A comparative study of different radiometric methodologies for the determination of 226Ra in water

An evaluation of various radiometric methods to analyze 226Ra in water has been employed on a set of 10 standard solutions of different concentrations in the range of 1-10 Bq/L−1. The analysis was carried out using well-established procedures by means of gamma-ray, alpha-particle and liquid scintillation spectrometry. The feasibility of the various methods has been quantified in terms of relative standard error and percentage error. Correlations between the various methods have been presented and discussed. In general, good agreement was found in the results of various methodologies, which assures the accuracy of the methods and allows for the validation of instrumentation and procedures. Of the different methods adopted here, a combined procedure for the determination of 226Ra along with 228Ra using Quantulus 1220 ultra-low level background liquid scintillation counting gave the most accurate results.