Kurion, Inc
1355 Columbia Park , Trail Richland,, United Kingdom

Kurion creates technological solutions to minimize and stabilize nuclear and hazardous waste for safe, secure and permanent disposal.

About Kurion, Inc.

Kurion’s suite of waste separation, stabilization and robotic technologies are complemented by engineering and environmental services that together provide an execution platform to service the world’s largest nuclear and hazardous waste sites.

Backed by venture capital firms Lux Capital, Firelake Capital and Acadia Woods Partners, the Kurion executive team employs a collective 150 years of industry experience managing nuclear and hazardous waste for commercial and government sites worldwide.

Kurion is based in Irvine, Calif., and operates a technology development center at its radioactive materials licensed facility in Oak Ridge, Tenn.; a detritiation testing facility in Houston, Texas; two facilities in Richland, Wash., for non-radioactive demonstration testing, engineering and storage of mobile systems; and an office in Loveland, Colo. for engineering design and development.

Kurion supports the TOMODACHI Initiative, a partnership born out of support for Japan’s recovery from the Great East Japan Earthquake, investing in the next generation of Japanese and American leaders through educational and cultural exchanges.

Kurion offers key technologies for waste minimization and stabilization. These technologies are used to treat nuclear and hazardous waste for safe, secure and permanent disposal.

Separation Technologies

Ion Specific Media (ISM)

Kurion has developed several classes of Ion Specific Media (ISM) to selectively remove hazardous ions from aqueous waste streams. Many of the byproducts of the fission process are ions dissolved in water that emit alpha, beta and gamma particles. Of highest concern are environmentally relevant ions and ions which have relatively long half-lives, such as: 137Cs+ (~30 year half-life), 90Sr2+ (~30 year half-life), 63Ni2+, 58/60Co2+, 129Sb (as [Sb(OH)6]-), 129I-, 99Tc (as TcO4-), among others. These ions can be captured by ISM using a process called ion-exchange. Since June 2011, Kurion’s ISM’s have been used to treat 134/137Cs+ from the wastewater at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant site. Once used, these exclusively inorganic media can be vitrified with Kurion’s stabilization technologies, MVS® and GeoMelt®.

Stabilization Technologies

In 2012 Kurion acquired GeoMelt® Technologies from Impact Services. The GeoMelt® In-Container Vitrification (ICV™) approach complements and shares several key traits of Kurion’s Modular Vitrification System (MVS®) – it is a cost-effective, modular, robust and easily deployable in-container solution. Where the ICV™ approach has strengths in debris-laden or pre-containerized waste, the MVS® is ideal for liquid and tank waste where temperature, glass former and process flexibility is important to address waste streams with varying and/or challenging chemistries and densities. GeoMelt® has been used all over the world and has many different applications. From hazardous waste (e.g., PCB's) to nuclear waste to mixed waste (both hazardous and nuclear), GeoMelt® is a proven technology for stabilization.

Kurion’s waste separation and stabilization solutions are used to treat nuclear and hazardous waste around the world. Its Ion Specific Media (ISM) separation technology is known for its contribution to the cleanup at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear plant following the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami. Kurion’s GeoMelt® In-Container Vitrification (ICV™) and Sub-Surface Planar™ processes have been in commercial use since the 1990s and have treated in excess of 26,000 tons of waste in the U.S., Japan and Australia.

Following is a sample of the most prominent and meaningful applications to demonstrate the diversity and reach of Kurion’s solutions, as well as the familiarity of the Kurion staff with very different regulatory environments.