Materials containing radionuclides of natural\ud origin and being subject to regulation because of their\ud radioactivity are known as Naturally Occurring Radioactive\ud Material (NORM). By following International Atomic\ud Energy Agency, we include in NORM those materials with\ud an activity concentration, which is modified by human\ud made processes. We present a brief review of the main\ud categories of non-nuclear industries together with the levels of activity concentration in feed raw materials,\ud products and waste, including mechanisms of radioisotope\ud enrichments. The global management of NORM shows a\ud high level of complexity, mainly due to different degrees of\ud radioactivity enhancement and the huge amount of worldwide\ud waste production. The future tendency of guidelines\ud concerning environmental protection will require both a\ud systematic monitoring based on the ever-increasing sampling\ud and high performance of gamma-ray spectroscopy.\ud On the ground of these requirements a new low-background\ud fully automated high-resolution gamma-ray spectrometer\ud MCA_Rad has been developed. The design of\ud lead and cooper shielding allowed to reach a background\ud reduction of two order of magnitude with respect to laboratory\ud radioactivity. A severe lowering of manpower cost is\ud obtained through a fully automation system, which enables\ud up to 24 samples to be measured without any human\ud attendance. Two coupled HPGe detectors increase the\ud detection efficiency, performing accurate measurements on\ud small sample volume (180 cm\ud 3\ud ) with a reduction of sample\ud transport cost of material. Details of the instrument calibration\ud method are presented. MCA_Rad system can\ud measure in less than one hour a typical NORM sample\ud enriched in U and Th with some hundreds of Bq kg\ud , with\ud an overall uncertainty less than 5 %. Quality control of this\ud method has been tested. Measurements of three certified\ud reference materials RGK-1, RGU-2 and RGTh-1 containing\ud concentrations of potassium, uranium and thorium\ud comparable to NORM have been performed. As a result,\ud this test achieved an overall relative discrepancy of 5 %\ud among central values within the reported uncertainty

An increasing demand of environmental radioactivity monitoring comes both from the scientific community and from the society. This requires accurate, reliable and fast response preferably from portable radiation detectors. Thanks to recent improvements in the technology, γ spectroscopy with sodium iodide scintillators has been proved to be an excellent tool for in-situ measurements for the identification and quantitative determination of γ ray emitting radioisotopes, reducing time and costs. Both for geological and civil purposes not only (40)K, (238)U, and (232)Th have to be measured, but there is also a growing interest to determine the abundances of anthropic elements, like (137)Cs and (131)I, which are used to monitor the effect of nuclear accidents or other human activities. The Full Spectrum Analysis (FSA) approach has been chosen to analyze the γ spectra. The Non Negative Least Square (NNLS) and the energy calibration adjustment have been implemented in this method for the first time in order to correct the intrinsic problem related with the χ(2) minimization which could lead to artifacts and non physical results in the analysis. A new calibration procedure has been developed for the FSA method by using in situ γ spectra instead of calibration pad spectra. Finally, the new method has been validated by acquiring γ spectra with a 10.16 cm × 10.16 cm sodium iodide detector in 80 different sites in the Ombrone basin, in Tuscany. The results from the FSA method have been compared with the laboratory measurements by using HPGe detectors on soil samples collected particular, the (137)Cs isotopes has been implemented in the analysis since it has been found not negligible during the in-situ measurements.

This study focuses on the radiological characterisation of building materials manufactured in Albania by using a high-resolution gamma-ray spectrometer. The average activity concentrations of (40)K, (226)Ra and (232)Th were, respectively, 644.1±64.2, 33.4 ± 6.4 and 42.2 ± 7.6 Bq kg(-1) in the clay brick samples and 179.7 ± 48.9, 55.0 ± 5.8 and 17.0 ± 3.3 Bq kg(-1) in the cement samples. The calculated activity concentration index (ACI), varied from 0.48±0.02 to 0.63±0.04 in the clay brick samples and from 0.29±0.03 to 0.37±0.02 in the cement samples. Based on the ACI, all of the clay brick and cement samples were categorised as A1 materials. The authors can exclude (at 3σ level) any restriction of their use as bulk materials.

We present a detailed map of uranium distribution and its uncertainties in the Variscan Basement of Northeastern Sardinia (VBNS) at a scale of 1:100,000. An area of 2100 km 2 was investigated by means of 535 data points obtained from laboratory and in situ gamma-ray spectrometry measurements. These data volume corresponds to the highest sampling density of the European Variscides, aimed at studying the genetic processes of the upper crust potentially triggered by an enrichment of radiogenic heat-producing elements. For the first time, the Kriging with Variance of Measurement Error method was used to assign weights to the input data which are based on the degree of confidence associated with the measurements obtained using different gamma-ray spectrometry techniques. A detailed tuning of the model parameters for the adopted Experimental Semi-Variogram led to the identification of a maximum distance of spatial variability coherent to the observed tendency of the experimental data. We demonstrate that the obtained uranium distribution in the VBNS, characterized by several calc-alkaline plutons emplaced within migmatitic massifs and amphibolite-facies metamorphic rocks, is an excellent benchmark for the study of 'hot' collisional chains. The uranium map of VBNS, and in particular the Arzachena minor pluton, confirms the emplacement model based on the recognition of the different petrological associations characterizing the Variscan magmatic processes in the Late Paleozoic. Furthermore, the presented model of the uranium content of the geological bedrock is a potential baseline for future mapping of radon-prone areas.ARTICLE HISTORY