Multiple Roles of Clays in Radioactive Waste Confinement

Download or read book Multiple Roles of Clays in Radioactive Waste Confinement written by S. Norris and published by Geological Society of London. This book was released on 2019-08-05 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Special Publication highlights the importance of clays and clayey material, and their multiple roles, in many national geological disposal facilities for higher activity radioactive wastes. Clays can be both the disposal facility host rock and part of its intrinsic engineered barriers, and may be present in the surrounding geological environment. Clays possess various characteristics that make them high-quality barriers to the migration of radionuclides and chemical contaminants, e.g. very little water movement, diffusive transport, retention capacity, self-sealing capacity, stability over millions of years, homogeneity and lateral continuity.