Natural Radioactivity and Associated Dose Rates in Soil Samples in the Destroyed Fuel Fabrication Facility, Iraq

Abdulla Ahmad Rasheed¹, Nada Farhan Kadhum¹ and Nadhim Khaleel Ibrahim^2,

¹Department of Physics, College of Science, AL-Mustansiriya University, Iraq

²Ministry of Science and Technology, Iraq

Cite this paper:
Abdulla Ahmad Rasheed, Nada Farhan Kadhum and Nadhim Khaleel Ibrahim. Natural Radioactivity and Associated Dose Rates in Soil Samples in the Destroyed Fuel Fabrication Facility, Iraq. International Journal of Physics. 2016; 4(3):50-54. doi: 10.12691/ijp-4-3-1

Abstract

The activity concentrations of naturally occurring radionuclides ²²⁶Ra, ²³²Th and ⁴⁰K in soil samples collected from Fuel Fabrication Facility in Al-Tuwaitha nuclear site were measured by using a high resolution gamma spectrometry system via High Purity Germanium (HPGe) Detector with a relative efficiency of (>40%) and resolution (<1.8keV) at energy of (1.33MeV) for ⁶⁰Co. The average activity concentrations of ²²⁶Ra, ²³²Th and ⁴⁰K in soil samples were found to be 15.78±1.16, 14.09±1.33 and 306.42±18.1 Bqkg^-1, respectively. The results obtained for the corresponding radionuclides are lower than the worldwide average values of 35, 30, and 400 Bqkg^-1, respectively. The average absorbed dose rate in air (Dγ), the average radium equivalent activity (Ra_eq) and the average external hazard index (H_ex) were determined as 28.90±2.12 nGyh^-1, 59.52±4.45 Bqkg^-1 and 0.16±0.012, respectively, which are below the permissible limit.

Keywords:
activity concentration gamma spectrometry radium equivalent activity hazard indices

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