• Resources Recycling
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.66-74
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• 2012

In order to evaluate the feasibility of selective sulfidization of uranium and rare-earth(RE) oxides, an analysis on thermodynamic data, such as $M-O_2-S_2$ phase stability diagram and changes of Gibbs free energy for sulfidization of uranium and rare-earth oxides were carried out. Comparing $RE-O_2-S_2$ with $U-O_2-S_2$ phase stability diagram at wide range of sulfur potential, $UO_2$ remains unreacted, while RE oxides are sulfidized. The Gibbs free energy change(${\Delta}G^{\circ}$) of sulfidization of RE oxides is lower than that of uranium oxides. Thus, the selective formation of RE sulfides is possible during sulfidization of RE and uranium oxides at lower temperature. $CS_2$ was selected as a sulfidizing agent, because it is a stronger sulfidizing agent than other agents and reacts at lower temperature.