Other Binders - Stabilization and Solidification of Hazardous, Radioactive, and Mixed Wastes - page 148

6.5.5 A PPLICATION

The HC process was specifically developed to deal with INEEL reprocessing waste.
INEEL waste is uniquely suited for cementitious solidification because overwhelm-
ing amounts of salt-forming caustic were never added to it and ~95% of it was
calcined. Like most of DOE's high-level waste, its total radionuclide content (~30
watts/m 3 ) is well under that of some of the “intermediate level” wastes routinely
converted to 0.5-m 3 concrete waste forms at Great Britain's THORP facility. A
portion of the reprocessing waste generated at other DOE fuel reprocessing facilities
could be directly processed into HC-type concrete (e.g., Scientific Review Panel's
strongly caustic “sludge washing” solutions 18 or the sludges now destined for its
glass melter), but the majority (the “supernates” and “salt cakes”) is unfit for making
anything but “saltstone” (or glass) unless first pretreated in a way that re-speciates
the sodium. “Steam reforming” is the only calcination technology still viable in the
DOE Complex that could conceivably be employed to accomplish this.

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