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Non-destructive measurements of natural radionuclides in building materials for radon entry rate assessment

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Abstract

To control the specific activity of 226Ra in building materials of operated buildings, a non-destructive in situ method consisted in measurements of gamma spectra with a fixed geometry of the detector position in a room is suggested. The calculation of the average specific activity of natural radionuclides in building materials is carried out by comparing the calculated flux density of unscattered gamma quanta normalized to the specific activity of 100 Bq/kg, and the experimentally measured count rates in the photopeak. For the measured values of the average specific activity of 226Ra in building materials, the expected values of radon concentration in rooms were calculated. The developed method has been verified for rooms in modern multi-storey energy-efficient buildings. Concentrations of 232Th and 40K in building materials which contribute to the indoor external radiation exposure can be measured by developed method also.

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Acknowledgements

The study was supported by Russian Science Foundation (Grant No. 19-19-00191).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Industrial Ecology UB RAS, 20, Sophy Kovalevskoy Str., Ekaterinburg, Russia, 620990

    Ilia Yarmoshenko, Aleksey Vasilyev, Aleksey Ekidin, Maria Pyshkina, Georgy Malinovsky, Aleksandra Onishchenko & Michael Zhukovsky

  2. Alpha-X91 Environmental Safety Agency, 56, Vostochnaya Str., Ekaterinburg, Russia, 620075

    Aleksey Ekidin & Maria Pyshkina

Authors
  1. Ilia Yarmoshenko
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  2. Aleksey Vasilyev
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  3. Aleksey Ekidin
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  4. Maria Pyshkina
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  5. Georgy Malinovsky
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  6. Aleksandra Onishchenko
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  7. Michael Zhukovsky
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Correspondence to Aleksandra Onishchenko.

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Yarmoshenko, I., Vasilyev, A., Ekidin, A. et al. Non-destructive measurements of natural radionuclides in building materials for radon entry rate assessment. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 328, 727–737 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-021-07690-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-021-07690-3

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