Gas bubble retention and its effect on waste properties: Retention mechanisms, viscosity, and tensile and shear strengths

Several of the underground nuclear storage tanks at Hanford have been placed on a flammable gas watch list, because the waste is either known or suspected to generate, store, and episodically release flammable gases. Because retention and episodic release of flammable gases from these tanks containing radioactive waste slurries are critical safety concerns, Pacific Northwest Laboratory (PNL) is studying physical mechanisms and waste properties that contribute to the episodic gas release from these storage tanks. This study is being conducted for Westinghouse Hanford Company as part of the PNL Flammable Gas project. Previous investigations have concluded that gas bubbles are retained by the slurry or sludge that has settled at the bottom of the tanks; however, the mechanisms responsible for the retention of these bubbles are not well understood. Understanding the rheological behavior of the waste, particularly of the settled sludge, is critical to characterizing the tendency of the waste to retain gas bubbles and the dynamics of how these bubbles are released from the waste. The presence of gas bubbles is expected to affect the rheology of the sludge, specifically its viscosity and tensile and shear strengths, but essentially no literature data are available to assess the effect of bubbles. The objectives of this study were to conduct experiments and develop theories to understand better how bubbles are retained by slurries and sludges, to measure the effect of gas bubbles on the viscosity of simulated slurries, and to measure the effect of gas bubbles on the tensile and shear strengths of simulated slurries and sludges. In addition to accomplishing these objectives, this study developed correlations, based on the new experimental data, that can be used in large-scale computations of waste tank physical phenomena