One More Week to Go

THE New Family should be closing on their new house in one week if everything goes according to plan. They should have been able to close today but cannot because of some issues the lender raised.

The house was tested for radon. Radon is the number one cause of lung cancer in non-smokers. While radon is not a new problem, the magnitude of it as a health risk has only become clear in the last few years because the research had not been done.

The EPA states that levels above 4 picocuries per liter pose an imminent hazard to health. The home tested at 20.2 pCi/l. Dad negotiated with seller to install a mitigation system. Lender wants confirmation that the system installed is doing its job. But waiting on the retest forced the closing to get set back one week.

Hopefully the test will come back below 4 pCi/l and Dad can submit the results to the lender for approval.

Anyway, in the meantime Dad gets to look at pictures of, hopefully soon to be, his mitigation system.

Radon is a naturally occurring gas that can seep into homes from the surrounding ground. Mitigation, preventing it from entering, involves sealing up entry points like sump wells (pictured above) and foundation cracks. 

Active mitigation involves removing the gas from below the basement slab (think of a vacuum cleaner). A core hole is drilled, pvc piping is inserted, and a fan sucks the gas out creating negative pressure below.

The the gas is evacuated to the outside where it is released into the atmosphere. It quickly dissipates to unmeasurable levels.