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Plutonium Contents and Fluxes in a Soybean Crop Ecosystem Near a Nuclear Fuel Chemical Separations Facility¹

ABSTRACT

A soybean (Glycine max) crop was grown in fields within 1 km of a nuclear fuel chemical separations plant at the Savannah River Plant, S.C. Aerial releases of ²³⁸Pu and ^239,240Pu have been occurring at various rates during the past 25 years and have produced characteristic Pu isotopic ratios (ISR) in various environmental matrices. This unique situation, along with pot studies and a farm site receiving only global fallout, provided the opportunity to study various biological and physical processes that determine Pu contamination of ecosystems and their components.

Contamination of the external surfaces of the soybeans contributed more to Pu contamination than did root uptake and translocation. Contamination of beans harvested with a combine was also mostly surficial, indicating that physical processes are more important than biological processes in this "real-world" situation. Pu-bearing particles directly deposited from the point source (62-m stack) and soil-surface resuspendible materials were the primary contaminants for the vegetation, while resuspension and transfer of Pu-bearing particles from vegetative surfaces were the dominant ones for the harvested beans. The Pu input from this particular chemical separations facility to the foodstuff (soybean beans) contributed little to radiation dose to humans compared with the natural background radiation.

Key Words: plutonium deposition • transuranics • plutonium cycling • dose assessment • nuclear energy

¹ This research was conducted under the auspices of contracts EY-76-C-09-0819 and AT(07-2)-1 between the U.S. Dep. of Energy and the University of Georgia's Savannah River Ecology Laboratory and E. I. duPont de Nemours and Co.'s Savannah River Laboratory, respectively.

² Associate Professor of Agronomy, Assistant Ecologist, and Assistant Ecologist, respectively, Savannah River Ecology Lab., Box E, Aiken, SC 29801; and Research Supervisors, Savannah River Lab., E. I. duPont de Nemours and Co., Aiken.

Received for publication September 29, 1981.

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