Development of radiochemical analysis strategies for decommissioning activities

Radioactive waste generated in decommissioning activities need be classified according to their radioactive content. The radiological information required by national authorities includes diverse alpha and beta emitters, which can only be determined after a radiochemical separation process. This paper presents the work on the development of radiochemical methods for the simultaneous separation of several radionuclides in concrete, steel and graphite samples, on the basis of individual sample treatments which merge in a common radiochemical separation procedure based on extraction chromatography.