An Assessment of the Sulfate Solubility Limit for the FRIT 418 - Sludge Batch 2/3 System

The objective of this report is to establish a ''single point'' sulfate solubility limit or constraint for the Frit 418 - Sludge Batch 2/3 (SB2/3) system. Based on the results of this study, it is recommended that the glass limit in the Product Composition Control System (PCCS) for the Frit 418 - SB2/3 system be set at 0.60 wt%. The new limit has been set based solely on sealed crucible scale data and does not take credit or account for potential volatilization that may occur in the Defense Waste Processing Facility (DWPF) melter. Although the limit is established based on sealed crucible scale tests, supplementary testing using the Slurry-Fed Melt Rate Furnace (SMRF) provides a measure of confidence that applying the 0.6 wt% limit in PCCS will prevent the formation of a salt layer in the melter. The critical data point that was used to define the solubility limit for this system was from a ''spiked'' 30% waste loading (WL) glass targeting 0.65 wt%. The measured content in this glass was 0.62 wt%. Applying the Savannah River Technology Center - Mobile Laboratory (SRTCML) inductively coupled plasma (ICP) atomic emission spectroscopy (AES) uncertainties to establish a solubility limit for the Frit 418 - SB2/3 system of 0.60 wt% (in glass) provides a ''single point'' limit that covers the anticipated WL interval of interest. It is noted that there are glasses above the 0.60 wt% limit that were homogeneous, thus reinforcing the theory of a compositional effect on solubility within this specific system. In general, higher solubilities were observed at higher targeted waste loadings