Currently, the Institute of Nuclear Science and Technology (INST) is operating and managing the National Network for Environmental Radiation Monitoring and Warning (NNERMW) including 11 stations in the North, the North Middle region, and 01 the Monitoring and Management Centre (MMC) of the NNERMW located at the INST. The online radiation monitoring equipments have been designed and manufactured with different monitoring data recording, transmitting, format, and storage technologies from three countries of Germany, Japan, and Vietnam, namely:
- The SARA (ENVINET – Gemany) equipment can record total environmental gamma dose equivalent rate (H*(10)), gamma radiation spectrum and can calculate H*(10) for some interest radioisotopes;
- The NAH (FUJI – Japan) equipments consist of 2 models NAH2 and NAH3. NAH2 model only records total H*(10). NAH3 can record total H*(10) and gamma radiation spectrum, but not yet calculate H*(10) for some interest radioisotopes;
- The RADMON (Vietnam) equipment can record total H*(10) and gamma radiation spectrum, also not yet calculate H*(10) for some interest radioisotopes.
Especially, the data format of these databases is very different, inconsistent and encrypted, and stored in the database of each device system.
Each system measures and transmits data to a separate server, so it causes difficulties for systematical management, as well as for integration simultaneously, and displays the ambient radiation status at desired times.
To overcome the above difficulties and contribute to supporting the operation of the network of environmental radiation monitoring and warning, the project has been set up with 2 goals:
1) To unify the collecting online environmental radioactive monitoring data from different stations in the MMC into a common database with the same format;
2) To have a procedure for processing the unified database to support the network management and operation.
To achieve the two above-mentioned goals, the project has set out the following main research works: 1) To build a procedure of converting and integrating online radioactive monitoring data sources from different devices into a common database of the same unified format. Applying to convert online monitoring data from stations in operation from 2016 to 2020; 2) To build a procedure for processing the unified database, displaying results on the Web interface. Applying to process the unified database from 2016-2020 for management.
On approach, research method, and technique used: Firstly, the project has gathered and studied documents about the software and data formats used in the MMC; has researched and developed software to read, extract and convert data formats from different monitoring device systems, thereby building a common database with a unified format; has researched and developed software to process data and display processing results on Web interface in windows operating system. Secondly, it also studied data formats such as ANSI/IEEE N42.42, SQL; and used several popular data management systems such as MySQL, Oracle, RDBMS, PostgreSQL; as well as applied some programming languages such as Windows PowerShell, HTML, and C # and so on. Thirdly, The function G(E) method has been researched and applied to calculate the total H*(10), the photopeak area method of calculating the area of characteristic photopeaks to calculate H*(10) for the interest radioisotopes.
After 2 years of implementation, the project has completed and over completed the registered contents and has achieved the following main scientific research results:
- The project has had an overview of the software to receive, manage, transmit data, and format data from the online environmental monitoring equipment systems in use, including SARA equipment and NMC software, NAH equipment and software included RADMON equipment and ERMS software.
- The project has built the procedure of data conversion and integration, including modules to extract source data from SARA, NAH, and RADMON devices. These modules have been integrated into the software called RADACOIN V.1, which allows converting and integrating online radiation monitoring data sources from the above devices into a unified format, including total average H*(10) and spectrum data of 2048 channels corresponding to a 10-minute, 1-hour, and 1-day measurements. These data all have a unified SQL format, convenient for subsequent data processing. The quality of this product exceeds the assigned target of the project. The project requires converting and integrating data sources from 3 equipment, the project has been implemented for 15 equipment (including 12 additional equipment installed during the implementation of the project).
- The project has built a procedure to process the uniform environmental radioactive database, process online gamma spectral data to determine the total H*(10), H*(10) for some radioisotopes K-40, Bi-214, and Tl-208 in the form of specialized software called RADAPROC V.1 that can automatically calculate and display the results in a Web browser. The quality of this product also exceeds the assigned target of the project. The project requires a processing spectrum from 2 equipment, the project has been implemented for 8 equipment (including 6 spectrometer equipment that were installed in the process of implementing the project).
The results calculated using the RADAPROC V.1 software have been compared with the results of other methods. The difference in the results between the methods was less than 25% (see Table 1). Figure 1 is one of the typical interfaces of the RADAPROC V.1 software.
Table 1. Average H*(10) in 2020 according to different determination methods at some monitoring stations
Table 2 shows H*(10) calculated from spectrum data recorded by SARA device using RADAPROC V.1 software.
Table 2. Average H*(10) of the interest radionuclides in some monitoring stations
RADACOIN V.1 and RADAPROC V.1 software have been working automatically and continuously 24 hours a day at the MMC, effectively supporting the current tasks of environmental radiation monitoring and warning conducting by the INST. However, these are the first versions that need to be updated every year, especially when the equipment is added to the monitoring network.
The online environmental radiation database created by the 2 above software including H*(10), gamma spectral data, H*(10) for some radioisotopes such as K-40, Bi-214, and Tl-208 measured in different durations (10 min, 1 h, and 1 d) have the same uniform format. This is the first online environmental radiation database in Vietnam and is regularly updated 24/24h at the MMC. This database is getting bigger and bigger and also being interested.
The project has produced one report at the National Conference of Nuclear Science and Technology in Quang Ninh in August 2019 and one paper accepted for publication in the Nuclear Science and Technology Journal of the VINATOM.
Figure 1. Time series of H*(10) at Cao Bang, Da Nang, Vinh, and Mong Cai radiation monitoring stations in 2020
The project was completed well and exceeded the registered contents.
The research results of the project are of scientific significance and have high practical application value in unifying the data format of online radiation monitoring data, processing and storing monitoring data for management, and scientific research in the field of monitoring and timely warning the status of the environmental radiation in Vietnam.
After the project is finished, the main products of the project will be transferred to the INST for use. Network operators will be guided to use the project’s software for their research.
Dr. Vuong Thu Bac, INST
