Most of the Earth's surface is covered by oceans, which are teeming with a wide variety of life. Interestingly, these huge bodies of water also contain diluted distributed uranium ions.
The extraction of these ions has the potential to provide renewable fuel for nuclear power generation.
A recent study by ACS Central Science describes a new material designed for electrochemical extraction.
This innovation is more effective at capturing elusive uranium ions from seawater than previous technologies.
A nuclear power reactor releases energy naturally stored inside atoms and converts it into heat and electricity by breaking them down – a process known as fission. Uranium has become the most popular element in this process because it is unstable and radioactive in all its forms, making it easy to **.
Currently, the metal is extracted from rocks, but uranium deposits are limited. However, the Nuclear Energy Agency estimates that 4.5 billion tonnes of uranium float in our oceans as dissolved uranyl ions.
This protected area is more than 1,000 times larger than on land. However, extracting these ions has proven to be challenging, as the materials that do so do not have sufficient surface area to capture the ions effectively.
Therefore, Rui Zhao, Guangshan Zhu, and colleagues hope to develop an electrode material with many microscopic nooks and crannies that can be used to electrochemically capture uranium ions from seawater.
This new coated cloth effectively accumulates uranium (yellow) on its surface from the seawater of the uranium spikes. **Adapted from ACS Central Science, 2023, DOI:101021/acscentsci.3c01291
To make the electrodes, the team started with flexible cloth woven with carbon fiber.
They coated the cloth with two special monomers and polymerized them.
Next, they treated the cloth with hydroxylamine hydrochloride to add the amide oxime group to the polymer.
The natural porous structure of the cloth is:
Many tiny pockets have been created that can be snuggled up inside and easily capture uranyl ions.
In the experiment, the researchers will:
In natural ** or uranium-spiked seawater, a graphite anode is added, and a circulating current is run between the electrodes.
Over time, bright yellow uranium-based precipitates accumulate on the cathode cloth.
In the test using seawater collected from the Bohai Sea, the electrode extracted 12. per gram of coating active material over a 24-day period6 mg uranium.
is higher than most other uranium extraction materials tested by the team.
In addition, using electrochemical capture of ions is about three times faster than simply letting them accumulate naturally on the cloth.
The researchers say the work provides an efficient way to capture uranium from seawater, which could make the ocean a new leader in nuclear fuel.
Reference: "Self-Standing Porous Aromatic Skeleton Electrode for Efficient Electrochemical Uranium Extraction," Dingyang Chen, Yue Li, Xinyue Zhao, Minsi Shi, Xiaoyuan Shi, Rui Zhao, and Guangshan Zhu, December 13, 2023, ACS Central Science.
doi： 10.1021/acscentsci.3c01291