• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.304-315
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• 2004

The ageing effects of radionuclides in radioactive soil on remediation using the electrokinetic method were analyzed. Comparative experiments were conducted for the reactive soil around a TRIGA research? reactor contaminated with $^{137}Cs\;and\;^{60}Co$ for 15 years and the non-reactive soil that was intentionally contaminated with $Cs^+\;and\;Co^{2+}$ for 3 days. It was observed that because of an aging effect on $^{137}Cs$, the efficiency of removing it decreased. $H_{2}SO_4$ used as an additive to increase the removal efficiency showed a higher removal capability than other chemicals for both $^{137}Cs\;and\;^{60}Co$. The efficiency of removing radionuclides from the radioactive soil in the column was proportional to the capability of the added chemical to extract radionuclides. It took 10 days to achieve a $54\%$ removal of $^{137}Cs$ and a $97\%$ removal of $^{60}Co$ from the soil. The volume of the soil wastewater discharged from the soil column by the electrokinetic method was $20\%$ below that for soil washing.