Recovery chemistry, overview

An overview is given of plutonium process chemistry used at the U. S. Department of Energy Hanford, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Rocky Flats, and Savannah River sites, with particular emphasis on solution chemistry involved in recovery, purification, and waste treatment operations. By extrapolating from the present system of processes, this paper also attempts to chart the future direction of plutonium process development and operation. Areas where a better understanding of basic plutonium chemistry will contribute to development of improved processing are indicated. 

Even from such a brief overview of its chemistry, it should be clear that phosphorus is an element still at the forefront of all areas of practical chemistry - from purely academic right to decidedly industrial. Though many of the latter uses are declining because of environmental concerns - witness the decrease in the use of phosphate detergents, ZDDP oil additives and organophosphorus pesticides - the fact remains that demand for the element is still enormous. Eventually, as the twenty-first century progresses, this demand will impact upon resources, and economics will dictate that phosphate recovery, - for example, from sewage - becomes vital. Much work to this end is already underway. ... 

As detailed in this overview, the non-covalent attachment of catalysts on a solid support is an important additional technique for the separation and recovery of catalysts from reaction mixtures. Such non-covalent immobilization strategies bring together a number of advantages of solution-phase chemistry and solid-phase supported chemistry. The catalysts can be separated from reaction mixtures by simple filtration. The pre-catalysts can be prepared and characterized in solution. The underlying principle is partitioning between a solid phase or a supported liquid phase and a liquid reaction phase of different solvating power. 

This book is a collection of invited, reviewed, contributed and poster papers presented at the conference. The typical presentation is multidisciplinary, containing a blend of chemistry, physics, materials processing and technology applications. The result is a comprehensive overview of polymer-related topics, including innovative synthetic techniques, electronic properties, processing, device applications, material recovery, and waste analysis. Both review and research papers are included. The review papers should assist in the cross-fertilization of different areas, while the research papers will serve as useful reference materials summarizing the current status of individual topics and projecting future directions. 

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