Influence of humic acid on plutonium sorption to gibbsite: Determination of Pu-humic acid complexation constants and ternary sorption studies

Abstract

In this work stability constants describing Pu(IV), Th(IV), and Np(V) binding to Leonardite humic acid (HA) were determined using a discrete pK_a model. A hybrid ultra-filtration/equilibrium dialysis, ligand exchange technique was used to generate the partitioning data. Ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA) was used as a reference ligand to allow the aqueous chemistry of the Pu(IV)-HA system to be examined over a range of pH values, while minimizing the possibility of precipitation of Pu(IV). The conditional stability constant for Pu(IV) complexation with HA determined as part of this work is log β₁₁₂ = 6.76 ± 0.14 based on the equation: Pu⁴⁺ + HL3 + 2H₂O ↔ Pu(OH)₂L3⁺ + 3H⁺ where HA is represented by HL3 (a binding site on the HA with a pK_a value of 7). This value is three orders of magnitude higher than the Th(IV)-HA constant and between six and eight orders of magnitude higher than the Np(V)-HA complex. The magnitude of the stability constants and the general trend of increasing complexation strength with increasing pH is consistent with previous observations. The Pu(IV)-HA stability constants were used to model sorption of Pu(IV) to gibbsite in the presence of HA. Assuming only aqueous Pu-HA complexes and AlOH-Pu surface complexes, the model was unable to predict the observed data which exhibited greater sorption at pH 4 relative to pH 6; a phenomenon which does not occur in the absence of HA. Therefore, this study demonstrates that ternary Pu-HA-gibbsite complexes may form under low pH conditions and exhibit greater sorption than that observed in the absence of HA. Although the presence of HA may increase the solubility/aqueous concentrations of Pu in the absence of a solid phase, formation of ternary complexes may indeed retard the subsurface migration of Pu. The corollary to this finding is that increased mobility may occur if the ternary surface complex forms on a mobile colloid rather than part of the subsurface matrix