Radon exhalation rate in south-east Sicily building materials

One of the main contributions to indoor radon levels is given by the exhalation from building materials. For this reason we performed measurements of radon exhalation rate in materials commonly used in buildings of the eastern Sicily. The measurements were carried out by using solid state nuclear track detectors in diffusion chambers. We report the results obtained for samples of materials used both for building and for decorating dwellings. The obtained values have shown that building materials commonly used in the eastern Sicily have surface exhalation rates ranging between 1.9 and 43.1 mBq m^-2*h^-1 showing higher values for volcanic materials. (authors)