Abstract
The characterisation of buried radioactive wastes is challenging because they are not readily accessible. Therefore, this study reports on the development of a method for integrating ground-penetrating radar (GPR) and gamma-ray detector measurements for nonintrusive characterisation of buried radioactive objects. The method makes use of the density relationship between soil permittivity models and the flux measured by gamma ray detectors to estimate the soil density, depth and radius of a disk-shaped buried radioactive object simultaneously. The method was validated using numerical simulations with experimentally-validated gamma-ray detector and GPR antenna models. The results showed that the method can simultaneously retrieve the soil density, depth and radius of disk-shaped radioactive objects buried in soil of varying conditions with a relative error of less than 10%. This result will enable the development of an integrated GPR and gamma ray detector tool for rapid characterisation of buried radioactive objects encountered during monitoring and decontamination of nuclear sites and facilities.
Highlights
The presence of radioactive objects in the shallow subsurface is a major public health risk because these objects can induce high levels of radiation above the ground
The results showed that the method can simultaneously retrieve the soil density, depth and radius of disk-shaped radioactive objects buried in soil of varying conditions with a relative error of less than 10%
The results showed that this integrated approach is able to retrieve the key parameters of soil density, depth and radius of disk-shaped radioactive objects buried in soil of varying conditions simultaneously
Summary
The presence of radioactive objects in the shallow subsurface is a major public health risk because these objects can induce high levels of radiation above the ground. A cobalt-60 source found buried at a depth of about 32 cm in a Cambodian hospital induced radiation levels of up to. 60 mSv h−1 above the ground [1]. The high energy penetrators used in ammunition are usually made from depleted uranium, which is a by-product of the nuclear fuel enrichment process. Many of these penetrators get lodged in the ground during military operations and become potential sources of groundwater contamination because of their high solubility in sand and other volcanic rock [3]. It is important to promptly detect, and safely dispose these objects
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