Study of natural radionuclides and its radiation hazard index in Malaysian building materials

The main component of most building materials in Malaysia is rock. All rocks are known to contain natural radionuclides such as(238)U and Th-232 series as well as K-40. In order to estimate the radiological impact to the dweller, the level of radionuclides present in various building materials available in Malaysia were analyzed using gamma-spectrometry. The radiation hazard indexes were calculated based on the above results. The results showed that the activity concentration of natural radionculides(238)U, Th-232,K-40 was between 19.0-42.2 Bq/kg, 16.5-28.8 Bq/kg and 243.3-614.2 Bq/kg, respectively. On the whole, the radionuclides concentration was still below the global average of 50 Bq/kg, 50 Bq/kg and 500 Bq/kg for U-238, Th-232, and K-40, respectively The radiation hazard indexes of the building materials were also lower than the maximum value suggested.