PMID- 24705012 OWN - NLM STAT- PubMed-not-MEDLINE DCOM- 20150422 LR - 20140616 IS - 1872-9800 (Electronic) IS - 0969-8043 (Linking) VI - 90 DP - 2014 Aug TI - Handling interferences in (8)(9)Sr and (9)(0)Sr measurements of reactor coolant water: a method based on strontium separation chemistry. PG - 94-101 LID - S0969-8043(14)00123-7 [pii] LID - 10.1016/j.apradiso.2014.03.022 [doi] AB - Measurements for determining the activity of (89)Sr and (90)Sr in reactor coolant water are associated with limitations due to interferences from radionuclides with similar chemical properties and beta(-)-energies. From a measurement bias point-of-view these interferences would result mainly in an overestimated activity concentration of (90)Sr. In order to address the interference problem, a common and well-known method was used in order to show the need for sufficient decontamination. An improvement was achieved by taking the sample through two initial strontium separations in order to increase the decontamination factor. This method determines the activity concentration of (89)Sr and (90)Sr, via its daughter nuclide (90)Y, by Cherenkov counting. This work is primarily based on theoretical calculations of strontium-, yttrium- and other potential interfering radionuclide ratios after instant fission. The work done to confirm the theoretical calculations were carried through on spiked strontium standard solutions and fresh reactor coolant water. The reactor coolant water was known to contain interferences at a composition resembling that of instant fission. The detection limit for double separation was calculated to 0.17 Bq/kg for (90)Sr and 0.38 Bq/kg for (89)Sr. When using methods that solely rely on strontium resins, this paper shows that the decontamination factor (DF) is significantly higher when using double separation than that of a single separation. The paper also shows that the DF of an initial double strontium separation is as effective when it comes to removing high ratio interferences as separations done with both Sr- and Ln-resin (EiChrom Technologies, Inc., 2003; Tovedal et al., 2009b). However, 'old' samples, where e.g. (140)Ba and (89)Sr has decayed, does not benefit from double separation. Furthermore, samples with low ratios of interfering radionuclides does not benefit from using this method either, seeing as this is a more time consuming method due to the double separations. CI - Copyright (c) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. FAU - Holmgren, S AU - Holmgren S AD - Swedish Defence Research Agency, SE-901 82 Umea, Sweden. Electronic address: stina.holmgren@foi.se. FAU - Tovedal, A AU - Tovedal A AD - Swedish Defence Research Agency, SE-901 82 Umea, Sweden. FAU - Jonsson, S AU - Jonsson S AD - Swedish Defence Research Agency, SE-901 82 Umea, Sweden. FAU - Nygren, U AU - Nygren U AD - Swedish Defence Research Agency, SE-901 82 Umea, Sweden. FAU - Rameback, H AU - Rameback H AD - Swedish Defence Research Agency, SE-901 82 Umea, Sweden; Chalmers University of Technology, Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Nuclear Chemistry, SE-412 96 Goteborg, Sweden. LA - eng PT - Journal Article DEP - 20140326 PL - England TA - Appl Radiat Isot JT - Applied radiation and isotopes : including data, instrumentation and methods for use in agriculture, industry and medicine JID - 9306253 OTO - NOTNLM OT - (85)Sr OT - (89)Sr OT - (90)Sr OT - Interferences OT - Reactor coolant water OT - Separation EDAT- 2014/04/08 06:00 MHDA- 2014/04/08 06:01 CRDT- 2014/04/08 06:00 PHST- 2013/10/08 00:00 [received] PHST- 2014/03/04 00:00 [revised] PHST- 2014/03/18 00:00 [accepted] PHST- 2014/04/08 06:00 [entrez] PHST- 2014/04/08 06:00 [pubmed] PHST- 2014/04/08 06:01 [medline] AID - S0969-8043(14)00123-7 [pii] AID - 10.1016/j.apradiso.2014.03.022 [doi] PST - ppublish SO - Appl Radiat Isot. 2014 Aug;90:94-101. doi: 10.1016/j.apradiso.2014.03.022. Epub 2014 Mar 26.