Isotope separation energy demand

The selection of an isotope separation process including the design of the separative units and the cascade depends principally on engineering and economic considerations. One must consider the amount of product which is desired, choose the starting material, consider energy demand, etc. It comes as no surprise, then, that many different methods have been used for isotope separation. Some of these have been listed in Table 8.1 and a few are discussed in more detail in the material which follows. 

The classical methods of isotope separation on a large, technical scale, such as thermal diffusion, or gas centrifuge techniques are expensive because they demand costly equipment or consume much energy [14.11], New techniques based on a combination of laser spectroscopy with photochemistry may considerably reduce the costs. Up to now several methods have been proposed and some of them already proved their feasibility in laboratory experiments. The extension to an industrial scale, however, demands still more efforts and many improvements. ... 

One more example can be taken from a real problem of either the chemical or isotope separation of molecules. Let two different gases be divided by a partition. If the partition is removed, both gases will spontaneously become mixed. However, the return process of separation will not take place separation demands a huge expenditure of energy and effort. 

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