Determination of plutonium in soil samples from the Federal Republic of Germany.

For evaluation purposes of measured plutonium values which occur at monitoring the surroundings of nuclear facilities values recently measured far off from these facilities were needed. Therefore Pu-238 and Pu-239/240 activities in soil samples from 44 locations in the Federal Republic of Germany have been determined. With one exception (16 mBq/kg dry matter) all the measured Pu-238 values were lower than the detection limit of 11 mBq/kg dry matter. Mean and standard deviation of the Pu-239/240 values amounted to 123 +/- 66 mBq/kg dry matter. 90% of the Pu-239/240 values were between 50 and 150 mBq/kg dry matter. All the values corresponded quite well to the known deposition density of the plutonium deposition following the nuclear weapons tests in the 50th and 60th. There were no indications for additional plutonium deposits in the Federal Republic of Germany after the Chernobyl accident in 1986.