How can radon levels be reduced

If your radon levels are in the high range for more than a month, contact a professional. Through sufficient ventilation or radon mitigation, you can help to ensure that dangerous levels do not collect inside. Thousands of Radon sensors across the world, broken down by location. See your region's approximate risk level. Looking for something else? Global homepage. Top five tips for reducing Radon Marie Bannister , October 18, Five easy DIY radon tips: Ventilation Experiment with ventilation by opening windows and vents to ensure air is flowing throughout the house.

Sealing access points Draft excluders and rubber seals are an inexpensive way to seal around doors and other access points in a building. Caulking Using caulking products will enable you to seal entry points in floors and walls of the home. Clear natural underfloor ventilation Homes with a suspended ground floor and space underneath often have underfloor vents.

Choose energy-efficient appliances Dispose of tree residues Protecting Your Drinking Water Reduce Radon Levels. Sub-slab suction is most effective with foundations built on good aggregate or highly permeable soil.

Pumps can be inside the house However, in some cases it may be difficult to create enough suction to prevent radon from penetrating hollow-block basement walls. Some homeowners drain water away from the foundation of their house by perforated pipes called footing tiles. If these drain tiles form a continuous loop around the house and drain into a sump, you can apply suction to the sump.

Drain-tile suction pulls radon from the surrounding soil and vents it away from the house. A heat recovery ventilation HRV system increases ventilation and uses the heated or cooled air being exhausted to warm or cool the incoming air. HRV systems are more effective in reducing radon levels when used to ventilate only the basement.

They are generally not used in crawl spaces. With HRV, heating and cooling bills will increase. By covering exposed earth with high-density polyethylene plastic, you reduce the flow of radon into the house. Exposed earth in basement cold rooms, storage areas, drain areas, sumps, and crawl spaces is often a major entry point for radon.

But covering exposed earth may not be enough to solve your radon problems. Sealing cracks reduces the flow of radon into your home and is often used with other radon methods. However, by itself sealing has not been shown to lower radon levels significantly or consistently. Use our interactive tool to help you decide whether you need to reduce your radon level and if so how.

Some simple actions such as sealing around loft-hatches, sealing large openings in floors and extra ventilation do not reduce radon levels on their own. When combined with other effective measures, they can improve the reduction of radon levels. Completely sealing floors is difficult and can cause rot in wooden floors.

The diagram below is intended as a guide. The Environmental Health Department of your local council may be able to offer advice. Costs depend on many factors including the complexity of the building and whether any of the work can be done by DIY.

The table below shows approximate costs for measures installed by a contractor apart from the DIY sump. UK Health Security Agency. Click here. How to reduce radon levels. Radon address search A report will tell you the estimated probability above the Action Level. An active radon sump can usually be installed in one day and all the work is carried out from outside your home.

The annual running cost of the fan depends on the power of the fan used. For active sump systems it is important to discuss the choice of fan with the contractor. Normally remediation is successful at the first attempt. It is a good idea to agree with your contractor what steps may be taken if the radon levels remain high.

The EPA provides a list of registered contractors below who will be able to advise you about the most suitable solution for your home. It is important to discuss the following issues with the contractor, depending on the method of remediation agreed:.

It is important to have your home re-tested after the work has been completed, to ensure that it has reduced the radon levels in your home. The EPA provides a free post-remediation service to homeowners. Please contact us to avail of this. Email: radon epa. Home Environment and You Radon Fixing a radon problem.

Fixing A Radon Problem Radon prevention Reducing high levels Getting the work done Contact us In this section you will find information about the preventive measures that are required when building a home, school or workplace and how to reduce your radon levels if they are above the Reference Level.

Radon Prevention If your home or workplace was built after 1st July , the building regulations require that it is fitted with a standby radon sump.

Reducing high levels The best way to reduce radon depends on the levels in your home and the building type. Here is a guide to the methods most commonly used: Improving indoor ventilation One of the simplest ways to dilute moderate levels of radon is to increase the indoor ventilation by installing wall vents or window trickle vents.