Electrochemical formation of uranium–zirconium alloy in LiCl–KCl melts

Since zirconium is considered an electrochemically active species under practical conditions of the electrorefining process, it is crucial to understand the electrochemical behavior of zirconium in LiCl–KCl melts containing actinide ions. In this study, the electrochemical codeposition of uranium and zirconium on a solid cathode was performed. It was found that the δ-(U, Zr) phase, which is the only intermediate phase of the uranium–zirconium binary alloy system, was deposited on a tantalum substrate by potentiostatic electrolysis at −1.60 V (vs. Ag+/Ag) in LiCl–KCl melts containing 0.13 in mol% UCl3 and 0.23 in mol% ZrCl4 at 773 K. To our knowledge, this is the first report on the electrochemical formation of the δ-(U, Zr) phase. The relative partial molar properties of uranium in the δ-(U, Zr) phase were evaluated by measuring the open-circuit-potentials of the electrochemically prepared δ-phase electrode.