November is radon awareness month!
What’s radon? It’s a radioactive, colourless, odourless, tasteless gas that seeps through the ground everywhere in the world.
Why should you care? A build up of radon is very dangerous and when inhaled it can damage your lungs and cause cancer. It’s the leading cause of lung cancer for non-smokers.
Radon is measured in BQ’s, which stands for becquerel - a unit used to measure radioactive decay. And radon is everywhere - outdoor levels hover around 5-15 Bq/m3. Indoors we ideally want a readying of 50 Bq/m³ or below. 50-100 Bq/m³ is Good. The government recommends that is you have a yearly average reading over 200 Bq/m³ you should explore a radon mitigation system. And if it’s above 600 Bq/m³ to get that installed asap.
Great… Should you be worried? If I sold you into a condo - don’t worry the risk is less and less the higher you are from the ground - move on to the jokes at the end of the email.
However if you have a foundation that has direct contact to the ground - YES - you should be aware. And if you spend more than 4 hours in that location OR there is a ground floor bedroom you should consider a testing unit for peace of mind.
That being said - the worst area in BC for radon is the interior where 30% of homes have high levels. In the lower mainland the percentage is around 1% of homes and the Fraser Valley is around 4% that exceed 200 Bq/m³.
Here’s a map of the province that shows the level - MAP
