Natural and technologically enhanced radioactivity (NORM/TENORM) in soils, mining residues and waters of mining areas worldwide: a systematic review and multivariate synthesis of the 1976-2026 literature.

Authors

Edmundo Escareño-Juarez

Published in

Journal of environmental radioactivity. Volume 300. Pages 108195. Oct 17, 2026. Epub Oct 17, 2026.

Abstract

Mining and mineral processing redistribute naturally occurring radionuclides and can generate technologically enhanced naturally occurring radioactive material (TENORM). A PRISMA 2020-guided systematic review of the 1976-2026 literature was combined with a quantitative, multivariate synthesis of activity concentrations reported in abstracts. Of 60,242 records from seven bibliographic sources, including the IAEA INIS database, and citation searching, 16,689 were eligible and 1308 studies from 103 countries provided 4532 values (4276 study-level records). In mining-impacted soils, geometric means of ²²⁶Ra(²³⁸U), ²³²Th and ⁴⁰K were 56.7, 38.1 and 306 Bq kg^-1; medians exceeded the UNSCEAR world medians by 11% and 26% for ²²⁶Ra(²³⁸U) and ²³²Th, whereas ⁴⁰K was 18% lower. Uranium mining showed the highest soil ²²⁶Ra(²³⁸U) (geometric mean 324 Bq kg^-1) and tin/rare-earth/mineral-sand operations the highest ²³²Th (78.9 Bq kg^-1). The ²³²Th/²²⁶Ra(²³⁸U) ratio was lowest in phosphate and uranium operations (medians 0.30 and 0.56) and 0.7-1.4 in the other industries. After adjustment for industry, region and publication year, tailings and residues contained 6.6 times more ²²⁶Ra(²³⁸U) than soils, and 31% of tailings records exceeded 1 Bq g^-1. Uranium exceeded the WHO drinking-water guideline (30 μg L^-1; a yardstick for mine waters) in 45% of groundwater and 83% of mine-water records, and 53% of mine-water records exceeded 1 Bq L^-1 of ²²⁶Ra. The median outdoor effective dose from soils was 0.072 mSv y^-1. In this abstract-level dataset, the largest enhancements and guideline exceedances occurred in residues and mine waters and differed among industries; harmonised reporting would enable full-text meta-analysis.

PMID:
42892229
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 18 Oct 2026.

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