Measurement of 226Ra, 232Th and 40K radioactivity contents in by-product phosphogypsum from phosphate fertilizer industry using gamma ray spectrometric method
Third Eurasian Conference "Nuclear Science and its Applica, Toskent, Uzbekistan, 5 - 09 October 2004, pp.186-187, (Summary Text)
- Publication Type: Conference Paper / Summary Text
- City: Toskent
- Country: Uzbekistan
- Page Numbers: pp.186-187
- Ankara University Affiliated: Yes
Abstract
Phosphatic fertilizers are produced from the industrial processing of rock phosphate ores
which are known to contain naturally occurring radionuclides such as 3 U and its daughter
products. A high volume by-product known as phosphogypsum (PG) from the production of
phosphoric acid and phosphate fertilizer causes serious storage and environmental problems
in phosphoric acid industries. During the phosphoric acid production process, 226Ra (ti/2=1600
y) ends up in PG which has chemical analogous to calcium element. Since the stockpiles of
PG near the phosphatic fertilizer plants are huge amounts, the radioactivity contained in PG
has measured in view of environmental radioactivity problem. In this work, the natural
radioactivity in eighty PG samples taken from a stock near Samsun phosphoric fertilizer plant
was measured by a high resolution gamma ray spectrometer. The mean activity of 226Ra in PG
samples has been found to be 546 Bq.kg'1. However, the activities of 232Th and 40K measured
in PG samples are negligibly small. In the presented paper, the gamma spectrometric method
employed for this work is discussed and the radiological risk impact of radon gas emanation
from 226Ra mainly contained in PG, has been assessed