Pre-Viking Swedish Hillfort Glass: A Novel Long-Term Alteration Analogue for Vitrified 6 Nuclear Waste

Published

March 1, 2018

Author(s)

Jamie L. Weaver, Carolyn Pearce, Rolf Sjoblom, John McCloy, Micah Miller, Tamas Varga, Bruce Arey, Michele Conroy, David Peeler, Robert Koestler, Paula DePriest, Edward Vicenzi, Albert Kruger

Abstract

Examining ancient anthropogenic glasses altered in natural environments over hundreds of years can inform and verify models for predicting long-term rates of glass corrosion. Understanding corrosion mechanisms is critical for modeling the performance of nuclear waste glasses that are required to retain radionuclides for >1000 years, and will be disposed in shallow subsurface environments. Two types of ancient Swedish hillfort glasses — one clear, iron-poor glass, and one dark, iron-rich glass — have been characterized to evaluate their use as long-term alteration analogues for vitrified nuclear waste disposed under near-surface conditions. These glasses are of interest to the nuclear waste glass community as they have comparable elemental compositions to glasses under development for disposal of nuclear waste at the Hanford Site, USA. They are also of historical importance to Sweden; thus, an analysis protocol, focusing on non-destructive to semi-destructive analyses, has been developed to maintain the historical integrity of the samples. X-ray computed tomography, micro X-ray diffraction, micro X-ray fluorescence, and electron microscopy data are presented for both vitreous and mineralogical components of the hillfort samples. The internal microstructure and elemental distribution of the glasses, including the presence of crystalline inclusions, are discussed in the context of ancient glassmaking technology.

Citation

International Journal of Applied Glass Science

Pub Type

Journals

Keywords

glass alteration, archaeology, long-term model

Citation

Weaver, J. , Pearce, C. , Sjoblom, R. , McCloy, J. , Miller, M. , Varga, T. , Arey, B. , Conroy, M. , Peeler, D. , Koestler, R. , DePriest, P. , Vicenzi, E. and Kruger, A. (2018), Pre-Viking Swedish Hillfort Glass: A Novel Long-Term Alteration Analogue for Vitrified 6 Nuclear Waste, International Journal of Applied Glass Science (Accessed May 8, 2024)