Radon Paranoia! (documents, 2015, inspection, broker)

[Barking Spider]

Level of exposure is a factor. Think of getting a chest x-ray once a year. Really very little health risk. What if you got one 6 times a year? A little more health risk. However, if you got a chest x-ray once a week, you are at a much higher health risk.

Lets say you have a home office and you really never get out much. You could live in a home with fairly low radon levels and have a higher health risk than someone living in a house with high radon levels, but travels for work and is only home two days a week.

A mitigation system not only reduces the radon levels in a home, but will also reduce humidity levels. Its a small price to pay for knowing that you never have to worry about high radon levels.

Sure there are ways to subvert a radon test. While some testing devices will detect tampering, if someone wants to cheat, and they know how, it would be very difficult to prove.

I view people that set out to defeat a test as unethical cheats. They might also hot charge an ailing air conditioning unit to get it to work OK for a few months, then die long after they have collected their money from the home sale. I see people that try to cheat potential buyers all the time while doing inspections. They hide known defects and hope no one finds them. I can't tell you how many times I have found a hole in the wall or floor having some furniture blocking access.

[Blackjack6]

Originally Posted by 35cents

Wow, the plethora of internet information (or misinformation) on radon is numbing. I just bought an electronic continuous tester and ran a 2-day test on my basement, it is showing a 6.4 pCi/l concentration. I will let it run and see where it ends up in a couple of weeks. Short of having a professional company come in and test, I feel this is a fairly reliable test method.

From everything that I can disseminate as factual on the net, I am not going to panic but maybe do a little more due diligence before deciding what to do, if anything. With all of the contradictory information out there, it's tough if not impossible for the homeowner to make an "educated" decision and weed out unbiased information from everything out there. This is especially disconcerting for the average homeowner who fears they may have put their family's health in danger.

There are two sides to the Radon Story, make sure you look at both. Much of the newer studies show there is a beneficial effect from low levels of Radon, up to the 4-7 pCi/L range, where the Zero Threshold models from 20 to 30 years ago predicted no safe level. Even the EPA contradicts themselves between "5,000 to 20,000 deaths per year" and "radon at typical indoor levels presents no risk for lung cancer". This is a $3Billion a year industry in the US, follow the money. OldNavy1 has some great posts here on Radon.

[BoBromhal]

Originally Posted by Blackjack6

There are two sides to the Radon Story, make sure you look at both. Much of the newer studies show there is a beneficial effect from low levels of Radon, up to the 4-7 pCi/L range, where the Zero Threshold models from 20 to 30 years ago predicted no safe level. Even the EPA contradicts themselves between "5,000 to 20,000 deaths per year" and "radon at typical indoor levels presents no risk for lung cancer". This is a $3Billion a year industry in the US, follow the money. OldNavy1 has some great posts here on Radon.

not that I expect this pop-up poster to ever answer, but ...

I cannot wait to hear about the benefits of radon exposure above the somewhat arbitrary regulatory/legal action level.

[Blackjack6]

Yes, I am a new "pop-up" poster, but don't let that concern you. Maybe I should prejudge you as well and say "you probably won't understand the science" but that wouldn't be nice. Where would you like to start?

LNT model errors? It has been known since the late 1980s there was significant evidence to contradict the LNT or Zero Threshold model.
"The use of collective doses and the LNT-theory has recently been condemned by UNSCEAR (United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation). They express this as;
“the Scientific Committee does not recommend multiplying very low doses by large numbers of individ-uals to estimate numbers of radiation-induced health effects within a population exposed to incremental doses at levels equivalent to or lower than natural background levels. (2009)

Ernst Caspari (1909 – 1988) stated "Thus the results in this low dose region do not follow the LNT-theory, but rath-er indicate a threshold for low dose rates."

Robley D. Evans (1907 – 1995) studied the Radium Dial Girls. Young women employed to paint the number on watch dials with radium paint who would lick the points of brushes to make a fine point for delicate work. of the approximately 6000 in the study the following results were found. "The great majority of radium dial painters went through life with no recognizable consequences of their exposures.
They lived as long as, and apparently in as good health as, their unexposed neighbours. This fact seems to have been little appreciated and seldom mentioned, but it may be the most important finding of the entire study.
No leukemia, no breast cancer and no lung cancer in spite of the rather large doses given at a low dose rate.

Of the cancers that were found, none were detected after the 1928 law prohibiting licking the brush.

Health Physics Society (leading radiological study group since the 1950s) (2006). Substantial scientific data indicate that the LNT model of radiation effects oversimplifies the relationship between dose and response. Linearity at low dose may be rejected for a number of specific cancers, such as bone cancer, lymphoma, and chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Heritable genetic damage has not been observed in human studies.

The references to 100 mSv in this position statement should not be construed as implying that health effects are well established for doses exceeding 100 mSv. Considerable uncertainties remain for stochastic effects of radiation exposure between 100 mSv and 1,000 mSv...the references to 100 mSv in this position statement should generally be interpreted as 100 mSv above natural background dose.

How about the EPA response to this information?
Jerome S. Puskin, PhD, Center for Science and Technology, Radiation Protection Division, ORIA (6608J), EPA, Washington, DC; Periodically, EPA updates its radiation risk models. In this process, EPA derives most of its assumptions and models from reports by scientific advisory bodies including the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP), the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Ionizing Radiation (UNSCEAR), and the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP), with additional input from its own independent review of the scientific literature.
For low-LET radiation, however, even the largest epidemiology studies are only sensi-tive down to incremental doses of ~100 mGy above background. At this dose, each cell nucleus is traversed by ~100 electron tracks. In compari-son, at natural background levels, each cell nucleus is traversed by only on the order of 1 track per year.
The use of LNT for radiation protection purposes is often justified as being “conservative”; i.e., it is presumed that, while we may not be able to estimate the risk at low doses accurately, linear extrapolation is unlikely to (greatly) underestimate risk. Given these features of pro-tectiveness and convenience, there is very wide support for LNT in the context of radiation protection, even among scientists and regulators who harbor serious doubts about its scientific validity.

In other words, there is a great deal of evidence against the LNT model but we chose to be conservative in protecting the public. Even if data shows otherwise.

I could go on for another 2 hours (the length of my state approved Radon Fact or Fiction class) but you get the general idea, maybe. Search for "post 2000 radon studies" read what they have to say. There have been dozens of studies all showing the same thing, i.e. LNT is faulty, low dose over a long period results in decreased cancer rates.

[davebarnes]

Originally Posted by Blackjack6

Where would you like to start?

Your points are relevant for science.
You points are irrelevant vis à via the residential real estate business.
Where I live in Denver, it has become almost mandatory that radon mitigation be installed before selling a house.
People are paranoid and no amount of rational discourse is going to change their minds.
The word radiation scares the crap out of people.

[marino760]

Originally Posted by davebarnes

Your points are relevant for science.
You points are irrelevant vis à via the residential real estate business.
Where I live in Denver, it has become almost mandatory that radon mitigation be installed before selling a house.
People are paranoid and no amount of rational discourse is going to change their minds.
The word radiation scares the crap out of people.

And yet for the last 200 years people never gave radon exposure a second thought in this country or even knew about it but cancer rates in the past are far less in the general population than they are now and are expected to be in the future. So who the hell knows what difference it makes?

[Coldjensens]

The threat is both real and exaggerated from what I have learned about it. In some areas (parts of Kentucky and Tennessee primarily - if i remember correctly) it is a huge problem. On the other hand those states do not have a massively lower life expectancy or massively higher lung cancer for smokers that other locations generally. Meaning the people who have been living in high levels of radon for centuries have not been dying off in droves because of it. (On the other hand, Tennessee and Kentucky historically have high levels of smokers and therefore higher levels of lung cancer, so it is hard to discern what impact radon may have had.)

Still it is pretty well established that living in very high levels of radon can cause various types of cancer and breathing disorders. People have died because of radon, but people have died because of about a thousand things you can find in your house. You have to balance the reality of your particular risk. At the same time if you get a high test result, do not sell your home and go on a last month to live European Jaunt and spend all of your money. First get more tests done under differing conditions. Talk with your doctor. Do a ton of research. become a more knowledgeable expert on the subject than your radon salesman (not too hard) and learn to distinguish the hype or scam articles form real science (much harder).

Radon remediation companies do not make money by telling you you have insignificant levels of radon in your home and do not need to be concerned. They want you to believe any radon whatsoever is horrific and must be mitigated immediately at any cost. They do not want you to know that radon is pretty much everywhere at some level. At one point someone tried to start a scare about radon emanating form granite counter tops in kitchens. I do not know how whomever started that intended to profit from it, maybe it was manufacturers of Corrian.

So do your research. Try to avoid the hype try to get good information about how to perform meaningful tests and analysis not tests designed to maximize the panic factor and sell you what is essentially a fan and some pipe at extravagant prices. Sometimes, you can "mitigate" radon by opening two windows and putting fans in them one blowing in, one out. (Worked for us). This is the newest homeowner scam area as well as being a real and potentially dangerous threat, so you need to became an informed consumer. Like many things (mold, asbestos, even lead paint to some extent), there is a real threat but far less common and often far less severe than the scammers want to make it out to be. There is no good way to differentiate between the companies really concerned about your well being and those concerned only about their bottom line (most are in between an some have been fed a load of hogwash that they now believe. On the other hand, some are quite knowledgeable, but will still push you to err on the side of caution - that is how they feed their children after all). When the salesperson starts spewing out highly technical sounding words and statistics, ask where they got their engineering or medial degree, or at least ask them what their training and qualifications are.

Here is the problem, it seems like you cannot afford a real scientist to conduct the tests and do the analysis and if necessary, design a remediation program, but it could actually cost you more to get sold a bill of goods for something you may not need, or get sold something something that will not help much with a real problem.

What I tried when we wanted to gt some testing done is to ask the company to provide names and telephone numbers of ten households unrelated to any of their people where they did the testing and found no risk. Unfortunately none of them could do this except one but their list turned out to be a scam (people who did not exist, had not had testing done or were relatives). Our state offered free radon testing kits with detailed instructions on how to test properly. Then you sent the tests thingies in to them for laboratory analysis. Not sure whether any states still do, but it is worth checking.

Keep in mind if you do testing and get high level results, in some states you will have to disclose this when you sell your home. So keep good records of their results and what they tell you.

Good luck with this. It is not an easy problem to deal with, and perhaps the best solution is to just allow the possibility of being completely scammed and pay for something you do not need rather than dying because your tried to save a few thousand dollars. You have to balance this though, because if you go for all of the "threats" you read about, you will end up living in the poor house or on the streets where the risks are far more serious.

[Sherifftruman]

You could also just hire someone like a home inspector that does radon testing but not remediation. (Like me). I have no care or vested interest in what the reading is. And I can’t really give you a list of people and their readings as that would breach confidentiality, but I can tell you that in my area maybe 1 in 20 tests come back high. (Obviously the areas mentioned above are probably well more than that) I suppose I could black out the addresses and names on the reports and leave a zip of someone wanted to see them.

You can also buy a long term test kit from these guys (a test of more than 90 days is better than the short term test I can do anyway, but since you don’t have that long when buying a house, you do what you can). https://shop.accustarlabs.com/ They also have no vested interest in your reading and the tests are pretty inexpensive. I would recommend 6 months as you’ll capture more diverse weather conditions that way.

[Blackjack6]

Originally Posted by davebarnes

Your points are relevant for science.
You points are irrelevant vis à via the residential real estate business.
Where I live in Denver, it has become almost mandatory that radon mitigation be installed before selling a house.
People are paranoid and no amount of rational discourse is going to change their minds.
The word radiation scares the crap out of people.

Science changes as we learn more about a subject, but the more recent studies are very relevant to real estate. As a RE Broker and instructor it is our responsibility to educate our buyers and sellers. Most of the information out there is based on 30+ year old science and mitigation companies and inspection companies are promoting fear by quoting, and misquoting, the old science. The more recent studies, last 10 years, show a beneficial effect against a variety of cancers from prolonged low dose exposure. Exposure up to 3X the EPA "action" level are proven to reduce cancer. The risk difference between low dose and moderate dose (3X level) over the 70 or 80 year projection data is 0.5% (0.41% to 0.91%). I respect your opinion, everyone has one, but do the research before you dismiss something as irrelevant. Exposure to most anyone who smokes, is around smokers, or who has respiratory illnesses puts the situation in a very different category.

[Sherifftruman]

How about some links to the studies you’re talking about.?