Developement of a numerical tool for assessing radon prevention and mitigation methods in energy-efficient new buildings and existing buildings.

Radon (Rn) is a radioactive gas that emanates from rocks and soils and tends to concentrate in enclosed spaces. The main source is soil gas infiltration, although other sources such as building materials and water extracted from wells are relevant in some specific cases.

Rn constitutes the second cause of lung cancer after smoking. Current estimates of the proportion of lung cancers attributable to Rn range from 3 to 14%, depending on the average Rn concentration in the country and smoking prevalence, as there is a strong combined effect of smoking and Rn.

The European Commission published in 2013 the Basic Safety Standards directive 2013/59/Euratom in which all member states are required to design and implement a National Radon Plan (NRP) to protect the population from high levels of indoor radon. One of the issues that each NRP must address is the assessment in prevention of radon entry into new buildings and mitigation of radon levels in existing buildings. Although existing mitigation methods are efficient in reducing radon levels, there are areas for improvement in relation to the site-specific characteristics, which can render them ineffective in some cases.

Furthermore, reducing air leaks in a building to make it more energy-efficient can lead to an increase in radon concentration. Modelling radon generation and transport in the source media, its entry into a building and its distribution throughout the different floors and rooms of a building is a very challenging task that may require different computational tools. The main goal of this project is to develop a user-friendly, site-specific tool that can simulate indoor radon level dynamics and the effect of energy-efficient measures and different mitigation methods, combining the results of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations with a box model. This tool is intended to be useful for assessing radon risk in the design of energy-efficient buildings and mitigation methods in existing dwellings.

The candidate should have basic knowledge of radioactivity and fluid dynamics, including solving transport equations. In addition, good programming skills are required, and knowledge of Comsol Multiphysics software and numerical methods (finite differences or elements) will be an advantage. In general, this project is seeking graduates in physics or computer engineering.

We are looking for a highly motivated individual who is capable of working on multidisciplinary tasks in which he/she will have to collaborate with or seek advice from physicists, engineers, and architects.

The IONHE (IONising Radiation: Health and Environment) research group (2021 SGR 00607) is composed of members from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya and UAB. It focuses on 2 main research lines: Health and Environment, paying attention to the effect of ionizing radiation on human health in the first case, and the use of radionuclides as tracers of environmental processes in the second.

The UAB members are experts on modelling radon generation and transport in the source, and its entry and accumulation indoors from a dynamic point of view. The group developed the RAGENA model, one of the most cited indoor radon models (Font and Baixeras, The Science of the Total Environment 307 (2003) 55-69).

The Group of Nanotransport Properties (2021 SGR 00644) is a research group focused on the study of transport phenomena in general, and specifically on systems with characteristic nanoscale features. They use finite element and ab initio software as numerical tools for modelling and analysis.