What is a radon mitigation system?
A radon mitigation system is any system or steps designed to reduce radon concentrations in the indoor air of a building. Your house type will affect the kind of radon reduction system that will work best. Houses are generally categorized according to their foundation design. For example: basement, slab-on-grade (concrete poured at ground level), or crawl space (a shallow unfinished space under the first floor). Some houses have more than one foundation design feature. For instance, it is common to have a basement under part of the house and to have a slab-on-grade or crawl space under the rest of the house. In these situations a combination of radon reduction techniques may be needed to reduce radon levels to below 4 pCi/l. There are several methods that a contractor can use to lower radon levels in your home. Some techniques prevent radon from entering your home while others reduce radon levels after it has entered.
How do you actually get rid of radon? Most radon mitigation systems are based around a suction system that creates negative air pressure below your home and sucks up air and radon and vents it through a series of pipes out above your roof and away from your home. This is called Active Soil Depressurization, or ASD (or sub-slab suction).To do this, all cracks and fissures and holes in your basement and foundation are sealed (to keep radon from seeping in), then one or more holes are drilled through the basement floor to get to the space beneath (to get to the air below your house where the radon exists). The biggest hassle is getting the air from below your basement floor out through the top of your roof — this means finding a path between the floors of your home where you can invisibly hide a plastic PVC pipe/tube that needs to run from the basement up to the attic and out the roof.
A Mitigation System consists of a plastic pipe that goes from the basement/crawlspace floor to the outside of the house. A special fan pulls RADON that is trying to enter the house and expels it directly to the outside. RADON is bypassed from entering the living area of the house and goes from the soil under the house directly outside. These systems work extremely well in lowing RADON in a house. What does a RADON Mitigation System look like inside the house? Here is a “Before” Snapshot without a RADON Mitigation System: And an “After” snapshot with a RADON Mitigation System Installed (vertical white pipe): An Indicator shows how well the RADON fan is pulling a vacuum, pulling RADON from the living areas of the house. An Exterior View of a RADON Mitigation System: Towards the bottom of the system is a special fan that pulls RADON that is trying to enter the house and moves this RADON directly outside.
