By Thomas Witt

I’ve been performing radon tests for years in the Metro area as an auxiliary part of a home inspection and probably find an elevated radon level that requires action about 3 out of 10 tests. Certainly we don’t have a serious radon problem in our area but I had one test come back at such a relatively high level that I’m rethinking my assumptions.

The EPA recommends that every house be tested and I think that is the correct approach. Because without a test you just can’t know which house has an elevated level and which doesn’t. Better to be safe than sorry in other words.

For instance, last summer in Hampden I did two tests in the same week on houses only 5 blocks apart. As you probably know most of the houses there are quite similar to one another. One house came back with a low level and one came back with a level the EPA recommends remediation be done. Anything at 4.0 or above picoliters. And just recently I tested a typical house on Coldspring lane that came back with a level well above any I have recorded in the metro area. I was so glad the homeowners had decided to do the test because many don’t.

Just wanted to let you all know so you can educate your clients accordingly.

Tom – Avocet Inspections LLC

PS- Here is an update. I just picked up a monitor from Rodgers Forge. Reading was 9.0 or
twice the level at which the EPA recommends remediation. You just never know without a test!

7.24.2015 – Another update, just picked up a radon monitor in Parkville and got very high readings. 26.91 picoliters!

I had no idea we could get readings that high in the Baltimore Metro area.

Thomas Witt – Avocet Inspections LLC

5/22/14