Radon levels in underground workplaces: a map of the Italian regions

The indoor radon exposition is a widely recognised health hazard, so specific laws and regulations have been produced in many countries and so-called radon-risk maps have consequently been produced. In Italy the regulation applies to general workplaces and a national survey was carried out in the 1990s to evaluate the exposure to radon in dwellings. Failing a national coordinated mapping programme, some Italian regions performed a survey to identify radon-prone areas, nevertheless with different methodologies. In this work a national map of the average annual radon concentration levels in underground workplaces, obtained from the results of 8695 annual indoor radon measurements carried out by U-Series laboratory between 2003 and 2010, was presented. Due to underground locations, the mean radon concentration is higher than that from previous map elaborated for dwellings and a significant radon concentration was also found in Regions traditionally considered as low-risk areas.