Gel Product Traps Radioactive Contamination
CBI Polymers, a division of Cellular Bioengineering Inc. on Nov. 7 announced the launch of its DeconGel™ 1101 product.
The product is the most effective radiological decontamination solution available to industries worldwide ranging from nuclear power utilities, decommissioning and decontamination sites, hospital facilities, and research laboratories, according to a press release from the company.
DeconGel™ decontaminates a broad range of surfaces and contaminants. Its binding properties allow it to trap and encapsulate a wide spectrum of radioisotopes on different substrates in a simple, no-preparation process allowing easy and safe disposal without the use of water or cleaning agents.
It has been in beta testing for the past year and has secured more than 30 customers around the world, including Ontario Power Generation, Washington Savannah River Company, Sandia National Laboratory, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Colorado State University, and Tripler Army Medical Center.
Dan Young, First Line manager at Ontario Power Generation, said: "We used the gel to decontaminate a concrete room that was difficult to clean with our current method. The application was very simple. We applied the gel and peeled the next day. It came up from the floor very easily with minimal waste generated and reduced the loose contamination from 5000 cpm (counts per minute) to 0 cpm."
DeconGel™ was initially funded by the Hawaii Technology Development Venture under its contract with the Office of Naval Research. Additional R&D funding was secured through the USAF Force Protection Battlelab, HTDV, and the National Defense Center of Excellence for Research in Ocean Sciences under its contract with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.