Recycling Nuclear Fuels: Need of the Hour

The current power scenario should be a matter of great concern to the future and present engineers. The consumer demands are increasing day by day and the rate of increase in the generating capacity is yet to match the pace of the consumers. Consequentially, we have villages with 14 to 16 hours of load shedding and the urban areas are enjoying their lives to the fullest. Thus to bridge up this gap, Nuclear energy will play a key role.
The key factor in using Nuclear fuels is that it has a tremendous potential and the emission of the green house gases (CO2, methane etc.) is negligible.
The process of recycling the nuclear waste involves the separation of Uranium and plutonium from the waste so that it can be reused as a fuel. Earlier plutonium was extracted for making nuclear weapons but now a days it is used in the thermal reactors also. Some of the recycling processes are as given below:

1. Purex: This is the current standard method. It is Plutonium and uranium recovery by extraction. This is a liquid-liquid extraction process, in which both the elements are extracted independently from the fission products. It has Pu-240 which can be sfely reused.

2. Urex: This is a modification of the purex. In this process 99.9% of uranium and 95% of technetium are separated from each other.

3. Truex: This is a transuranic extraction process developed in USA to remove the transuranic materials (Am,Cm) from the waste by lowering the alpha activity of the waste.

4. Diamex: Diamide extraction process avoids the formation of organic waste which contains elements other than carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen. This takes care of the hazard arising from acid rains.

5. Sanex: It is selective actinides extraction which are unwanted in the wastes.

6. Unex: It is a universal extraction process. It is used to remove the radioactive isotopes from the waste (Sr,Cs etc. )

Some of the other obsolete methods are electrolysis, pyroprocessing, bismuth phosphate, redox etc.

If recycling is used only to reduce the radioactivity of the waste then it should be remembered that uranium reaches the normal level of radioactivity in 40 years. But Pu-239 takes 1,00,000 years to come to normal level. So it would be better to reuse this separated wastes as fuel again instead of letting it damage the atmosphere. In the years to come, there would be a deficit of 40,000 MW of power. If planned judiciously nuclear generation can help fulfill this need. It would also enhance resource utilization and secure radioactive waste management.