Argonne-SRNL Agreement Supports
Critical DOE, National Priorities
Joint research efforts to focus on nuclear energy, environmental management
Argonne National Laboratory has signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU)
with Savannah River National Laboratory
(SRNL) to collaborate on nuclear energy and environmental management research
projects in support of critical U.S. Energy Department (DOE) needs and other
important national priorities.
"The MOU allows Argonne to remain a leader in nuclear energy research,"
Argonne Director Robert Rosner said. "Argonne has the nation's largest
concentration of scientists and engineers involved in fast-reactor design and
nuclear fuel separations and processing technologies – expertise that is
essential to developing next-generation nuclear energy systems, a key component
of President Bush's Global
Nuclear Energy Partnership."
The agreement will bring together the strengths of the two national
laboratories, including SRNL's applied science and engineering expertise and
their nuclear facilities for the safe handling and study of highly radioactive
materials. The SRNL facilities include the Shielded Cells,
where highly skilled employees use remote manipulator arms to perform work with
radioactive samples, while safely protected behind thick shielding. Argonne
brings to the partnership scientific and engineering expertise and
state-of-the-art radiological facilities for studying chemical phenomena at the
smallest scale. Among the facilities that may be used in understanding materials
properties include the Advanced Photon Source, the brightest X-ray beam in the
western hemisphere.
"This agreement blends the key skills and capabilities from SRNL and Argonne
for advancing U.S. nuclear energy capabilities," said G. Todd Wright, SRNL
laboratory director. "SRNL's core competencies for the development and
deployment of applied technology solutions for safe nuclear facilities operation
will help this partnership make advances that support important energy
independence initiatives for the nation."
Argonne and SRNL will collaborate in areas in which the two research
facilities have complementary strengths, including actinide chemistry,
separations science and technology, and computational chemistry and modeling.
"Advances in these research areas are vital for any U.S. expansion of the use of
safe, clean nuclear energy, closing the nuclear fuel cycle and management of
legacy nuclear materials," said Mark Peters, Argonne's program manager for the
Global Nuclear Energy Project (GNEP) and the deputy to the associate laboratory
director of energy sciences and engineering.
Actinide chemistry involves the study of radioactive heavy metals, such as
uranium, neptunium and plutonium, that are indigenous to nuclear energy
processes. Maintenance of a core competency associated with actinide science is
critical to sustain continued growth of nuclear programs in the United States
and to effectively treat legacy nuclear materials. Argonne's actinide experience
dates back to the earliest days of the Manhattan Project and is focused on basic
scientific understanding and knowledge. SRNL's experience, which dates back to
the early 1950s, has been generally focused on production-scale deployment,
including the design and development of specialized technologies for the safe
characterization, purification, stabilization and disposition of these
materials.
Separations science involves the design, study and application of processes
for separating mixtures of compounds into their component substances. The two
laboratories have made significant contributions to the field over their
histories. These contributions date to the earliest years of the U.S. nuclear
enterprise and continue to support such national initiatives as GNEP. The labs
will develop a joint plan for advancing separations science and technology
programs to meet the current and future needs of DOE with a focus on the DOE
Offices of Nuclear Energy and
Environmental Management.
Argonne National Laboratory brings the world's brightest scientists and
engineers together to find exciting and creative new solutions to pressing
national problems in science and technology. The nation's first national
laboratory, Argonne conducts leading-edge basic and applied scientific research
in virtually every scientific discipline. Argonne researchers work closely with
researchers from hundreds of companies, universities, and federal, state and
municipal agencies to help them solve their specific problems, advance America
's scientific leadership and prepare the nation for a better future. With
employees from more than 60 nations, Argonne is managed by UChicago Argonne, LLC
for the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Science.
Savannah River National Laboratory, located in Aiken, S.C., puts science to
work to provide applied R&D solutions in the areas of national and homeland
security, energy security, and environmental management. It serves as the
corporate laboratory for DOE's Office of Environmental Management and is managed
for DOE by Washington Savannah River Company, a subsidiary or the Washington
Division of URS Corp.
Argonne National Laboratory
News Release, May
15, 2008
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