Radon?

[jneutron]

Originally posted by Nixie
It's a standard pen-shaped shirt pocket-clip quartz fiber dosimeter.

If it's only measuring gamma and x-ray, which makes sense as the barrel is all-metal, where the hell am I getting so much gamma and x-rays? On the few occasions I ran the x-ray machine, I've checked the dosimeter before and after and the reading did not visibly change, so that is not the source.

Ya gotta read the links I gave you....here's a link from the nrc page.

http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/basic-...radiation.html

If you notice, 45 to 50 per year is the average dose we receive from outta space...so it would appear that your dosimeter is spot on..

Cheers, John

[dfdye]

Look, the tester you have will NOT reliably give you any idea of your radon exposure. Go and buy a long and a short term radon kit. I think the short term test is 1-4 weeks. If that comes back scary, run. If that is OK, wait till the 1 year test completes and see what your actual exposure is.

Remember, Radon exposure varies greatly day to day. You need a long term test to be on the safe side, and unless your pen do-hicky-thing-a-ma-bob is specifically designed for long term radon measurements, you should get a kit (well, two--long and short term). The fact that you are not sure what the pen actually does should be clue #1 that you are on the wrong page.

In the short term, there won't be much danger. This is a chronic exposure risk. Don't panic. Just check it out and get your foundation fixed if there is a problem.

[KBK]

So...the entire Sudbury basin may have an issue.

Large Uranium deposits found, overall. Ie, really ..overall. Widely scattered. If I was so inclinded to manufacture a 'destructive device', I could possibly wander the Sudbury area to find my own and, er, purify. Long drawn out task, and likely the hard way to do it, but it CAN be done.

Watchout for the bears. Lotsa bears.

[dgoodier]

I agree with jnuetron.
The dosimeter is not a good method of testing.

I used to be a Radon Sampling tech. Your testing options are:
Continuous Radon Monitoring- A machine that logs the level during a specific time frame.
An Eperm test - usually done by a professional, some companies will send you a canister for self test.
A charcoal canister test- Quick and DIY, The lab I work (Maryland, USA) for sells them. If you want I'll give you the website for the company. Costs about $70 including analysis and it's not the cheapest.
Make sure you know the analysis cost of DIY radon kits, a lot of kits make it seem like the include analysis until you read the fine print on the box.

Use one of these methods and you will have better idea if you should be worried. I think Canada has a different background level that is considered acceptable, so check with you enviromental authority.

Mitigation shouldn't be that expensive. It is important to shop around, I have seen huge price ranges in mitigation quotes.

This has a lot of good info on Radon in Canada:
https://www03.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/b2c/b2.../pdf/61945.pdf


David

[Eric_B_C]

Here in the states they offer us free radon test kits.

There is a scale of however "whatever" PPM you can be exposed to. The EPA say anything under 4ppm is safe.

We get 1.2ppm in the winter and 2.9ppm in the summer. Not enough to warrant a mitigation pump. Radon is highest in the basement and in the top floor, but lower in the middle floor.

Its prevalent in my area and a lot of us have mitigation pumps. Since we all have drain tiles under the homes the mitigation pump creates positive pressure and doesn't allow the radon to come into the home.

I need to retest our since its been 2 years since our last test.

Get it checked with a real test and follow the directions. I forgot the exact numbers of a number of 10 or higher gives you a pretty high chance of getting lung cancer. If you smoke and its 10 and higher its not a matter of if your getting it, just when.

Good thing is, exposure is over the long term. 2 years unless its astronomically high is not the end of the world.

Age of the home matters too. Newer homes are tighter so they have higher concentrations. In Michigan it was never a problem until the houses started to get better and there was less air leakage.

[maxro]

Originally posted by KBK
Large Uranium deposits found, overall. Ie, really ..overall. Widely scattered. If I was so inclinded to manufacture a 'destructive device', I could possibly wander the Sudbury area to find my own and, er, purify. Long drawn out task, and likely the hard way to do it, but it CAN be done.

KBK, in this case, I'm not sure if a "CANDU" attitude is a good thing.

Max

[Nixie]

Ouch.