Determination of uranium in uranyl nitrate raffinate generated through sodium di-uranate process

• Published in: Journal of radioanalytical and nuclear chemistry Vol. 314; no. 3; pp. 2129 - 2135
• Main Authors: Gupta, S. N. V. M. S., Satyanarayana, G., Nayak, A. K., Misra, U. B., Rao, Y. Balaji, Babu, C. Phani, Kalyanakrishnan, G.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer Netherlands 01.12.2017; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Ammonium salts; Atomic emission spectroscopy; Carbonates; Chemistry; Chemistry and Materials Science; Diagnostic Radiology; Emission analysis; Hadrons; Heavy Ions; Inductively coupled plasma; Inorganic Chemistry; Nuclear Chemistry; Nuclear energy; Nuclear Physics; Physical Chemistry; Sodium; Trioctylphosphine oxide; Uranium; Uranium compounds; Sodium di-uranate (SDU); Tri; Inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometer (ICP-AES); octyl phosphine oxide (TOPO); Uranyl nitrate raffinate (UNR); Easily ionizable elemental interference (EIE)
• ISSN: 0236-5731; 1588-2780
• DOI: 10.1007/s10967-017-5546-x

The paper discusses a method developed for the determination of uranium in uranyl nitrate raffinate (UNR) generated through sodium di-uranate (SDU) process using inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometer (ICP-AES). High concentration of Na in UNR limits the direct determination of uranium in ICP-AES. Therefore, selective extraction of uranium from UNR using tri- n -octyl-phosphine oxide (TOPO) and stripping by ammonium carbonate was followed. Effect of sodium on estimation of uranium is discussed. The method has been validated by standard recovery of spiked real time UNR samples with known amounts of uranium CRM (Merck-HC42984673). The developed method compared well with EDXRFS and Redox titrimetric methods.