Column Studies on the Sorption of Radioactive Isotopes by Some Natural Clay Minerals

Abstract

Different types of naturally occuring minerals have been investigated in respect of the sorption of various radioisotopes. The present work deals with column studies of the sorption of ⁸⁹Sr and ⁶⁰Co oh four natural bentonites, collected from localities. Columns of cross section of 1.47 cm² were used for the determination of the breakthrough capacities for both Sr and Co. The applicability of Glueckauf plate theory to the systems was tested. It was found that HETP is constant for a given system of column and cationic species, which proves the applicability of the theory. From this, it follows that the data obtained for the short laboratory colums can be used to predict the breakthrough behavior for longer columns.

Keywords:

• clays
• cobalt 60
• decontamination
• ion exchange
• strontium 89