Assessment of Natural Radioactivity in Cements Used as Building Materials in Poland

Abstract

It has been analyzed in this article the radioactivity concentrations of 226Ra, 232Th, 40K and radiological hazard parameters in different types of cements commonly used in Poland and available on the Polish market. The radiological hazard parameters are, in particular, absorbed gamma dose rate, annual effective dose, radium equivalent activity, the external hazard index, and the gamma and alpha indices. The radionuclide activities of the most important radionuclides 226Ra, 232Th, 40K have been determined by gamma-ray spectrometry with the use of two kinds of spectrometers of different operational parameters. One performed also measurements on 30-day and 45-day aged samples as to verify if there is a statistically significant difference in radioactivity concentration for shorter and longer aging time. The radioactivity concentrations in the cement samples ranged from 21.7–75.7 Bq·kg−1 for 226Ra, 12.3–47.3 Bq·kg−1 for 232Th to 123–430 Bq·kg−1 for 40K. The radiological parameters in cement samples were calculated as follows: mean radium equivalent activity Raeq = 127 Bq·kg−1, mean absorbed gamma dose rate D = 115 nGy·h−1, mean annual effective dose E = 570 µSv·y−1, external hazard index Hex = 0.32, internal hazard index Hin = 0.51, mean activity concentration index Iγ = 0.47 and mean alpha index Iα = 0.28. The results were compared with the reported data from other countries and the international standard values given by European Commission (EC) and United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR 2000). Finally, thorough statistical analysis has been performed.

Environmental Radiation Dosimetry for school buildings, hospitals and health centers in Babil Governorate-Iraq using TL-technique

“…It appears that some areas have high absorbed radiation doses, which have a direct effect on the thermal thermoluminescence signal. These results are in line with those of previous researchers, and they can be attributed to building materials' inherently radioactive constituents (Al-Salihi et al, 2022;Alhiall & Alsalihi, 2019;El-Taher, 2012;Hassan et al, 2022;Imani et al, 2021;Lewicka, Piotrowska, Łukaszek-Chmielewska, & Drzymała, 2022).…”