Abstract
A series of nondestructive assay measurements were performed before, during, and after localized heating of an industrial standard 12B cylinder of uranium hexafluoride to replicate dose variations previously observed on commercial 30B cylinders. While cylinders represent a closed system, enrichment measurements may be impacted by altered uranium and daughter product distributions due to sublimation. A series of measurements were performed to examine localized heating impacts on dose rates, ratios of uranium and daughter product distributions, and measured 235U enrichment as calculated by two different approaches. The less complex enrichment meter approaches were found to be more robust and less prone to deviation than isotope ratio approaches such as FRAM, but the impact can be minimized by using observable dose changes to avoid impacted areas.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration Office of International Nuclear Safeguards and US Department of Energy, Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725.
Funding
Glenn A. Fugate, Susan K. Smith; Conceptualization: Glenn A. Fugate; Methodology: Glenn A. Fugate, Susan K. Smith, Ram Venkataraman; Investigation: Allison T. Greaney, Kathryn Peruski, Jason M. Richards; Formal analysis: Glenn A. Fugate, Allison T. Greaney, Kathryn Peruski, Jason M. Richards, Susan K. Smith, Ram Venkataraman; Writing—original draft preparation: Glenn A. Fugate, Allison T. Greaney, Kathryn Peruski, Jason M. Richards; Writing—review and editing: Glenn. A. Fugate, Allison T. Greaney, Kathryn Peruski, Jason M. Richards, Susan K. Smith, Ram Venkataraman.
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Greaney, A.T., Peruski, K., Richards, J.M. et al. Thermal impacts on nondestructive analysis measurements of uranium hexafluoride. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 330, 357–365 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-021-07949-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-021-07949-9