Studies on applications of room temperature ionic liquids

Room temperature ionic liquids (RTILs) have many potential applications in nuclear fuel cycle, especially actinide and fission product separations. This paper outlines the results of work in our Centre directed towards identifying specific applications with respect to recovery of uranium and palladium from nitric acid media. The use of RTILs as diluents for extraction processes as well as electrolysis media have been explored. The extraction of uranium(VI) and palladium(II) from nitric acid medium by tri-n-butyl phosphate solution in RTIL has been studied. Voltammetric investigations on the suitability of RTIL as electrolytic medium for the electrodeposition of uranium and palladium at near ambient conditions are reported. The feasibility of electrodeposition of uranium as uranium oxide (UO2) and palladium(II) as metallic palladium from the loaded organic phase has been demonstrated.