Re: Is breathing outdoor air containing radon gas any safer than it is indoors?

What an excellent question!  The difference between radon contaminated air 
in a house and radon contaminated air outside is directly related to the 
concentration of the radon in the sample.  New homes and buildings are 
built with airtight seals on the windows and doors to help eliminate 
heat/AC loss and to stop drafts.  This has made for a more comfortable 
environment to live in, but it has also caused the problem with radon 
comtamination.  The radon gas can leak into your home through cracks in 
your basement.  If a window or door is opened all the time in the house, 
then the radon will eventually make its way through the house and into the 
atmosphere.  However, if the doors and windows are never open during the 
winter and usually not open in the summer (AC), then the concentration of 
radon gas will build inside the home to unhealthy levels.  That is why 
the "indoor radon pollution" problem has been studied extensively.  

     The way to "fix" the problem is by installing a radon collector and 
venting system in your basement.  This is simply a couple of PVC pipes 
with holes drilled in the bottom placed on a gravel bed under the concrete 
foundation.  An exhaust fan is attached to one end and a plug on the other 
end.  All of the cracks in the concrete slab in the basement must be 
filled with caulk to prevent leakage into the home.  The exhaust fan then 
constantly draws the radon contaminated air from the ground, through the 
pipe and into the atmosphere.

     The reason that we don't worry about radon in the atmosphere is 
called the "dilution solution".  Once the radon gas reaches the atmosphere 
it is diluted by the other gasses in our atmosphere (O2, N2, H2O, Ar, CO2, 
etc.) to levels that cannot harm humans.  However, your concern is 
justified by our history of dumping garbage into the ocean.  The "dilution 
solution" was used as an argument to justify the dumping, "look at the 
size of the world's oceans, it will always dilute and filter out all of 
our human waste."  Well the people that said that were wrong, and ocean 
dumping was found to be ruining our greatest natural resource with toxic 
levels of metals, pcb's, and with garbage washing up on our beautiful 
beaches (I'm from NJ, so trust me I know!!)  But it was scientists like 
you that questioned the "dilution solution" in the ocean and helped to 
make our world a safer and more beautiful place to live.  So what am I 
getting at?  I think that the atmosphere is large enough to dilute the 
radon released from the earth, but people always have to question the 
theories.  That is why probing, thoughtful questions like yours will make 
you a terrific scientist one day!!


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Admin note:

Michael S Ford adds the following:

Andrew,

I'm going to have to disagree with Mr. Sherman on this one.

The premise of your question assumes that radon in concentrations found in
the home environment is harmful.

Despite what you may have heard, there are NO (emphasize NO) definitive
links tying radon exposure with lung cancer.  The original study by the
National Academy of Science published in a document known as BEIR IV
(Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation IV - Health Risks of Radon and
Other Internally Deposited Alpha-Emitters, National Academy Press 1988)
attempted to draw a correlation between observed lung cancers in uranium
miners and radon exposures.  However, the BEIR study made several LEAPs in
logic that do not hold up under scrutiny:

1.  All lung observed lung cancers were attributed to radon exposure, even
though the miners were exposed to numerous other potential carcinogens ¯-
uranium dust, silica dust, arsenic, diesel fumes ¯- and large doses of
external radiation from the uranium ore.

2.  The vast majority of miners also smoked.  Smoking in and of itself
delivers 10 to 20 times the annual background dose due to the presence of
radon decay products plating out on the tobacco leaf.  The radon dose from
smoking was ignored.  Virtually all of the lung cancers have been among
the smoking miners.  Additionally, Dr. Gino Saccomanno of St. Mary's
Hospital in Grand Junction, Colorado has studied uranium miner disease for
40 years.  He states that he hasn't found a single case of lung cancer
among nonsmoking uranium miners who breathe in radon eight hours a day,
five days a week.  A homeowner would have to breathe in what the EPA
considers "dangerous levels" of radon for 400 years to get that kind of
exposure.

The biggest problem, however, is the EPA.  The Environmental Protection
Agency ignored ALL of the cautionary statements in the BEIR Reports IV and
VI (Health Effects of Exposure to Radon, National Academy Press 1999) and
proclaimed that radon IS killing thousands of people every year ¯- NOT
that there is a POSSIBILITY that radon in the home MAY contribute to the
incidence of lung cancer.  By making this proclamation, the EPA created
the Radon Industry; a multi-billion dollar industry that is duping
citizens into thinking that their homes are dangerous places when there
isn't a single shred of evidence to support it.

On the contrary, there are numerous studies that point to the absence of
harm or even beneficial effect of radon.  Remember, mankind has coexisted
with radon since life began on earth.  Dr. Bernard Cohen of the University
of Pittsburgh published a study covering over 90% of the US population in
the Journal Health Physics demonstrating that higher radon levels (by
county) are accompanied by LOWER lung cancer incidence.  Additional
studies in China, Finland, Sweden, and many other countries bear
substantiate his findings.  Please check out the following web page on the
Radiation, Science, and Health site for a detailed discussion of this
issue :

http://cnts.wpi.edu/RSH/Data_Docs/1-2/6/3/1/12631list.html


It is also interesting to note that the Russians use radon at 
concentrations thousands of times above the EPA's "Safe" level to treat a
whole host of respiratory , joint and other types of ailments.  There are
even former uranium mines in the US (Boulder, MO) where people visit to
sit and breathe in radon-laden air to receive similar benefits as those
found in the Russian Radon Hospitals (see, Free Enterprise Health Mine,
Boulder, Montana:
http://216.147.22.123/index.html 
).

If you keep an open mind, you might find in your reading of these
documents, as I have, that the EPA's radon scare is one of the largest
scams ever perpetrated on a trusting American public.  It is a shameful
and deceitful practice that continues today and something that I feel I
must speak out on.

v/r

Michael