New Jersey, which shares the radon-rich Reading Prong [AtE Jul 85] with Pennsylvania and New York, has set up a Radon Hotline (609-292-5586) to answer specific questions. Two radon measurement services are much cheaper than reported last month. One is the Radon Project, Physics Dept., U. of Pittsburgh, PA 15260. For $12, they send a detector that is exposed in the home for a week, then resealed and returned for evaluation. (Because of seasonal variations, this should be repeated in 3 month's intervals.) Pennsylvania State University has a similar program using Track-Etch detectors; the period of exposure is three months, cost $22 (Penn. State U., Attn. R.W. Granlund, 228 Academic Projects Bldg., University Park, PA 16802).
GRAPHIC: ATE02_8603.TIF
The map above shows the more extensive areas with geological formations and ore deposits that have elevated radon concentrations: granite, phosphates, uranium, and shale. It is not a reliable map of high radon concentrations, it does not show the radon "hot spots" small in area, but high in intensity.
Some misinformation is already beginning to appear.
1) Except as a transporter, radon itself is virtually without danger: the lung cancers are caused by its decay products, which are shortlived, solid (metallic) radioisotopes.
2) An impervious sheet or block isolating the building foundations from the ground may not be a remedy: the water supply may bring significant amounts of radon into the house.
3) Do not overestimate the danger. For centuries, the infirm have flocked to Bath, Lourdes, Bad Gastein, and other spas where the water has a high radon content; and Prof. B. L. Cohen is now using the radon measurements to disprove the linear hypothesis (if there were no threshold, there would be vastly more cancers). I have harped on radon for six years not to scare you, but to point to the horrendous inconsistency of regulators and demagogues in their double standard for energy conservation and energy production: Naderite charlatan Dr Sydney Wolfe petitioned the OSHA for radon standards that would limit the exposure of uranium miners to one twentieth the level to which infants can be exposed in some energy-conserving homes; and the "environmentalists" of the National Resource Defense Council nit-pick old bomb tests under an analogous double standard of "Let the babies perish."
4) Beware of dubious remedies. A pilot program in Pennsylvania uses forced ventilation systems that suck the radon-rich air from below the basement and blow it away. The cost is between $5,000 and $10,000, not including the energy continuously consumed by the pumps. Should your home have unusually high radon levels, you may therefore have to sell your gold-plated monocles and diamond-studded fingerbowls; alternatively, you can help clear the access to clean and abundant energy, allowing people to open their windows again.
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Vol. 13, No. 6
Newsletter: Access to Energy Newsletter Archive Volume: Issues Issue/No.: Vol. 13, No. 6 Date: November 29, 2004 03:59 PM Title: Review of a review
Copyright © 2004 - Access to Energy Newsletter Archive
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