Preliminary investigation of geological controls on radon concentration in surficial sediment in Whitehorse, Yukon (NTS 105D/11, 14)

Although the presence of radon has been reported in Yukon, the controls on radon soil gas fluxes in Yukon have not been studied. Here we report 328 radon concentration measurements collected in surficial sediment at 30 sites throughout Whitehorse during the summer of 2020 for the purpose of examining the controlling factors. The sediment types include till, glaciofluvial sand and gravel, glaciolacustrine silt, fluvial sand and gravel, and eolian sand. Average radon concentrations were compared to bedrock lithology, thickness of surficial sediment, surficial sediment type, surficial sediment grain size distribution, sorting, sediment maturity, and soil moisture to determine the first-order geological controls. Pronounced interseasonal variation was observed, but intraseasonal summer readings were relatively consistent. Positive correlation is apparent between radon concentration and grain size distribution, as well as between radon concentration and soil moisture. Negative correlation is observed between radon concentration and sediment maturity, with till and weathered bedrock displaying the highest concentrations of radon. No appreciable correlation was observed with depth to bedrock or with bedrock type. Additional data are being collected to complete the analyses in order to establish which geological and environmental factors are primary controls on radon concentration in near surface sediments.

Datasets available for download

• Yukon Geological Survey publication metadataHTML
  To Download

  • More information
  • Go to resource
• appendicesXLSX
  To Download

  • More information
  • Go to resource
• paperPDF
  To Download

  • More information
  • Go to resource
• Original metadata (https://open.yukon.ca)HTML
  To Download

  • More information
  • Go to resource

• Science and Technology
• ygs-import
• ygs-import-20250711
• ygs-publications
• yukon-geological-survey

Additional Info

• Maturity Level 1 (46%)
• Maturity Level 2 (38%)
• Maturity Level 3 (0%)
• Maturity Level 4 (0%)
• Maturity Level 5 (0%)
• Maturity Level 6 (0%)

Field	Value
Last Updated	October 20, 2025, 02:22 (UTC)
Created	October 20, 2025, 02:22 (UTC)
Domain / Topic Domain or topic of the dataset being cataloged.
Title Title for the Dataset.	Preliminary investigation of geological controls on radon concentration in surficial sediment in Whitehorse, Yukon (NTS 105D/11, 14)
Description A description of the dataset.	Although the presence of radon has been reported in Yukon, the controls on radon soil gas fluxes in Yukon have not been studied. Here we report 328 radon concentration measurements collected in surficial sediment at 30 sites throughout Whitehorse during the summer of 2020 for the purpose of examining the controlling factors. The sediment types include till, glaciofluvial sand and gravel, glaciolacustrine silt, fluvial sand and gravel, and eolian sand. Average radon concentrations were compared to bedrock lithology, thickness of surficial sediment, surficial sediment type, surficial sediment grain size distribution, sorting, sediment maturity, and soil moisture to determine the first-order geological controls. Pronounced interseasonal variation was observed, but intraseasonal summer readings were relatively consistent. Positive correlation is apparent between radon concentration and grain size distribution, as well as between radon concentration and soil moisture. Negative correlation is observed between radon concentration and sediment maturity, with till and weathered bedrock displaying the highest concentrations of radon. No appreciable correlation was observed with depth to bedrock or with bedrock type. Additional data are being collected to complete the analyses in order to establish which geological and environmental factors are primary controls on radon concentration in near surface sediments.
Tags / Keywords Keywords/tags categorizing the dataset.	Science and Technology ygs-import ygs-import-20250711 ygs-publications yukon-geological-survey
Format (CSV, XLS, TXT, PDF, etc) File format of the dataset.
Dataset Size Dataset size in megabytes.
Metadata Identifier Metadata identifier – can be used as the unique identifier for catalogue entry
Published Date Published date of the dataset.	2021-01-18
Time Period Data Span (start date) Start date of the data in the dataset.
Time Period Data Span (end date) End date of time data in the dataset.
GeoSpatial Area Data Span A spatial region or named place the dataset covers.

Field	Value
Access category Type of access granted for the dataset (open, closed, service, etc).
License License used to access the dataset.	Open Government Licence - Yukon
Limits on use Limits on use of data.
Location Location of the dataset.	https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/5cb4662e-7573-4416-8839-36e2318bc60a
Data Service Data service for accessing a dataset.
Owner Owner of the dataset.	Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Contact Point Who to contact regarding access?	Yukon Geological Survey
Contact Point Email The email to contact regarding access?
Publisher Publisher of the dataset.
Publisher Email Email of the publisher.	[email protected]
Author Author of the dataset.
Author Email Email of the author.
Accessed At Date the data and metadata was accessed.

Field	Value
Identifier Unique identifier for the dataset.
Language Language(s) of the dataset
Link to dataset description A URL to an external document describing the dataset.
Persistent Identifier Data is identified by a persistent identifier.
Globally Unique Identifier Data is identified by a persistent and globally unique identifier.
Contains data about individuals Does the data hold data about individuals?
Contains data about identifiable individuals Does the data hold identifiable data about individual?
Contains Indigenous Data Does the data hold data about Indigenous communities?
Portal Type Platform type of the source portal.

Field	Value
Version Version of the datatset	None
Source Source of the dataset.	None
Version notes Version notes about the dataset.
Is version of another dataset Link to dataset that it is a version of.
Other versions Link to datasets that are versions of it.
Provenance Text Provenance Text of the data.
Provenance URL Provenance URL of the data.
Temporal resolution Describes how granular the date/time data in the dataset is.
GeoSpatial resolution in meters Describes how granular (in meters) geospatial data is in the dataset.
GeoSpatial resolution (in regions) Describes how granular (in regions) geospatial data is in the dataset.

Field	Value
Indigenous Community Permission Who holds the Indigenous Community Permission. Who to contact regarding access to a dataset that has data about Indigenous communities.
Community Permission Community permission (who gave permission).
The Indigenous communities the dataset is about Indigenous communities from which data is derived.

Field	Value
Number of data rows If tabular dataset, total number of rows.
Number of data columns If tabular dataset, total number of unique columns.
Number of data cells If tabular dataset, total number of cells with data.
Number of data relations If RDF dataset, total number of triples.
Number of entities If RDF dataset, total number of entities.
Number of data properties If RDF dataset, total number of unique properties used by the triples.
Data quality Describes the quality of the data in the dataset.
Metric for data quality A metric used to measure the quality of the data, such as missing values or invalid formats.

Please login or register to comment.