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RE: Background Radiation Information Sought
To all,
Based on NCRP 93 we know that the average person in the US gets about 200
mrem from radon and about 100 mrem from other sources. The USGS maps are
great, but do not address all sources of exposure. I am using background
variation in my training class to hopefully convince people that a few
extra millirem per year from occupational exposure should not be of great
concern since the natural background varies widely and negative effects
have not been identified. I am amazed that an up-to-date version of this
basic information is not readily available. EPA is the logical repository
of such information and was the source of the old data that I have. You
would think they have such information readily available, but I couldn't
find anything on their web site. I keep hoping someone knows.
Dave Derenzo, RSO
University of Illinois at Chicago
At 11:16 AM 1/14/02, you wrote:
>Jim O.
>
>The residential concentration groups are "doses." Is the data set behind
>these groups available? It would be interesting to see radon,
>terrestrial, and cosmic summed by county. Does this really not exist
>anywhere?
>
>On the national map it's easy to see that Iowa is the worst state to try
>to find a radon dose-response. There is no low-dose region! Eliminates
>the meaningful data in Cohen and other more substantial analyses!? :-)
>
>Now Tennessee would be good! :-) Virginia, but ocean/mountain
>confounders; Connecticut has the opposite - hi radon on the ocean side;
>Nebraska giant counties and population density problems? Alabama, but
>disparate? Who would do Louisianna - all counties low!?
>
>Regards, Jim
>============
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Jim Otton
>Sent: Mon 14-Jan-02 11:22 AM
>To: Jim Muckerheide
>Cc: radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
>Subject: RE: Background Radiation Information Sought
>
>Jim M,
>There is no radon dose information at the USGS site. The USGS role in
>radon
>studies focused on the geologic causes of variation in indoor radon
>levels
>and devloping means of estimating the geologic radon potential for the
>U.S.
>In the work performed by the USGS for the EPA in mapping U.S. radon
>potential, we focused on developing geologic estimates of the average
>indoor
>radon level of residences the U.S. These geologic radon potential
>estimates
>were published by the USGS in a series of 11 Open-File reports in 1993
>and
>1995. These 11 reports covered each of EPA's 10 regions plus an extra
>report for Guam and Puerto Rico. EPA then used these geologic estimates
>to
>develop their "Map of Radon Zones"
>(http://www.epa.gov/iaq/radon/zonemap.html) in which each county
>received a
>low, moderate or high (yellow, orange, red) ranking.
>
>Jim Otton
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Jim Muckerheide [mailto:jmuckerheide@cnts.wpi.edu]
>Sent: Friday, January 11, 2002 10:59 PM
>To: Jim Otton
>Cc: radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
>Subject: RE: Background Radiation Information Sought
>
>
>Jim,
>
>Is there radon dose info on this "radon site?" :-)
>
>Any way to add terrestrial to radon doses by location? plus cosmic?
>
>These sources don't address the original question, which would be of
>interest.
>
>Regards, Jim
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Jim Otton
>Sent: Fri 11-Jan-02 12:19 PM
>To: BERNARD L COHEN; Dave Derenzo
>Cc: radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
>Subject: RE: Background Radiation Information Sought
>
>Dave, Bernard, and all,
>The terrestrial gamma component to dose has been estimated for the U.S.
>by
>Joe Duval (USGS, Reston, VA). A map showing that dose and related maps
>showing the apparent concentrations (in ppm or percent) of the U, Th,
>and K
>components of that dose can be found at
>http://sedwww.cr.usgs.gov:8080/radon/DDS-9.html or
>http://energy.cr.usgs.gov/radon/radonhome.html These maps are part of
>the
>USGS' radon webpage. These maps are derived from the NURE aerorad
>dataset,
>the cosmic-source gamma component was eliminated (upward-looking
>crystals
>were used in the survey).
>
>Jim Otton
>U.S. Geological Survey
>Environmental Geology of Radionuclides
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: owner-radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
>[mailto:owner-radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu]On Behalf Of BERNARD L COHEN
>Sent: Friday, January 11, 2002 7:55 AM
>To: Dave Derenzo
>Cc: radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
>Subject: Re: Background Radiation Information Sought
>
>
> My paper "Indoor radon maps of the United States" might be
>useful,
>since radon is the dominant contributor to doses from natural radiation,
>and it varies much more than does the gamma ray background radiation.
>
>On Fri, 11 Jan 2002, Dave Derenzo wrote:
>
> > Dear Radsafers,
> >
> > In one of my training classes, I use a very old slide of a US map with
> > average background levels for each state. The slide says the source
>of
>the
> > data was EPA. This slide does not include the radon contribution to
>the
> > ede. I would like to update this slide, but have had no luck in
>finding
> > more recent information. Can anyone point me to a reference that has
>this
> > information on a state by state basis? I have already tried NCRP 94,
>but
> > unless I missed something, this information is not included. A search
>of
> > the EPA web site also was not productive. Any help would be
>appreciated.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Dave Derenzo, RSO
> > University of Illinois at Chicago
> >
> >
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