Argonne-SRNL agreement supports critical DOE, national priorities

Joint research efforts to focus on nuclear energy, environmental management

Argonne, Ill. (May 15, 2008) – Argonne National Laboratory has signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) to collaborate on nuclear energy and environmental management research projects in support of critical U.S. Energy Department (DOE) needs and other important national priorities.

"The MOU allows Argonne to remain a leader in nuclear energy research," Argonne director Robert Rosner said. "Argonne has the nation's largest concentration of scientists and engineers involved in fast-reactor design and nuclear fuel separations and processing technologies – expertise that is essential to developing next-generation nuclear energy systems, a key component of President Bush's Global Nuclear Energy Partnership" (GNEP), Rosner added.

The agreement will bring together the strengths of the two National Laboratories, including SRNL’s applied science and engineering expertise and their nuclear facilities for the safe handling and study of highly radioactive materials. The SRNL facilities include the Shielded Cells, where highly skilled employees use remote manipulator arms to perform work with radioactive samples, while safely protected behind thick shielding. Argonne brings to the partnership scientific and engineering expertise and state-of-the-art radiological facilities for studying chemical phenomena at the smallest scale. Among the facilities that may be used in understanding materials properties include the Advanced Photon Source, the brightest x-ray beam in the western hemisphere.

“This agreement blends the key skills and capabilities from SRNL and Argonne for advancing U.S. nuclear energy capabilities. SRNL’s core competencies for the development and deployment of applied technology solutions for safe nuclear facilities operation will help this partnership make advances that support important energy independence initiatives for the nation,” said Dr. G. Todd Wright, SRNL Laboratory Director.

Argonne and SRNL will collaborate in areas in which the two research facilities have complementary strengths, including actinide chemistry, separations science and technology, and computational chemistry and modeling. "Advances in these research areas are vital for any U.S. expansion of the use of safe, clean nuclear energy, closing the nuclear fuel cycle, and management of legacy nuclear materials," said Mark Peters, Argonne's program manager for GNEP and the Deputy to the Associate Laboratory Director of Energy Sciences and Engineering.