Abstract

A study has been done on the separation of iodide from spent pressurized water reactor (PWR) fuels and its quantitative determination using ion chromatography. Spent PWR fuels were dissolved with mixed acid of nitric and hydrochloric acids (80 : 20 molL%) which can oxidize iodide to iodate to prevent it from be vaporized. After reducing <TEX>${IO_3}^-$</TEX> ­to <TEX>$I_2$</TEX> in 2.5 M <TEX>$HNO_3$</TEX> with <TEX>$NH_2OH{\cdot}HCl$</TEX>, Iodine was selectively separated from actinides and all other fission products with carbontetrachloride and back-extracted with 0.1 M <TEX>$NaHSO_3$</TEX>. Recovered iodide was determined using the ion chromatograph of which the column was installed in a glove box for the analysis of radioactive materials. In practice, spent PWR fuel with 42,000~44,000 MWd/MtU was analyzed and its quantity was compared to that calculated by burnup code, ORIGEN2. The agreement was achieved with a deviation of -8.3~-0.5% from the ORIGEN 2 data, <TEX>$324.5{\sim}343.6{\mu}g/g$</TEX>.