Amalgamating rice straw and wood sawdust with chlorinated polyvinyl chloride as environmentally sustainable natural...

The current investigation aims to develop novel radiation shielding composites utilizing environmentally sustainable and natural materials such as wood, sawdust, and rice straw. Samples were formulated by amalgamating rice straw and wood sawdust in varying weight proportions with chlorinated polyvinyl chloride (CPVC). The composition of straw/sawdust composites was ascertained through energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDX), while their structure was examined using a scanning electron microscope (SEM). Compressive testing was used to assess the mechanical properties. The linear attenuation coefficient (μ) was determined from the experiment, which included five radioactive gamma sources: 241Am, 133Ba, 137Cs, 60Co, and 152Eu, covering an energy range from 0.059 MeV to 1.408 MeV. Mass attenuation coefficient (MAC) experiments showed a relative deviance (Δ%) between -3.69% and 4.09% when compared to XCOM software's theoretical data. The mean free path (MFP), half value layer (HVL), and tenth value layer (TVL) are additional radiation shielding measurements that were computed. Building factors (BFs), effective atomic number (Zeff), equivalent atomic number (Zeq), and other measurements were also assessed. The inclusion of wood dust and rice straw in the CPVC improved the γ-ray shielding properties compared to an alternative composite.