News By Location

Scientists from the DOE's Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory and Khlopin Radium Institute in Russia received an $800,000 three-year grant from DOE’s Environmental Management Science Program to study and improve their solution to separating out much of the radioactive material in nuclear waste. The Universal Extraction, or UNEX, process is the first demonstrated technology of its kind capable of removing multiple radioactive elements from high-level nuclear waste in one step.

Researchers can now precisely map mineral crystals and bacterial growth on basalt using a customized laser imaging Fourier transform mass spectrometer. A team has created high-resolution pseudo-images showing the arrangement of minerals within basalt and bacterial growth on the rock surface to better understand why some microbes are attracted to specific minerals. The technique creates highly reproducible two-dimensional maps of the bacterial-mineral interface, providing critical information about bacterial metabolism.

A different blend of gasoline is being pumped into government vehicles at the U.S. Department of Energy's Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory. It's reducing petroleum consumption and helping the INEEL cut air emissions without additional fuel costs.

In a portion of fractured basalt more than 200 feet below the surface of the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory lies a highly concentrated sludge of the heavy liquid toxin trichloroethene (TCE). INEEL engineers are determined to rid the rock of the toxic solvent which, over more than 30 years, has gradually leached into the groundwater of the Snake River aquifer.

The Idaho Accelerator Center stands as a monument to the future--using science to develop devices to further national security, healthcare, and business.

INEEL researchers used pressurized, heated carbon dioxide and an added metal binding chemical compound to clean radioactively contaminated soil. The method removed more than 69 percent of the plutonium and americium from spiked, local soil, report two chemists from the U.S. Department of Energy's Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory in the October 2001 issue of Radiochemica Acta. This is the first time supercritical fluid extraction it has been used to remove plutonium from soil.

Researchers at DOE’s Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory can now detect part-per-million levels of chemical warfare agents chemical warfare agents such as the blister agent HD or the nerve agent VX on soil or plant surfaces within 5 to 10 minutes using a new ion-trap secondary ion mass spectrometer.

Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL) have developed an energy-efficient process for producing alkylate-a high-octane gasoline blend that is very low in environmental pollutants such as sulfur and benzene. Instead of using a liquid catalyst, the team generates alkylate using a solid acid catalyst to change low-octane gaseous feedstock into liquid alkylate. Once the solid catalyst becomes coated with undesired hydrocarbons, researchers use a supercritical fluid solvent to clean and rejuvenate the catalyst, and then begin alkylate production again.

Researchers at the Department of Energy's Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory can detect part-per-million levels of chemical warfare agents such as the blister agent HD or the nerve agent VX using a novel ion-trap secondary ion mass spectrometer (IT-SIMS). INEEL researchers are developing surface analysis instrumentation specifically for environmental samples such as soil or plant surfaces. Chemical warfare agent detection is just one possible application of IT-SIMS. Results are published in the International Journal of Mass Spectrometry, volume 208.

One of the hardest metallic materials known, Super Hard Steel has been recognized as one of the 100 most significant technological achievements for the year 2001 by R&D Magazine. Super Hard Steel can be sprayed onto a wide variety of metal surfaces using conventionally available thermal spray technologies, and surpasses the existing commercial coatings in wear, corrosion and impact resistance.