Despite the fact that the nuclear power industry has been greatly developed at present, the nuclear power plant is considered a danger due to a large amount of radioactive material leaked from the nuclear accidents such as in Fukushima. In particular, radionuclides such as cesium-137 and strontium-90 were the most damaging in the Fukushima accident, since they have long half-lives (30 years) and emit strong gamma rays. In order to minimize the volume of these radionuclides generated in large quantities, it is necessary to develop a practical adsorbent able to selectively remove for both. For the synthesis of the effective adsorbent for both cesium and strontium ions, we demonstrate an effective modification of montmorillonite (MT) using solid-state NaOH thermal treatment at 300 °C. Through this facile activation by desilication, porosity was enhanced and abundant surface functional groups for ion-exchange were generated. It was possible to optimize the adsorption performance of the activated montmorillonite (NaMT) by adjusting the mass ratio of NaOH (unity to MT). The adsorption mechanism analysis from XRD and XPS studies showed that cesium ions were mainly exchanged with intercalated cations in MT, and strontium ions were adsorbed on the surface functionalities (Si-O-Na+). As a result, the enlarged BET surface area (117 m2) and functional groups enabled adsorption of strontium (capacity of 185 mg/g, pristine MT: 16 mg/g), and cesium adsorption capacity was also increased (137 to 291 mg/g). In addition, NaMT exhibited the simultaneous removal of cesium and strontium ions, and selective removal of them under groundwater conditions where competing cations exist, such as sodium, potassium, and calcium. Furthermore, it showed stability under a wide range of pHs (3-11) and following irradiation of gamma-ray (at 6 Gy/h for 30 min). This improvement removal performance of adsorbent synthesized from cost-effective montmorillonite has increased the applicability to realistic conditions.

Simultaneous removal of radioactive Cs+ and Sr2+ ions from wastewater by facile solid-state alkali-activation of montmorillonite

Macromolecular Chemistry: The Second Century

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ACS Spring 2020 National Meeting & Expo

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.