Thermal Expansion of U.S. and Australian SYNROC B

Abstract

For the safe disposal of nuclear waste, a synthetic rock (SYNROC) was developed. Continuing research in this field has led to U.S. and Australian versions of SYNROC B. For both materials, the thermal expansion and expansivity have been determined by the temperature range from 296 to 1100K.Although both versions of SYNROC B have basically the same composition and agree in the major constituent phases, the U.S. version expands slightly more than the Australian one. With increasing temperature, the difference becomes greater and runs up to 3.5% at 1100 K. Because of the good linearity in the temperature dependence of the relative thermal expansion (ΔL/L0), a linear regression was made and the resulting equations determined.