Investigation of various concrete compositions with respect to gamma-radiation transmission properties of Cs-137

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.radphyschem.2020.108679Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Discrepancies between measured and simulated half-value layers are observed.

  • Half-value layers are presented for ordinary, hematite, and barite concrete.

  • Gamma-transmission measurements and CT scans reveal structural impacts on shielding properties.

  • Monte-Carlo simulations show that a precise specification of the concrete composition/density is essential.

Abstract

We investigated different concrete samples with respect to their gamma-radiation transmission properties of Cs-137. From results of gamma-spectroscopic measurements, respective half-value layers are presented for ordinary, hematite, and barite concrete. The outcomes are compared to literature values. In addition, CT scans were performed and analyzed to reveal structural impacts on shielding properties. Finally, Monte-Carlo simulations were performed to examine the reliability of theoretical predictions. As a result, precise specification of the concrete composition is essential to simulate shielding designs of new facilities, as accurate theoretical predictions are necessary to avoid excessive costs due to oversizing or rework.

Introduction

Reinforced concrete shielded buildings show a few cases where the experimental results are in contradiction to structural engineering predictions i.e. they were not consistent with the shielding properties expected from theoretical calculations.

For example, Sharifi et al. (2013) reported on measured and simulated results of half-value layers (HVL) for ordinary and barite concretes as given in Table 1, with discrepancies of about a factor 2 are observed.

In addition, there is a lack of data concerning shielding properties of different concrete materials. Hence, ordinary concrete is often used as reference material in shielding predictions.

The German Technical Inspection Association claims that often the concrete density 2.4 g/cm3 is employed to simulate shielding designs of new facilities. This could result in very high costs if too much concrete material is used. Alternatively, the shielding may not be sufficient (AKD, 2018).

More detailed information about concrete radiation shielding properties is useful, as concrete is a building material, which is used for specific requirements like for radiation protection in interim storage facilities for high-level waste and in surface facilities of deep geologic repositories.

Thus, in this work different concrete samples were investigated with respect to their γ-radiation transmission properties of Cs-137 photons.

Section snippets

Material and methods

Experiments and Monte Carlo simulations concerning γ-ray transmission properties of different concrete samples were realized. Sets of different concrete plates were prepared at the Institute of Building Materials, Concrete Construction and Fire Safety (iBMB). Independent of the particular type of aggregates each concrete mixture was designed in order to achieve comparable volumetric amounts of water, cement and aggregates. The corresponding values were chosen so that they comply with those of

Results

Fig. 3 shows a representative result of the gamma-spectroscopic measurements. The displayed spectrum obtained with a Cs-137 source clearly shows the photopeak at 662 keV, which yields the information for the transmission determination.

In order to assess the reliability of theoretical predictions, the Monte-Carlo code Geant4 [Geant4, 2017] was employed to simulate the interaction of photons with matter as well as the detector's response in form of gamma-ray spectra. To compare theory and

Discussion

The starting point of this investigation was the fact that differences for simulations and experiments concerning HVL are present in literature, as the examples in Table 1 show. Therefore, in this study, different concrete samples were investigated in detail. Experimental measurements with gamma-ray beams from a Cs-137 source and CT scans were performed and Monte Carlo simulations were used for deeper understanding.

The results presented in Fig. 4 indicate that different concrete density

Conclusion

In view of the differences for simulations and experiments concerning HVL presented in literature, as well as the paucity of underlying data, this work provides experimental datasets for ordinary, hematite, and barite concrete. The experimental transmission data are in agreement with our respective Monte Carlo simulations. As a result, an improved data availability is given and these data could be used as reference for further investigations.

We could demonstrate that CT-scans and transmission

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgments

The work was financially supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) in the context of the ENTRIA project (grant numbers 15S9082E and 15S9082A).

References (10)

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