Framatome Anp Gmbh

Universite Claude Bernard – Lyon1

Compagnie Europeenne Du Zirconium Cezus

Cnam-Conservatoire National Des Arts Et Metiers

Frédéric Chitry

Stéphane Pellet-Rostaing

Jacques Foos

Marc Lemaire

Alain Guy

Olivier Vigneau

Christel Gozzi

Marc Lionel Lemaire

Noël Ozanne

Alain Jean-Louis Guy

A process in which isotopes of the same element belonging to the alkaline earth metals, transition elements and heavy metals having an atomic mass of less than 209, in particular lanthanide metals, are separated in an aqueous medium by treating an aqueous medium.

Method of separating isotopes

A method for separating a metal (a) from a metal (2), preferably zirconium from hafnium, which consists in dissolving said metals in an aqueous solution wherein said metals are in a state preventing them from passing through a nanofiltration membrane; treating the aqueous medium with a ligand, for example EDTA, which is complexed with metal (1) and/or metal (2), then in passing the resulting treated medium on a filtering membrane allowing through the ligand-metal complexes, but retaining the metals not complexed with the ligand.

Method for separating metals such as zirconium and hafnium

The invention relates to the separation of lanthanides and actinides by nanofiltration complexation. The object of the invention is to satisfy the existing need for a simple, efficient and economical technique for separating lanthanides and actinides. This object is achieved by a process consisting of using ligands of the polyamino acid type, such as EDTA or DTPA, for complexing lanthanides and/or actinides before separating them by nanofiltration. The invention further relates to novel polyamino acid ligands incorporating ligand structures additional to EDTA and DTPA. Application to the production of rare earths or nuclear waste processing, especially to recycling operations carried out on spent nuclear fuels is also discussed.

Method for separating in an aqueous medium lanthanides and/or actinides by combined complexing-nanofiltration, and novel complexing agents therefor

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Villeurbanne, France

Frédéric Chitry