Economical Aspects of Denitration in the Management of Reprocessing Concentrate

At today’s state of the art denitration of HAWC is mandatory prior to vitrification. Although there is the potential that the ceramic melter will take HAWC at 5 M free nitric acid, the process is not yet demonstrated. For industrial application corrosion of the off-gas equipment would be intolerable, and the deliberation of some specific nuclides at higher acid concentrations will lead to problems with the off-gas treatment in total.The DWK-concept for the reprocessing plant at Wackersdorf uses the HCHO-process. The gaseous reaction products are recombined to nitric acid and recycled to the high tritium acid recovery system. Denitration of MAWC is not mandatory but offers the chance of reducing the volume of solidified waste by 340 concrete shielded drums (400 1) per year. It provides flexibility in the processing of MAW by not being limited to the maximum salt concentration rather to the activity limits. For MAWC the HCOOH-process is used.