Radiocarbon and Tritium Levels Along the Romanian Lower Danube River

Abstract

The Lower Danube Basin covers the Romanian-Bulgarian sub-basin downstream from Cazane Gorge and the sub-basins of the Siret and Prut rivers. To extensively survey the Romanian nuclear power plant impact on the Danube water, tritium and radiocarbon baseline values are required. Therefore, the reported study tried to establish these values based on a 2-yr sampling campaign covering 975 km of the Danube from Cazane Gorge to Tulcea. The tributaries Cerna, Jiu, Olt, and Arges were also included in this study. During the sampling campaigns, tritium concentration of different sampling locations showed values between 7 ± 2.1 and 33.5 ± 2.3 TU. Measured 14 C activity for the same locations ranged between 88.45 ± 1.46 and 112.36 ± 1.56 pMC. Lower values were recorded for tributaries: between 8.3 ± 2.1 and 12.2 ± 2.2 TU for tritium and between 67.3 ± 1.29 and 86.04 ± 1.42 pMC for 14 C. Despite the nuclear activity in the observed areas, tritium and 14 C activities presented slightly higher values for specific locations without any influence on Danube River water.