Radiological impact of natural radioactivity in Egyptian phosphate rocks, phosphogypsum and phosphate fertilizers

In this study, the activity concentrations of the natural radionuclides in phosphate rocks and its products were measured using a high- purity germanium detector (HPGe). The obtained activity results show remarkable wide variation in the radioactive contents for the different phosphate samples. The average activity concentration of 235U, 238U, 226Ra, 232Th and 40K was found as (45, 1031, 786, 85 and 765 Bq/kg) for phosphate rocks, (28, 1234, 457, 123 and 819 Bq/kg) for phosphate fertilizers, (47, 663, 550, 79 and 870 Bq/kg) for phosphogypsum and (25, 543, 409, 54 and 897 Bq/kg) for single super phosphate respectively. Based on the measured activities, the radiological parameters (activity concentration index, absorbed gamma dose rate in outdoor and indoor and the corresponding annual effective dose rates and total excess lifetime cancer risk) were estimated to assess the radiological hazards. The total excess lifetime cancer risk (ELCR) has been calculated and found to be high in all samples, which related to high radioactivity, representing radiological risk for the health of the population.