The NORM4Building database, a tool for radiological assessment when using by-products in building materials

Scientific data on natural occurring radioactive materials (NORMs) is available in unknown quantities and the data is fragmented over several different sources. The new EU-BSS is regulating the use of NORM in building materials, however a large scale database with country specific information that can support legislators and industry in the assessment of the radiological impact of the use of by-products in construction is missing. Currently the COST Action ‘NORM4BUILDING’ (2014–2017) is creating such a database using a semi-automated datamining approach. In this paper radiological aspects on by-products that can find application in concrete are discussed based on the database.The authors would like to acknowledge networking support by the COST Action TU1301 www.norm4building.org. The authors wish to thank the University of Pannonia for the management and setting up of the database and datamining approach. In addition, the authors would like to thank all the colleagues who helped creating and evaluating the database and are very grateful to University of Hasselt for support on accessing the e-Journals. This work was supported by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Grant agreement No 701932.Natural occurring radioactive materials; Building materials; Database; Concrete; By-products; Euratom Basic Safety Standard