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Why is my dryer radioactive?

physics.stackexchange.com

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Re: Why is my dryer radioactive?

#81

Post by hammock »

skybrian wrote: post #30
ck2 wrote: post #13

Florida is about to build some test roads using phosphogypsum, a radioactive waste product of the fertilizer industry that has been piling up and they want to unload. It contains high quantities of radium which decays into radon, this should end well. > "Phosphogypsum contains appreciable quantities of uranium and its decay products, such as radium-226," according to the EPA. And because the fertilizer production pro…

It’s outside though, so the radon wouldn’t normally accumulate unless something weird happens. Seems like this is the sort of thing you’d want experts to look at.

>It’s outside though, so the radon wouldn’t normally accumulate

Well, no more than any other heavier-than-air gas, like say, fog.

Re: Why is my dryer radioactive?

#82

Post by hinkley »

danbtl wrote: post #16
anamexis wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed - radon checks are a standard part of pre-purchase home inspections, because remediation can be quite expensive

We had such a remediation done recently, in Alberta close to the rocky mountains. Costs were around $2,000 CAD to install a sub-slab depressurization system (i.e. a fan that pulls air from below the house and vents it away from the house). Radon values dropped from around 500 Bq/m3 to less than 20 Bq/m3.

Those systems must be new. The classic solution is to install drain pipes before pouring the slab, so one can imagine how difficult it would be using 1980's construction techniques to retroactively add piping below a finished house.

We also had to dig trenches to lay natural gas lines, but we have a way to do those with horizontal boring techniques (of course then people who didn't know what they were doing put them straight through sewer lines, causing backups, visits from the Roto Rooter man, and subsequent explosions due to dumping natural gas straight into the sewer main).

Is it safe to assume they're using something like that with perforated pipes to exhaust radon?

Re: Why is my dryer radioactive?

#83

Post by hinkley »

Kon-Peki wrote: post #14
anamexis wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed - radon checks are a standard part of pre-purchase home inspections, because remediation can be quite expensive

Most of the cost is the installation of equipment in the existing home. In areas of the country that have a lot of radon, it's not uncommon to install the equipment during construction of the house foundation, which then only adds a few hundred dollars to the total cost. > Radon-resistant new construction (RRNC) typically costs a builder between $250 and $750. RRNC could cost less than $250 if the builder already use…

Not uncommon as in it's building code in those areas.

Tricky bit I think is when you live in a state with small pockets of radon instead of broad regions. Then you're back into crapshoot territory.

Re: Why is my dryer radioactive?

#84

Post by schiffern »

joshuahedlund wrote: post #58
schiffern wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This claim (which ultimately came from the EPA) is suspect at best. It just comes from assuming a Linear No-Threshold model, which flatly contradicts the available body of medical evidence. https://youtu.be/TYZglUjLE0Y

Thanks for posting this, I will check it out. As a Midwesterner with a basement I had once looked into those claims about radon as the second-highest cause of lung cancer with concern and found the evidence much weaker than I expected. Even by EPA estimates[0] almost 90% of the lung cancer deaths attributed to radon are smokers (i.e. who have already weakened lungs), and there didn't seem to be good evidence of damag…

Let me preemptively disclaim that I do have nitpicks about the talk I linked, but IMO his main argument is sound.

In particular I think his scientific explanations aren't always fully accurate, and he worries about measurement minutia very strenuously. Also at one point he says you could breathe 80% radon/20% oxygen, which while chemically this is true, radiologically it would be suicidal.

Those nitpicks aside, his point about the EPA LNT model having no clothes is spot on. After "the scales fell from my eyes," now I can't not notice how all those same Party Line Claims get parroted in every piece of radon-related content.

Another glimpse down the rabbit hole is this interview with the late Dr Bernie Cohen, who studied the link between residential radon and cancer:

https://youtu.be/xhkBLhw-8pk

Re: Why is my dryer radioactive?

#85

Post by thadt »

BetterGeiger wrote: post #33

I think the core of the explanation given is correct but some of the adjacent details need adjustment. The important part is: "Clothes dryers are very effective at making statically charged surfaces. (Dryer sheets help.) So when radon and its temporary decay products are blown through the dryer, electrically-polarized molecules tend to be attracted to the charged surfaces" What that commenter misses is that nearly al…

Hey, that's a pretty slick package (and price point). I looked through bettergeiger.com and read the discussion about the difference between GM tubes vs scintillators, but never saw an indication of what material you're using. Would be useful information for those of us thinking of upgrading from an SBM-20.

Re: Why is my dryer radioactive?

#86

Post by roywiggins »

dylan604 wrote: post #20
tpmx wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also: That competence (the radiation safety technician).

I would hope that at some place like Los Alamos the technicians are a little more qualified than your run of the mill techs.

You'd hope so, but...

https://www.science.org/content/article/near-disaster-federa...

Re: Why is my dryer radioactive?

#89

Post by yummypaint »

afterburner wrote: post #3

> I was once prevented from leaving a neutron-science facility at Los Alamos after the seat of my pants set off a radiation alarm on exit. This was odd because the neutron beam had been off for weeks. It was a Saturday, so the radiation safety technician on call didn't arrive for half an hour — at which point I was clean, so the detective questions began. I had spent the day sitting on a plastic step stool. The tech…

They also make you take off synthetic jackets for the same reason. Apparently alot of people have had to do extra paperwork over the years because of their patagonia grabbing radon.

Re: Why is my dryer radioactive?

#90

Post by skybrian »

ck2 wrote: post #61
skybrian wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s outside though, so the radon wouldn’t normally accumulate unless something weird happens. Seems like this is the sort of thing you’d want experts to look at.

They have looked. For 30 years. And it was continuously banned. Until the previous president decided all regulation was silly and unprofitable. Now we have states trying to override federal regulations because superpac donations.

Who is "they?" What did they find?
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