Naturally occurring radium (Ra) in home drinking-water wells in the Sandhills region of South Carolina, USA: Can high concentrations be predicted?

ABSTRACT: A strong relationship exists between concentrations of several principal constituents of water chemistry and naturally occurring radium in water from home wells in the large Sandhills region of the inner coastal plain of South Carolina, United States, an area of common radium problems (75% (21 of 28 of randomly selected wells in the main study area were above the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) maximum contaminant level (MCL): 5 picocuries per liter for 226Ra plus 228Ra). Ingested radioactive radium is potentially carcinogenic, and water far above the MCL occurs in places. One focus here was to determine if elevated radium concentrations can reliably be predicted using more easily measured characteristics of water chemistry. The initial phase investigated (1) concentrations of

SUBMITTER: Schrag JM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7007152 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature