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Radiogeochemistry, mineralogy, lithology, radiogenic heat production, and health implication using airborne radiometric data of Ilesha and its surroundings

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Abstract

The current study analyzed and interpreted airborne radiometric data from Ilesha’s basement complex rock and its surroundings. At the surface, the concentrations of the most frequent primordial radionuclides notably K, elemental concentration of uranium eU, and elemental concentration of thorium eTh were measured. The weighted mean elemental and activity concentrations were 0.85%, 2.75 ppm, 10.22 ppm, and 267.54 Bq kg−1, 34.41 Bq kg−1, 41.51 Bq kg−1 for 40 K, 238U, and 232Th, respectively. The low concentration of 40 K was certainly due to the effects of weathering, kaolinization of granites, and pedogenesis activities. The abundance of uranium was ascribed to the availability of uranium minerals such as allanite, apatite, and sphene with accessories minerals, while that of thorium was due to minerals such as cheralite, thorite, uranothorite, thorianite, and uranothorianite with accessories minerals. The RPHR weighted mean 1.48 µWm−3 compared to the earth's crust mean between 0.8 and1.2 µWm−3 was higher due to significant presence of gneiss rocks in all the studied profiles. Radiological hazard, in particular, dose rates, external hazard index, internal hazard index, radium equivalent, annual gonadal dose, effective dose dispensed to various organs of the body were computed to determine the deleterious effects of rocks in the area. The weighted means of annual gonadal dose of 363.98 µSv y−1 and outdoor 0.91 × 10×3 and indoor 1.65 × 10−3 excessive life cancer risks were more than the global average 300 µSv y−1, 0.29 × 10−3 and 1.16 × 10−3. As a result, proper surveillance is required in the area in order to prevent epidemics occurrence in future.

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Data availability

Data for analysis and interpretation was made available by NGSA. Data was interpreted as seen in the Tables provided in the manuscript.

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Acknowledgements

The authors appreciate NGSA for making the survey data available for analysis and interpretation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Environmental, Radiation and Health Physics Division, Faculty of Science, Ekiti State University, Ado-Ekiti, Nigeria

    E. B. Faweya

  2. Department of Physical Sciences, College of Pure and Applied Sciences, Landmark University, Omu-Aran, Kwara State, Nigeria

    D. S. Olojede & S. O. Ikubanni

  3. Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, Federal University of Lafia, Lafia, Nigeria

    T. Adewumi

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  1. E. B. Faweya
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Contributions

Conceptualization (Faweya Ebenezer Babatope); methodology (Faweya Ebenezer Babatope and Adewumi Taiwo); final analysis (Faweya Ebenezer Babatope and Adewumi Taiwo); writing original draft (Faweya Ebenezer Babatope and Adewumi Taiwo); writing review and editing (Faweya Ebenezer Babatope and Adewumi Taiwo); funding acquisition (Faweya Ebenezer Babatope and Olojede Dare Samson); supervision (Faweya Ebenezer Babatope and Ikubanni Stephen Oluwole). All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to E. B. Faweya.

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Faweya, E.B., Olojede, D.S., Adewumi, T. et al. Radiogeochemistry, mineralogy, lithology, radiogenic heat production, and health implication using airborne radiometric data of Ilesha and its surroundings. Environ Monit Assess 195, 620 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-023-11168-y

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