CR3 News Magazine 2020 VOL 1: JANUARY National Radon Action Month | Page 18

Making Sure Your Home is Radon Safe:

By Peter C. Foller, Ph.D. 2019 December

A New Tool

A hazard, though little heard of

There is a health hazard in as many as

1 in 10 U. S. homes that is poorly understood. Radon. If you do not specifically test for it, you will never know it is there!

Radon is a gas that results from the radioactive decay of trace elements commonly found within rocky soils. Principle among these is naturally occurring trace uranium, which, over billions of years slowly decays through a sequence of different chemical elements, one of which is radon. The radio-active decay of radon, however, is rapid,

which is why it is hazardous.

Radon decay, and the further decay

of daughter elements over a lengthy pathway to eventual stability, produces fast moving negatively charged electrons (called beta particles) and fast moving positively charged

helium nuclei (called alpha particles). Both

are of high enough energy to break chemical bonds and cause genetic damage in living tissue. Being a gas, when radon is inhaled, its decay can cause damage within lung tissue. With long-term exposure, this can increase a person’s chances of getting lung cancer.

In the U. S. , some 228,000 people

are diagnosed with lung cancer every year. Smoking, of course, is the leading cause. However, radon also takes its toll. The U. S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates radon is the cause of 21,000

deaths in the U. S. every year.

Some portion of this ongoing tragedy is preventable. Smoking is a choice. It is also a choice whether or not to investigate your home for hazardous levels of radon and then take well-known and effective mitigation steps, some of which are not even very costly.

The greatest determinant of whether your home may have a radon issue is where it is situated. The underlying geology is the single most critical factor. The EPA has published maps of the U. S. showing the location of the rocky soils from which radon is emitted. Outdoors, such emissions are of no concern due to the immediate dilution of radon into the vast volume of the atmosphere. Indoors, however, the air within your home turns over slowly. Modern homes are now more tightly constructed for energy efficiency, exasperating the problem. Radon gas can seep in from soil through cracks in slabs and foundations, inadequate sealing around sumps, and to a lesser extent, from well water. Depending upon the season, indoor warmer air being at a lower pressure than its surroundings, a home may exhibit a “chimney effect,” actively drawing in radon. Seasonal water table variation is also a factor.

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