title: The use of portable equipment for the activity concentration index determination of building materials: method validation and survey of building materials on the Belgian market.
abstract: The Euratom BSS requires that in the near future (2015) the building materials for application in dwellings or buildings such as offices or workshops are screened for NORM nuclides. The screening tool is the activity concentration index (ACI). Therefore it is expected that a large number of building materials will be screened for NORM and thus require ACI determination. Nowadays, the proposed standard for determination of building material ACI is a laboratory analyses technique with high purity germanium spectrometry and 21 days equilibrium delay. In this paper, the B-NORM method for determination of building material ACI is assessed as a faster method that can be performed on-site, alternative to the aforementioned standard method. The B-NORM method utilizes a LaBr3(Ce) scintillation probe to obtain the spectral data. Commercially available software was applied to comprehensively take into account the factors determining the counting efficiency. The ACI was determined by interpreting the gamma spectrum from (226)Ra and its progeny; (232)Th progeny and (40)K. In order to assess the accuracy of the B-NORM method, a large selection of samples was analyzed by a certified laboratory and the results were compared with the B-NORM results. The results obtained with the B-NORM method were in good correlation with the results obtained by the certified laboratory, indicating that the B-NORM method is an appropriate screening method to assess building material ACI. The B-NORM method was applied to analyze more than 120 building materials on the Belgian market. No building materials that exceed the proposed reference level of 1 mSv/year were encountered.
authors.affiliation: NuTeC (Nuclear Technological Centre), Wetenschapspark 27, 3590 Diepenbeek, Belgium; Hasselt University, Agoralaan Gebouw D, 3590 Diepenbeek, Belgium. Electronic address: mark.stals@uhasselt.be.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Stals
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Verhoeven
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bruggeman
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Pellens
authors.forename: W
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Schroeyers
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Schreurs
mesh_terms: D000396:Air Pollutants, Radioactive / Q000032:analysis; D016902:Air Pollution, Indoor / Q000032:analysis; D001530:Belgium; D003252:Construction Materials / Q000032:analysis*; D057230:Limit of Detection; D011197:Potassium Radioisotopes / Q000032:analysis; D011834:Radiation Monitoring / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods*; D011883:Radium / Q000032:analysis; D013910:Thorium / Q000032:analysis
chemical_list: D000396:Air Pollutants, Radioactive; D011197:Potassium Radioisotopes; D013910:Thorium; D011883:Radium
keywords: Activity concentration; Building materials; Euratom Basic Safety Standards; Measurement; NORM