JPS58146695A - Floatable apparatus for collecting sea water uranium - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] This bulletin contains application data before electronic filing, so abstract data is not recorded.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a device for harvesting uranium from seawater using ocean currents.

Previously proposed devices that adsorb and collect uranium from seawater using ocean currents generally had the following drawbacks and were not suitable for processing large amounts of seawater.

(1) Since particles, nets, fibers, etc. are used as uranium adsorbents, the resistance when water passes through them is large;
To avoid this, it is necessary to make the water flow cross-sectional area of the adsorption layer extremely large.

Therefore, the device becomes large.

(2) As the size of the device increases, the mechanism for holding the uranium adsorbent becomes larger and the construction cost increases. In particular, when a typhoon passes over the ocean, the force is 5 to 10 times greater than in normal times, so a powerful holding device is required, which significantly increases the construction cost.

The present invention aims to solve these problems by making it possible to evacuate into the sea when a typhoon passes, thereby reducing the size of the device and making it possible to efficiently and uniformly bring seawater into contact with the uranium adsorbent. I did it like that. The purpose is to provide equipment for extracting uranium from seawater.

For this reason, the seawater uranium extraction device of the present invention is a floating body with a uranium adsorbent that can be spread left and right with respect to ocean currents and can adsorb and collect uranium in seawater, and a ballast tank that can be filled with water to adjust the floating and sinking of the floating body. It is characterized in that it is provided with mooring cables attached to the left and right sides of the floating body and connected to the support structure.

According to the above-described apparatus of the present invention, it can be implemented in the following manner.

(1) By using a lattice-shaped uranium adsorbent, the pressure loss when seawater flows through the system is significantly reduced, allowing a large amount of seawater to contact the adsorbent efficiently and uniformly. do.

(2) A large number of panels incorporating a large number of adsorbents in a certain direction are connected to form an adsorbent, and an air tank is attached to the top of this adsorbent to create a floating body, and the floating body drifts alone on the sea surface. By making the mooring possible, the force required to hold the mooring is reduced.

(3) At the bottom of the adsorbent, a ballast tank with adjustable floating and sinking is installed to keep the adsorbent on the seabed or deep under the sea when a typhoon passes through.

By avoiding the effects of wind and waves caused by typhoons.

Reduce the force required for mooring and downsize the mooring device.

(4) Placing a membrane or plate-shaped baffle member on the lower surface of the fan-shaped part formed by the adsorbents arranged in a sawtooth pattern to prevent ocean currents from passing through the lower part of the adsorbents. As a result, it increases the efficiency of seawater contact with the adsorbent.

(5) By using the energy of ocean currents to obtain the power required to pass water through the adsorbent, equipment costs and power costs for pumps required to transport vast amounts of seawater can be reduced.

In view of these points, according to the present invention, a large amount of seawater is brought into contact with the uranium adsorbent at a high rate.

A compact device for absorbing seawater uranium can be realized.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be explained with reference to the drawings.
1 to 3 show a floating type seawater uranium extraction apparatus as a first embodiment of the present invention.

Fig. 1 is a side view thereof, Fig. 2 is a plan view thereof, Fig. 3 is a front view of the floating body, and Figs. 4 to 6 are floating type seawater uranium extraction equipment as a second embodiment of the present invention. Fig. 4 is a longitudinal sectional view thereof.

FIG. 5 is a plan view thereof, and FIG. 6 is a front view of the floating body.

The mooring buoy 1 as a support structure is a single point mooring buoy (
SBM buoy], and the mooring line 2 attached to it is
It is a wire rope or a nylon rope, and is freely fed out and retracted by a winch (not shown) on the buoy 1, so that its length can be adjusted.

The adsorbent 4 is made up of a large number of lattice-shaped uranium adsorbents arranged in a panel in a fixed direction, and by having an air tank 3 at the top, it becomes a floating body that can drift on the sea surface by itself. The mooring lines 2 of the mooring buoy 1 are anchored to the left and right sides of the floating body.

As a result, the adsorbent 4 is arranged and held on the sea surface in a linear shape (first embodiment) or sawtooth shape (second embodiment) so as to be perpendicular to the ocean current.

The ballast tank 5 attached to the lower side of the adsorbent 4 has a seawater injection pulp 6, an exhaust drainage pulp 7, and an air injection pulp 8, and these pulps 6 to 8 are operated on the mooring buoy 1 or on land. hand.

By adjusting the amount of air and seawater in the ballast tank 5, the floating and sinking of the adsorbent 4 is adjusted.

In this way, by the ballast tank 5.

The mooring depth of the adsorbent 4 in the sea is adjusted, so if an abnormally large force is applied to this device when a typhoon passes, the adsorbent 4 can be sunk to the seabed.

For example, in a 200 ton-U/year uranium extraction plant, if the adsorbent bodies 4 are arranged in a sawtooth shape as in the second embodiment, the force required to hold the mooring can be reduced. Although 145 58M buoys are sufficient, 10 buoys are required in case one typhoon passes, which is one of the main reasons for the increase in plant construction costs.

In the device of the present invention, by providing a ballast tank 5 that can adjust the floating and sinking, the number of mooring buoys fV2 can be reduced to five, thereby significantly reducing the construction cost. In a second embodiment of the invention.

A membrane-like baffle member 9 is stretched from the lower side of the inlet B of the adsorbent 4 formed in a sawtooth shape to the lower side of the adsorbent 24. This baffle member 9 is made of flexible and water-resistant materials such as plastic, rubber, and cloth.
．． 0 fixed between the adsorbent 4 and the ballast tank 5
When the baffle member 9 is installed in this manner, the seawater that flows in through the inlet B formed in the sawtooth-shaped adsorbent 4 passes through the adsorbent without passing through the lower part of the adsorbent 4. This allows uranium to be adsorbed and collected in a highly efficient manner.

The baffle member 9 is not necessarily limited to a film-like shape and may be plate-like, block-like, etc., but by making it into a film shape, it is possible to prevent the lower ballast tank 5 from increasing the external force required for mooring one device. Capable of capturing inflowing seawater up to a depth of 0 or more As detailed above, the float-sinking seawater uranium extraction device of the present invention has a simple structure and can extract uranium from seawater extremely efficiently. This also ensures safety during stormy weather. −

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Figures 1 to 3 show a floating type seawater uranium extraction device as a first embodiment of the present invention, with Figure 1 being a side view and Figure 2 being a side view of the device.
Figure 3 is a plan view of the floating body, Figure 3 is a front view of the floating body, Figures 4 to 6 show a sinking type seawater uranium extraction device as a second embodiment of the present invention, and Figure 4 is a front view of the floating body. Longitudinal sectional view, 5th
The figure is a plan view of the floating body, and Figure 6 is a front view of the floating body.
Adsorbent, 5. Ballast tank, 6. Seawater injection valve, 7. Exhaust drainage valve. 8. Air injection valve, 9. Membrane-like obstruction member. A...ocean current, B...inlet. Sub-Agent Patent Attorney Yoshihiko Iinuma Figure 1 Figure 3

Claims (2)

[Claims] (1) A floating body with a uranium adsorbent that can be spread out from side to side with respect to ocean currents and can adsorb and collect uranium in seawater, and is provided with a ballast tank that can be filled with water to adjust the float of the floating body. A feature of this floating body is that mooring cables attached to the left and right sides of the floating body are connected to a support structure. A float-and-sink seawater uranium extraction device. (2) The female body with the uranium adsorbent is formed to have an inlet portion that takes in ocean current, and a baffle member is stretched from the lower side of the female body to the lower side of the floating body. A float-and-sink seawater uranium extraction device according to claim 1.