Ambient Monitoring of Airborne Radioactivity Near a Former Thorium Processing Plant

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
Twenty-four hour sampling for airborne radioactivity near a former thorium and rare-earth extraction facility was conducted for approx. 2 months with high-volume and dichotomous air samplers. Thoron (220Rn) daughters were identified in the air and confirmed to be originating from the waste storage site. High-volume samplers near the facility measured average 212Pb concentrations of 177, 43, and 237 pCi/m3 with corresponding ranges of (1.9–1351), (1.5–301) and (0.73–2201) pCi/m3. Simultaneous measurements with dichotomous samplers at the same sites measured average 212Pb concentrations on coarse particulates (2.5–15μm dia.) of 14, 4 and 10 pCi/m3 and on fine particulates (less than 2.5 μm dia.) of 94, 9 and 214 pCi/m3, respectively. Corresponding ranges were (0.2–109), (0.1–63) and (0.1–94) pCi/m3 for coarse particulates and (0.7–1094), (0.4–101) and (0.5–2685) pCi/m3 for fine particulates. Uranium, thorium and radium radionuclides were not identified as being present in significant concentrations in the particulate samples.

This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: