest such as limestone and coal to evaluate the economic activities by utilizing similarity measures, e.g., a spectral angle mapper and a spectral information divergence (SID). Thus, this paper presented a systematic change detection methodology for monitoring the uranium mining activity in the Pyongsan uranium mine with a similarity measure of SID. The proposed methodology using the target detection results consists of the following five steps. The first step is to acquire stereo images of areas of interest for change detection. The second step is to preprocess the stereo images as following measures: (i) the QUick Atmospheric Correction and the image-to-image registration with ENVI and (ii) the Gram-Schmidt pansharpening. The third step is to extract spectral information for minerals of interest, i.e., uranium tailing piles, by sampling pixels within the reference image. It is based on the satellite analysis report for the Pyongsan uranium mine by CSIS, which specified the location of the uranium tailing piles. As the fourth step, the target detection for uranium tailing piles was performed through the similarity measure of SID between the extracted spectral information and the spectral reflectance of the image. In the fifth step, the change detection was processed using the multivariate alteration detection algorithm, which compares the target detection results by canonical correlation analysis. Furthermore, this paper evaluated the performance of the proposed methodology with the change detection accuracy assessment index, i.e., the area under a receiver operating characteristic curve. In conclusion, this paper suggests the systematic change detection methodology utilizing time series analysis of target detection for uranium tailing piles, which can save time and cost for humans to interpret large amounts of satellite information at the restricted access areas. As future works, the feasibility of the proposed methodology would be investigated by analyzing distribution of minerals of interest regarding nuclear proliferation at Yongbyon, which has the historical events of suspicious nuclear activities.

For the peaceful use of nuclear energy, the international community has devoted itself to fulfilling its obligations under the Safeguards Agreement with IAEA. In this regard, uranium in a radioactive waste drum should be analyzed and reported in terms of mass and 235U enrichment. In order to characterize radioactive wastes, gamma spectroscopy techniques can be effectively applied. In the case of high-resolution gamma spectroscopy, because an HPGe detector can provide excellent energy resolution, it can be applied to analyze a mixture having a complicated isotopic composition. However, other substances such as wood, concrete, and ash are mixed in radioactive waste with various form factors; hence, the efficiency calibration is difficult. On the other hand, In Situ Object Counting System (ISOCS) has a capability of efficiency calibration without standard materials, making it possible to analyze complex radioactive wastes. In this study, the analysis procedure with the ISOCS was optimized for quantification of radioactive waste. To this end, a standard radioactive waste drum at KEPCO NF and low-level radioactive waste drums at Korea Radioactive Waste Agency (KORAD) were measured. The performance of the ISOCS was then evaluated by Monte Carlo simulations, Multi-Group Analysis for Uranium (MGAU) code, and destructive analysis. As a result, the ISOCS showed good performance in the quantification of uranium for a drum with the homogenized simple geometry and long measurement time. It is confirmed that the ISOCS gamma spectroscopy technique could be used for control and accountancy of nuclear materials contained in a radioactive waste drum.