Department of Chemistry Seminar – Today!

The Department of Chemistry invites you to its departmental seminar today, Monday, August 31, at 4:10 p.m. in Fulmer Hall, room 201.

Dr. Bruce Moyer from the Chemical Separations Group at Oak Ridge National Lab will present, Separations Chemistry and its Application to Cleaning up Legacy Nuclear Waste, Closing the Nuclear Fuel Cycle, and Increasing the Supply of Critical Materials.

Abstract: In this presentation, the application of separation science and technology to the solution of three major DOE problems will be examined, emphasizing the successful use of principles of molecular recognition. The ending of the Cold War initiated a massive cleanup campaign within the weapons-production sites in the DOE complex, the highest risk and cost arising from the disposition of nearly 100 million gallons of reprocessing waste stored in underground tanks. The needed separation of trace radionuclides, especially ¹³⁷Cs, in a complicated salt mixture has proven to be a challenging problem. Closing the nuclear fuel cycle in a way that minimizes the amount of waste going to a repository and maximizes the capture of energy value of used fuel will involve separation and recycle of the so-called minor actinides, mainly americium and curium. Scientifically, this task has proven to be daunting because of the similarity of the properties of these two actinides with the lanthanide fission products from which they must be separated. Most recently, DOE has begun to address the supply of critical materials needed for clean energy by funding the Critical Materials Institute led by Ames Lab with ORNL as a major partner. One of the focus areas in this endeavor involves solving a number of separation problems that will enable a greater diversity of sources of rare earths and lithium as well as make processing more efficient. This presentation will describe the role of molecular recognition in separations chemistry with examples of application in legacy waste cleanup, minor-actinide separations, and increasing the supply of critical materials.

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