Nuclear waste management provider Kurion acquires GeoMelt

ISVJ GeoMelt System

Nuclear waste management provider Kurion acquires GeoMelt

By Greentech Lead America: Kurion, an innovator in
nuclear waste management, has acquired all assets relating to the GeoMelt
business from Impact Services, Kurion also acquired the exclusive, perpetual,
worldwide and freely assignable and sub licensable rights of the license
holder, GeoSafe Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Battelle.

The acquisition of GeoMelt provides Kurion with a
complementary and commercially proven vitrification process. Vitrification, the
process of converting material into glass, is considered to be the “gold
standard” by international regulators for waste stabilization and
isolation prior to disposal.

The GeoMelt technologies were initially developed by the
U.S. Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). It is
a collection of patented and proprietary in-container and in-situ vitrification
processes designed to destroy hazardous organics and immobilize radioactive
materials and heavy metals.

The GeoMelt process has treated in excess of 26,000
metric tons of waste in the U.S., Japan and Australia, including remediating
sites contaminated with radioisotopes, pesticides, herbicides, solvents, PCBs,
dioxins, furans and heavy metals.

The acquisition of the GeoMelt technology to its portfolio
helps Kurion expand its addressable market to include nuclear, hazardous and
mixed waste contaminated debris, soils and pre-containerized wastes.

“The GeoMelt In-Container Vitrification (ICV(TM))
approach complements and shares several key traits of Kurion’s Modular
Vitrification System (MVS(R)) – 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 wastes where temperature, glass former and process flexibility is
important to address waste streams with varying and/or challenging chemistries
and densities,” said John Raymont, founder and CEO, Kurion.  

The GeoMelt in-situ Sub-Surface Planar process is unique
and especially valuable for large applications, such as treatment of large
quantities of contaminated soils found at sites like the Fukushima Prefecture
in Japan, mining sites, or weapons complex sites. Kurion anticipates contracts
at a number of sites in the coming months.

[email protected]