Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials (NORM) consist of materials, usually industrial wastes or by-products enriched with radioactive elements found in the environment, such as uranium, thorium and potassium and any of their decay products, such as radium and radon.
Natural radioactive elements are present in very low concentrations in earth's crust, and are brought to the surface through human activities such as oil and gas exploration or mining, and through natural processes like leakage of radon gas to the atmosphere or through dissolution in ground water. Another example of NORM is coal ash produced from coal burning in power plants. If radioactivity is much higher than background level, handling NORM may cause problems in many industries and transportation.

 

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 TITLE PAGE

APPROVAL PAGE
DEDICATION
ACKNOWELDGEMENT
ABSTRCT
TABLE OF CONTENT

CHAPTER ONE

1. INTRODUCTION
2. BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
3. OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY
4. SCOPE OF STUDY
5. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN NATURAL AND ARTIFICIAL RADIOACTIVITY
6. UNITS OF RADIOACTIVITY
7. NATURAL TYPES OF RADIOACTIVITY
8. RADIOACTIVE SOURCES IN OIL AND GAS INDUSTRY

CHAPTER TWO               

LITERATURE REVIEW
2.0      LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1      OVERVIEW OF RADIOACTIVITY
2.2     HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF RADIOACTIVITY
2.3      EARLY HEALTH DANGERS RADIOACTIVITY
2.4       RADIATION PROTECTION
2.5       REVIEW OF DIFFERENT TYPES OF NORM
2.6      DIFFERENT TYPES OF RADIOACTIVITY

CHAPTER THREE

3.0      METHODOLOGY
3.1      NORM IN OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION
3.2     EFFECTS NORM IN OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION
3.3     HAZARDS OF NORM IN OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION
3.4     REGULATION OF NORM

CHAPTER FOUR

4.1    HEALTH AND ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES OF OIL-FIELD NORM
4.2    FORM OF OIL-FIELD NORM
4.3    ABUNDANCE OF RADIUM IN OIL-FIELD NORM
4.4    DISPOSAL OF NATURALLY OCCURRING RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL
4.5    CURRENT STATUS AND FUTURE DIRECTION OF THE OIL-FIELD NORM ISSUE

CHAPTER FIVE

5.0      CONCLUSIONS AND REFERENCES

1. CONCLUSIONS

5.2     REFERENCES

 

 

 

CHAPTER ONE
1.0                                                        INTRODUCTION
All minerals and raw materials contain radionuclides of natural origin. The most important for the purposes of radiation protection are the radionuclides in the U-238 and Th-232 decay series. For most human activities involving minerals and raw materials, the levels of exposure to these radionuclides are not significantly greater than normal background levels and are not of concern for radiation protection. However, certain work activities can give rise to significantly enhanced exposures that may need to be controlled by regulation. Material giving rise to these enhanced exposures has become known as naturally occurring radioactive material (NORM).
NORM is the acronym for Naturally Occurring Radioactive Material, which potentially includes all radioactive elements found in the environment. However, the term is used more specifically for all naturally occurring radioactive materials where human activities have increased the potential for exposure compared with the unaltered situation. Concentrations of actual radionuclides may or may not have been increased; if they have, the term Technologically-Enhanced (TENORM) may be used.
Long-lived radioactive elements such as uranium, thorium and potassium and any of their decay products, such as radium and radon are examples of NORM. These elements have always been present in the Earth's crust and atmosphere, and are concentrated in some places, such as uranium orebodies which may be mined. The term NORM exists also to distinguish ‘natural radioactive material’ from anthropogenic sources of radioactive material, such as those produced by nuclear power and used in nuclear medicine, where incidentally the radioactive properties of a material maybe what make it useful. However from the perspective of radiation doses to people, such a distinction is completely arbitrary.
Exposure to naturally occurring radiation is responsible for the majority of an average person’s yearly radiation dose (see also Nuclear Radiation and Health Effects paper) and is therefore not usually considered of any special health or safety significance. However certain industries handle significant quantities of NORM, which usually ends up in their waste streams, or in the case of uranium mining, the tailings dam. Over time, as potential NORM hazards have been identified, these industries have increasingly become subject to monitoring and regulation. However, there is as yet little consistency in NORM regulations among industries and countries. This means that material which is considered radioactive waste in one context may not be considered so in another. Also, that which may constitute low-level waste in the nuclear industry might go entirely unregulated in another industry.

1.1                                           BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
The oil & gas activity provides about 90% of Nigeria’s foreign earnings and more than 80% of the nation’s national income. However, the extraction processes which take oil and gas from the ground leave behind dangerous wastes. Some of these hazardous wastes generated in conjunction with oil & gas activity have been discussed in the authors’ article published on 21 January, 2009 in this website. This edition deals specifically with radioactive sources and wastes arising from the oil & gas exploration and production activity.
Naturally occurring radioactive materials (radionuclides) present under the ground may, during oil & gas drilling, be enhanced to elevated and harmful levels in produced waters, drilling mud, or oil and gas extraction equipment. The radionuclides may be present in mineral scale, sludge, slimes or evaporation ponds or pits for produced waters.
There are also man-made radioactive sources used in improving recovery from oil and gas wells and in detecting leaks in oil and gas pipes. These radioactive sources and the radioactive wastes (arising from man-made and naturally-occurring radionuclides) produce ionizing radiations which are harmful to oil & gas workers and members of the general public if not properly handled.
The oil & gas industry is the major user of radioactive sources in Nigeria. By the same token, it is also the largest producer of radioactive wastes. The national drive to improve oil & gas recovery from reservoirs and increase crude oil reserve to 40 billion barrels by the year 2010 would require nuclear well-logging and increased use of radioactive sources. Hence, this calls for radiation safety regulator to take more stringent measures to enforce radiation protection safety and security of radioactive sources in the oil & gas industry.

1.2                                               OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY
The objective of the study is to study the effect of natural occurring radioactive material in petroleum industries.

1.3                                                 SCOPE OF THE PROJECT
Naturally-occurring radioactive material (NORM) is the term used to describe materials that contain radionuclides that exist in the natural environment. Of particular interest are the long-lived radioactive elements uranium and thorium, and any of their radioactive decay products, such as radium and radon, elements that have always been present in the earth’s crust and within the tissues of all living species.
Although the concentration of NORM in most natural substances is low, almost any operation in which any material is extracted from the earth and processed can concentrate NORM in product, by-product, residue or waste streams.
The Marcellus shale is a gas-bearing shale formation that ranges geographically. It was deposited around 390 million years ago in the shallow sea that once covered the region. Shale is composed of tiny mud particles and organic matter, which, because of the properties of radioactive elements in sea water, often contains concentrations of naturally occurring radioactive material (NORM).
There has been concern that drilling in the Marcellus shale will bring NORM to the surface in a concentrated form, which could pose a radiation hazard. Some of the details surrounding this issue are addressed in this work.

1.5       DIFFERENCE BETWEEN NATURAL AND ARTIFICIAL RADIOACTIVITY
Some points of difference between natural and artificial radioactivity are as follows:

Natural Radioactivity                                                             Artificial Radioactivity
1. It involves spontaneous                                          1. Stable nuclei are bombarded
Disintegration of unstable                                           with high energy particles
nuclei with emission of a                                            to produce radioactive
or 13 particles or y-radiations                                     nuclides.
giving rise to new nuclide.
2. It cannot be controlled.                                       2. It can be controlled by controlling                                                                             the speed of the                                                                                         bombarding projectiles.
3. It is shown by heavy                                              3. It can be induced even in the
elements i.e., elements                                               lighter elements.
with high atomic number
and mass· number.

1.6                                               UNITS OF RADIOACTIVITY
The SI unit of radioactivity is, Bacqueral (Bq) which is defined as one disintegration per second ( dps). Earlier, radioactivity was expressed in terms of curies (C;). One curie refers to the activity of one gram of radium, and is equal to 3.7 x 1010 disintegrations per second.
1Ci = 3.7 x 1010 dps = 3.7 x 1010 Bq.
1 millicurie ( m Ci) = 3.7 x 107 dps and 1 microcurie ( µ Ci) = 3.7 x 104 dps
A more recent unit of-radioactivity is Rutherford (Rd).
1 Rd = 106 dps.

1.6                                     NATURAL TYPES OF RADIOACTIVITY
The three common natural types of radiation from nuclear decay are;
α radiation (alpha)  - a helium atom nucleus. This is a "slow" moving particle,  with a short range in air.  Alpha particles are extremely dangerous inside the body but not very dangerous outside as they cannot penetrate the skin. The speed of αradiation is about 0.1 of the speed of light.
The radiation has two elementary positive charges and the particle has considerable mass.
β radiation (beta) - an electron  or β- ejected from the nucleus when a neutron changes spontaneously to a proton. These are moving fast, about 0.9 of the speed of light, they can get through skin and have a reasonably long range in air (about one metre ). These have only a little mass, and are negatively charged. βradiation is dangerous if ingested.
γ radiation (gamma)  ; this is a very energetic form of electromagnetic radiation. Compared to light , each bit (photon) has 1 million times as much energy ( or 1 thousand times more energy than an X-ray photon).
They travel at the speed of light. They happily travel through centimetres of lead and travel easily through air. They are a danger to the human body even when not ingested due to this penetrative ability.
Gamma radiation has no charge associated with it. Nuclear decays and reactions produce other forms of radiation as well. Some are from artificial elements, some are products of splitting atoms.
Neutrinos, antineutrinos,  , ; weird neutral particles which are emitted with electrons in beta decay. They can be ignored for the purpose of this course.
β+ ; an antielectron or positron  . It has all the same characteristics of a normal electron except for having the same charge as the proton and the disconcerting habit, if it meets an ordinary electron, of turning itself and the electron into gamma rays! (All "antimatter" will do this on meeting the matter counterpart!) n; a neutron,- emitted as a side product of nuclear fission. Solo neutrons have a half life of about 10 minutes. They easily pass through steel plating and large doses finally have deadly consequences. Neutron bombs are fission bombs with less blast but more leaky neutrons. They therefore do less damage to factories but kill very satisfactorily.
All radiation can be absorbed to "negligible" levels by sufficient material and, of course, the further one is from the source, the smaller the received dosage.  (Recall that radiation means spreading out from a centre.  The further from that centre you are the more the radiation energy has spread out.)
Because of the energy of the radiation, radioactive sources can fog photographic film.  This technique is used to crudely monitor dosage for people who work with the materials.

1.7                      RADIOACTIVE SOURCES IN OIL AND GAS INDUSTRY
There are two classes of radioactive sources that oil and gas workers and the public should be concerned about:
1) Technologically – Enhanced Naturally-occurring radioactive materials (TENORM or NORM):
There are over 100 naturally-occurring radionuclides, but public health concerns are limited to radionuclides in the uranium and thorium decay series. This is due to their relative abundance and toxicity. Others like naturally occurring potassium-40 have not been known to accumulate from oil and gas production. Radium-226 and radium 228 are the two most common to travel up with oil and gas at elevated levels. They come from the uranium -238 and thorium-232 decay chains, respectively. Other radioactive elements associated with the decay series are radon gas and lead-210. There is long-term radiological concern for radium-226, because of its long half-life (1,600 years). Lead-210 has a 22-year half life.
During drilling, the radon gas may be released to the atmosphere and inhaled by unprotected workers. The elevated levels of NORM (radium-226 & radium-228 ) are actually found in the produced waters, drilling mud and scaled sludge. The NORM residues also contaminate oil & gas equipment and facilities such as pipes, tanks, separators, etc. NORM is the most toxic waste oil and gas wells can generate.
2) Artificial Radioactive Sources:
Radioactive sources are required for industrial radiography and nuclear well-logging. Industrial radiography is a technique used to test the integrity of welds and to detect leaks caused by cracks and corrosion in pipes. The nuclear well-logging, which improves recovery from oil and gas wells, also uses radioactive materials. These radioactive sources become radioactive wastes when they are no longer useful, and they must be properly disposed of. These include Cs-137 and many radioactive tracers.

 

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