Skip to main content

Lund University Publications

LUND UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

Spatial variability of the dose rate from (137)Cs fallout in settlements in Russia and Belarus more than two decades after the Chernobyl accident.

Bernhardsson, Christian LU orcid ; Rääf, Christopher LU and Mattsson, Sören LU (2015) In Journal of Environmental Radioactivity 149. p.144-149
Abstract
Radionuclides from the 1986 Chernobyl accident were released and dispersed during a limited period of time, but under widely varying weather conditions. As a result, there was a high geographical variation in the deposited radioactive fallout per unit area over Europe, depending on the released composition of fission products and the weather during the 10 days of releases. If the plume from Chernobyl coincided with rain, then the radionuclides were unevenly distributed on the ground. However, large variations in the initial fallout also occurred locally or even on a meter scale. Over the ensuing years the initial deposition may have been altered further by different weathering processes or human activities such as agriculture, gardening,... (More)
Radionuclides from the 1986 Chernobyl accident were released and dispersed during a limited period of time, but under widely varying weather conditions. As a result, there was a high geographical variation in the deposited radioactive fallout per unit area over Europe, depending on the released composition of fission products and the weather during the 10 days of releases. If the plume from Chernobyl coincided with rain, then the radionuclides were unevenly distributed on the ground. However, large variations in the initial fallout also occurred locally or even on a meter scale. Over the ensuing years the initial deposition may have been altered further by different weathering processes or human activities such as agriculture, gardening, and decontamination measures. Using measurements taken more than two decades after the accident, we report on the inhomogeneous distribution of the ground deposition of the fission product (137)Cs and its influence on the dose rate 1 m above ground, on both large and small scales (10(ths) of km(2) - 1 m(2)), in the Gomel-Bryansk area close to the border between Belarus and Russia. The dose rate from the deposition was observed to vary by one order of magnitude depending on the size of the area considered, whether human processes were applied to the surface or not, and on location specific properties (e.g. radionuclide migration in soil). (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Journal of Environmental Radioactivity
volume
149
pages
144 - 149
publisher
Elsevier
external identifiers
  • pmid:26245870
  • wos:000362137800016
  • scopus:84938329562
  • pmid:26245870
ISSN
1879-1700
DOI
10.1016/j.jenvrad.2015.07.009
project
Radiation protection in Eastern Europe
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
fd3746f0-e17c-4d1b-9046-0fc55e464247 (old id 7844628)
alternative location
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26245870?dopt=Abstract
date added to LUP
2016-04-01 10:11:11
date last changed
2022-08-12 17:26:33
@article{fd3746f0-e17c-4d1b-9046-0fc55e464247,
  abstract     = {{Radionuclides from the 1986 Chernobyl accident were released and dispersed during a limited period of time, but under widely varying weather conditions. As a result, there was a high geographical variation in the deposited radioactive fallout per unit area over Europe, depending on the released composition of fission products and the weather during the 10 days of releases. If the plume from Chernobyl coincided with rain, then the radionuclides were unevenly distributed on the ground. However, large variations in the initial fallout also occurred locally or even on a meter scale. Over the ensuing years the initial deposition may have been altered further by different weathering processes or human activities such as agriculture, gardening, and decontamination measures. Using measurements taken more than two decades after the accident, we report on the inhomogeneous distribution of the ground deposition of the fission product (137)Cs and its influence on the dose rate 1 m above ground, on both large and small scales (10(ths) of km(2) - 1 m(2)), in the Gomel-Bryansk area close to the border between Belarus and Russia. The dose rate from the deposition was observed to vary by one order of magnitude depending on the size of the area considered, whether human processes were applied to the surface or not, and on location specific properties (e.g. radionuclide migration in soil).}},
  author       = {{Bernhardsson, Christian and Rääf, Christopher and Mattsson, Sören}},
  issn         = {{1879-1700}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  pages        = {{144--149}},
  publisher    = {{Elsevier}},
  series       = {{Journal of Environmental Radioactivity}},
  title        = {{Spatial variability of the dose rate from (137)Cs fallout in settlements in Russia and Belarus more than two decades after the Chernobyl accident.}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvrad.2015.07.009}},
  doi          = {{10.1016/j.jenvrad.2015.07.009}},
  volume       = {{149}},
  year         = {{2015}},
}