Radiation Exposure from Household Items Containing Uranium

(last updated 8 Sep 2004)

Contents:

• Workers Manufacturing Household Items
• Users of Household Items
• References

> see also:

• Uranium Radiation Properties · Uranium Toxicity
• Uranium Radiation Individual Dose Calculator
• Current Issues: Depleted Uranium in Household Items
• Unit Converter

Workers Manufacturing Household Items

Source Term

• Enamel powder: concentrations of 10% of depleted uranium were found in yellow enamel powder currently produced in France (see details).

Exposure of Workers Manufacturing Household Items

• Inhalation of enamel powder dust
  The effective dose from inhalation of 1 mg powder containing 10% uranium depleted to 0.2% is 11 µSv. The 20 mSv annual standard for workers is equivalent to 1.82 g. This would correspond to a dust concentration in air of 0.63 mg/m³. (See also: Uranium Radiation Individual Dose Calculator)
  If the uranium were recycled from spent fuel, the inhalation dose from 1 mg were 17 µSv. The 20 mSv annual standard for workers were equivalent to 1.18 g. This would correspond to a dust concentration in air of 0.41 mg/m³.
  (based on ICRP68 dose factors for insoluble compounds, breathing rate of 1.6 m³/h, worktime 1800 h/a, burnup of 39 GWd/tHM, storage time of 5 years after unload, tails from enrichment to 3.5%)
  

Users of Household Items

Source Term

• Ceramic dinnerware: the glaze of orange-colored ceramic dinnerware may contain up to 20% of uranium by weight [Sheets1995].
• Ceramic tiles:
• Uranium glass: contains approx. 1% of uranium
• Enamel jewelry: concentrations of depleted uranium of 10% were found in yellow enamel powder currently produced in France (see details).

Exposure of Users of Household Items

• External radiation
  Gamma and beta radiation exposure measured at 1 cm from the surface of natural uranium-glazed ceramic dinnerware samples ranged between 3.1 and 9.2 mR/h (19 - 56 µSv/h) [Sheets1995]. According to assumptions made by U.S. NRC, normal use of such items could result in an effective dose equivalent of about 0.07 mSv/yr (7 mrem/yr) from external exposures [NUREG-1717].
  The dose rate at the surface of enamel jewelry pieces containing depleted uranium was measured at 6.7 µSv/h. Assuming that 1% of the skin would be irradiated, this would cause a skin dose of 0.587 mSv/a for continuous exposure. With ICRP60's tissue weighting factor for skin of 0.01, this results in a committed effective dose of 5.87 µSv/a. (The tissue weighting factor is quite low, since ICRP uses US data for adults showing that skin cancer can be treated and only 0.2% of the cases are lethal.)

• Ingestion
  20% of 15 uranium-glazed ceramic dinnerware samples tested contained easily removable surface compounds of natural uranium [Sheets1995].
  Vinegar leached up to 30 µg/l of uranium from uranium glass. From a uranium-glazed plate, vinegar leached 31,800 µg/l of uranium, and nitric acid even leached 304,000 µg/l of uranium [Landa1992].
  Based on these leaching factors and certain consumption rates assumed by the U.S. NRC, an individual could ingest approximately 0.21 g of uranium during 1 year. Thus, given an ingestion dose factor of 1.9 mSv/g adopted by NRC, this would correspond to an annual effective dose equivalent of about 0.4 mSv (40 mrem) from ingestion of uranium leached from glazed ceramic tableware [NUREG-1717]. The annual limit on intake based on chemical toxicity would be exceeded around 10-fold.

  U.S. EPA standard for uranium in drinking water (65 FR 76707, Dec. 7, 2000): 30 µg/l

  WHO guideline for uranium in drinking-water [WHO2004] 15 µg/l

  (See also Uranium Toxicity)

References

[ICRP60] 1990 Recommendations of the International Commission on Radiological Protection, ICRP Publication 60, Oxford 1991

[Landa1992] Leaching of uranium from glass and ceramic foodware and decorative items, by Edward R. Landa and Terry B. Councell, in: Health Physics Vol. 63 No. 3, 1992, p. 343-348

[NUREG-1717] Systematic Radiological Assessment of Exemptions for Source and Byproduct Materials, Final Report, NUREG-1717, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 2001
> Download final report

[Sheets1995] Accidental contamination from uranium compounds through contact with ceramic dinnerware, by Ralph W. Sheets, Clifton C. Thompson, in: The Science of the Total Environment Vol. 175 (1995) No. 1, p. 81-84

[WHO2004] World Health Organization: WHO Guidelines for drinking-water quality, third edition, 2004

[xx FR yyyy] U.S. Federal Register , xx = volume, yyyy = page

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