Gross alpha and beta activities in drinking water from Goiás state, Brazil

Detection of gross alpha and beta radioactivity is important for a quick surveying of both natural and anthropogenic radioactivity in water. Furthermore, gross alpha and gross beta parameters are included in Brazilian legislation on quality of drinking water. In this work, a low background liquid sc...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Raquel Maia Mingote, Regina Apolinária Nogueira, Heliana Ferreira Da Costa
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Brazilian Radiation Protection Society (Sociedade Brasileira de Proteção Radiológica, SBPR) 2019-07-01
Series:Brazilian Journal of Radiation Sciences
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Online Access:https://bjrs.org.br/revista/index.php/REVISTA/article/view/410
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Summary:Detection of gross alpha and beta radioactivity is important for a quick surveying of both natural and anthropogenic radioactivity in water. Furthermore, gross alpha and gross beta parameters are included in Brazilian legislation on quality of drinking water. In this work, a low background liquid scintillation spectrometer was used to simultaneously determine gross alpha and gross beta in samples of the public water supplies in the state of Goiás, Brazil, during 2010-2015. Sample preparation involved evaporation to concentrate the sample ten-fold. The results indicate that the water meets the radioactivity standards required by the regulations MS 2914/2011 of the Brazilian Department of Health. Concerning the high level of censored observations, a statistical treatment of data was conducted by using analysis methods of censored data to provide a reference value of the gross alpha and beta radioactivity in drinking water from the state of Goiás. The estimated typical activities are very low, 0.030 Bq.L-1 and 0.058 Bq.L-1, for gross alpha and gross beta, respectively.
ISSN:2319-0612