Selective removal of cesium from acid solutions with immobilized copper ferrocyanide

Copper ferrocyanide can be immobilized on Chelex-20, a technical grade chelating resin, for selective removal of cesium from neutral to acidic solutions. The immobilized copper ferrocyanide is much easier to handle than the copper ferrocyanide powder in extraction and separation of cesium from aqueous solutions. In the presence of a reducing agent such as hydrazine, the immobilized copper ferrocyanide resin is able to remove 98% of the cesium from a simulated acid waste solution in one cycle of batch experiments. The resin shows promising properties for remediation of acidic nuclear wastes and for concentration of Cs-137 from environmental samples for quantitative analysis.