Chlorite: Geochemical properties, Dissolution kinetcis and Ni(II) sorption

Abstract: In Sweden, among other countries, a deep multi-barrier geological repository, KBS-3, is planned for the burial of nuclear waste. One of the barriers is identified as the grantic bedrock itself and in this environment chlorite is present at surfaces in fracture zones.This thesis is focused on characterisation of chlorite samples and studies of their dissolution and sorption behaviour, in order to verify chlorites capacity to retard possible radionuclide migration in the case of leaking canisters.Chlorite dissolution of has been studied in the pH interval 2-12, and as expected the dissolution is highest at acidic pH and at most alkaline pH, whereas dissolution is lowest at near neutral pH values. Chemical and physical properties of chlorites clearly influence the dissolution rates, and at steady-state dissolution rates in the interval 10-12 ‑ 10-13 mol g-1 s-1 was observed.Sorption studies were performed since Ni(II) is one of the important activation products in spent nuclear fuel and sorption data on minerals like chlorite are lacking. Ni(II) sorption onto chlorite was studied using batch technique as a function of; pH, concentration of Ni(II), ionic strength and solid concentrations. As expected, the sorption of Ni(II) onto chlorite was pH dependent, but not ionic strength dependent, with a sorption maximum at pH ~ 8, and with a Kd of ~ 103 cm3/g. This confirms that the Ni(II) sorption onto chlorite is primarily acting through surface complexation. The acid-base properties were determined by titrations and described by a non-electrostatical surface complexation model in FITEQL. Further, the sorption results were fit with a 2-pK NEM model and three surface complexes, Chl_OHNi2+, Chl_OHNi(OH)+ and Chl_OHNi(OH)2, gave the best fit using FITEQL.