Open AccessRadiological health assessment of natural radioactivity in the vicinity of Obajana cement factory, North Central Nigeria
Author(s) -
Matthew Omoniyi Isinkaye,
N. N. Jibiri,
Adebowale A Olomide
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
journal of medical physics/journal of medical physics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.292
H-Index - 24
eISSN - 1998-3913
pISSN - 0971-6203
DOI - 10.4103/0971-6203.152256
Subject(s) - radionuclide , radiological weapon , environmental science , cement , radium , factory (object oriented programming) , effective dose (radiation) , population , contamination , environmental chemistry , waste management , environmental health , nuclear medicine , radiochemistry , geography , medicine , archaeology , chemistry , physics , engineering , nuclear physics , ecology , computer science , biology , programming language
Measurements of activity concentrations of natural radionuclides in and around Obajana cement factory, North Central Nigeria have been carried out in this study to determine the activity levels of natural radionuclides in different environmental matrices in order to assess the radiological health hazards associated with the use of these matrices by the local population. A low-background Pb-shielded gamma spectroscopic counting assembly utilizing NaI (Tl) detector was employed for the measurements. The results show that sediment samples have the highest activity concentrations of all the radionuclides relative to soil, farmland soil, and rock samples. The radium equivalent activity and indoor gamma dose rates together with the corresponding annual effective indoor doses evaluated were found to be lower than their permissible limits. It suffices to say, that contrary to age-long fear of radiation risks to the population in the vicinity of the cement factory, no excessive radiological health hazards either indoors and/or outdoors is envisaged. Therefore, the environmental matrices around the factory could be used without any restrictions.