PROCESS CHANGES TO DWPF TO INCREASE THROUGHPUT AND INCORPORATE SALT STREAMS

The Defense Waste Processing Facility (DWPF) has been vitrifying High Level Waste sludge since 1996. Sludge batch 1a, 1b, 2, and 3 have been successfully stabilized. In the last several years, the Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) has worked with DWPF to implement process and compositional changes to improve throughput. These changes allowed significant increases in waste throughput for processing of sludge batch 3 and will be necessary to maintain reasonable throughput for Sludge Batch 4 (SB4). SB4 processing was initiated in June 2007 and will be the first significantly HM-type sludge batch processed. This sludge is high in aluminum and other components troublesome to DWPF processing. In addition, coupled processing is scheduled to start in the next fiscal year, which will also impact throughput. Coupled processing will begin with the incorporation of waste streams from the Actinide Removal Process and the Modular Caustic Side Solvent Extraction Unit and will eventually transition to the feed from the larger scale Salt Waste Processing Facility. A discussion of the programs to improve throughput and implement salt processing will be provided.