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Uranium Migration at Some Hydrothermal Veins Near Marysvale, Utah: A Natural Analog For Waste Isolation.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 February 2011

Micheal Shea
Micheal Shea*
Affiliation:
University of California at Riverside, Riverside, CA 92521
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Abstract

The fission track method was used to map 235U distribution in thin sections made from twenty-one rock samples. Uranium locations within the studied samples include: veins and veinlets, microcracks, secondary minerals sealing microcracks, rock matrix, grain boundaries and cleavages, and accessory minerals. Two traverses show evidence for nuclide movement by diffusion (−5 and −1 cm, respectively) away from a vein and a veinlet and two other traverses show limited movement along a few microcracks. Three traverses show evidence for no uranium movement. One shows a complex combination of perhaps both bulk diffusion and microcrack transport. Apparent diffusivity (Da) values derived for the rock matrix (10-19 to 10-16 [m2/sec]) are several orders of magnitude less, and distribution constant (Kd) values (1 to 102 [m3/kg]) are several orders of magnitude greater than predicted by laboratory experiments. Values for chlorite phases within the rock matrix were Da = 10-22 to 10-19 [m2/sec] and Kd = 101 to 104 [m3/kg].

Type
Research Article
Information
MRS Online Proceedings Library (OPL) , Volume 26: Symposium D – Scientific Basis for Nuclear Waste Management VII , 1983 , 227
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 1984

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