PUREX
Spent fuel reprocessing process for plutonium and uranium recovery / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dear Wikiwand AI, let's keep it short by simply answering these key questions:
Can you list the top facts and stats about PUREX?
Summarize this article for a 10 year old
PUREX (plutonium uranium reduction extraction) is a chemical method used to purify fuel for nuclear reactors or nuclear weapons.[7] PUREX is the de facto standard aqueous nuclear reprocessing method for the recovery of uranium and plutonium from used nuclear fuel (spent nuclear fuel, or irradiated nuclear fuel). It is based on liquid–liquid extraction ion-exchange.[8]
PUREX is applied to spent nuclear fuel, which consists primarily of very high atomic-weight (actinoid or "actinide") elements (e.g. uranium, plutonium, americium) along with smaller amounts of material composed of lighter atoms, notably the fission products produced by reactor operation.
The actinoid elements in this case consist primarily of the unconsumed remains of the original fuel (typically U-235, U-238, and/or Pu-239).