Thermal Treatment of Radon-222 Concentrations of Drinking Water in Zamfara State, Nigeria

Abstract

Excessive Radon (²²²Rn) activity concentrations of drinking water cause illnesses of radiological concern that could be avoided. In this paper Radon Mitigation remedy were carried out by thermal treatment in thirty (30) samples of ground water collected from the rocky communities of Kotorkoshi, Kura and Sankalawa environs in Bungudu Local Government Area of Zamfara state, Nigeria. However, Liquid Scintillation counter was used for the measurement of the radon activities. Initially the radon activity concentrations were higher than the upper bound (11.1 Bq/L), to which remedial action is required, as recommended by United State Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA). However, the thermal treatment was initiated by heating-up the samples (200ml) each in closed a beaker until, a temperature of 100⁰C boiling points were attained at time interval of thirty (30) minutes respectively, within a period of three (3) days. Similarly, radon activity concentrations obtained, varies from 9.38-19.73Bq/L (out of the initial concentrations of 18.42-35.59Bq/L) in kotorkoshi; 4.34-10.02Bq/L (out of the initial concentrations of 9.84-11.65Bq/L) in Sankalawa and 8.43-18.42 Bq/L (out of the initial concentrations of 16.02-30.59Bq/L) in Kura community. However, the Average Annual Effective Dose from the entire locations of the researched areas were found, within the limits of 0.1mSvy-¹ and 0.2mSvy^-1 for the both adults and children respectively, as recommended by World Health Organization (WHO) and European Union (EU) Council.