Actinide Waste Forms and Radiation Effects

Abstract

Over the past few decades, many studies of actinides in glasses and ceramics have been conducted that have contributed substantially to the increased understanding of actinide incorporation in solids and radiation effects due to actinide decay. These studies have included fundamental research on actinides in solids and applied research and development related to the immobilization of the high level wastes (HLW) from commercial nuclear power plants and processing of nuclear weapons materials, environmental restoration in the nuclear weapons complex, and the immobilization of weapons-grade plutonium as a result of disarmament activities. Thus, the immobilization of actinides has become a pressing issue for the twenty-first century (Ewing, 1999), and plutonium immobilization, in particular, has received considerable attention in the USA (Muller et al., 2002; Muller and Weber, 2001). The investigation of actinides and