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What is Radon?
The question "What is
radon? is often the first reaction we are asked in talking with someone
who is moving to our region of the country and has heard that our soil
and rocks contain possibly more uranium than the soil in the region
where they have moved from.
Radon is a
radioactive, invisible, odorless and colorless gas which can infiltrate
your home through small cracks in the basement or from high radon
levels in water if you are have a private well. In rare cases it can
come from radioactive decay of solids in concrete, gypsum or other
building materials. We offer five
different solutions to lower the radon levels in your home.
Radon is a
decay element from Uranium in the rocks underneath your house. Although
Uranium is a metal and therefore sticks to the rocks, when it decays in
several steps to the metal Radium-226 and from there to Radon-222 it
becomes a rare gas and escapes through the natural cracks in the rocks
upwards driven by the natural pressure gradient in the rock and soil
underneath the house..
Radon is approximately 7 times as heavy as the Oxygen molecule but
because it is a rare gas (meaning that it is not chemically active, as
are the other gasses Helium, Neon, Argon, Krypton and Xenon) it will be
easily kicked around by other air-molecules and be found throughout the
house. Typically the Radon concentration in a house one level higher
than the lowest lived-in level is 70%, although this distribution is
very broad, from 25% to 100%.
Health effects
by Radon in our homes:
The next logical question is how elevated levels of radon inside your
(current or future) home can affect your health and whether there are
groups in our population that are more at risk than others. Are there
possibly groups in our population who have no risk at all so that they
do not have to worry about radon? I answer these questions on the page:
Who is at risk?
Can something be
done to lower the level of radon in a home?
So far we have only talked about radon as a problem, but can the
problem be solved or should you abandon the thought of buying the home
you have worked so hard for to afford? If there is a solution, how
should you approach the problem? This is addressed on our page: What
should you do when your home was tested and high Radon concentration
levels were confirmed?
Next [Learn about Mold &
Spectrum Scans] >>
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