Uranium recovery from strong acidic solutions by solvent extraction with Cyanex 923 and a modifier

Abstract

Uranium stripping with strong acid solution is always highly desired due to its simple operation and less pollution. However, intensive acid neutralisation for uranium precipitation in the subsequent step limited its application. A new solvent extraction process has been developed to transfer uranium from strong to weak sulphuric acid solutions suitable for uranium precipitation without intensive neutralisation. An organic system consisting of 10% Cyanex 923 and 10% isodecanol as the modifier in ShellSol D70 was optimised for the process. It was found that uranium was extracted efficiently from 4 to 6M H2SO4 solutions with the organic system, and it could be efficiently stripped with 0.2–0.5M H2SO4 solutions. Both extraction and stripping kinetics of uranium were very fast, reaching the equilibrium within 0.5min. Temperature between 30 and 60°C has slight effect on uranium extraction and stripping. Four theoretical stages could effectively extract more than 98% uranium from a solution containing 17.5g/L U and 6.0M H2SO4 at an A/O ratio of 1:1.5, and it could generate a loaded organic solution containing about 12g/L U. More than 99% U could be stripped from the loaded organic solution containing 14.6g/L U with 0.5M H2SO4 using five stages at an A/O ratio of 1:3. As a result, the loaded strip liquor containing more than 40g/L U would be obtained which is suitable for uranium recovery by precipitation using hydrogen peroxide. A conceptual process has been proposed for uranium transfer from strong to weak sulphuric acid solutions for its recovery.