Way back in August of 2020, I set up the Airthings Wave Plus to detect the radon levels in my
new house. We’d moved to Colorado in March of 2020 and I’d heard about this thing called
radon, not knowing if our house would have lots of radon or safe levels.
Well, turns out we had double the safe amount of radon in our home. At least, that’s what
the Wave Plus told me. It also taught me through it’s variety of sensors that we live in
a dry climate with low relative humidity and pretty normal measurements for everything
else. In my original review, I was happy with the product, and I’ve continued to use it
since to track my radon levels.
You can still watch that original video on my channel, and while you’re clicking around,
click the subscribe button for nerdy videos just like this one. Props to my patreon and
buymeacoffee supporters like Seth G for making this episode possible!
Airthings has a new product available called the View Plus, which to be honest deserves
it’s own video review. So today, I’ll touch base on why I’m still a fan and why
I finally invested in radon mitigation, and the next video will cover the new View Plus
and how it’s keeping me aware of things like Radon, but also scary stuff like Colorado
wildfires.
So what is radon? Radon is a natural gas that comes from the ground. The problem is it’s
a cancer causing gas, the second leading cause of lung cancer to be precise, the first cause
of lung cancer among non-smokers. This totally invisible gas forms from uranium, which breaks
down over time into radioactive decay. Radon is one of those elements that forms from the
decay of uranium, and radon emits radiation in the form of alpha particles. The particle
- two protons and two neutrons, can damage our DNA cells and overtime, cause health problems.
Radon usually just gets ventilated out into the air and dissipates but in buildings, it
can sit there and build up when you have little air flow. So even if you have a concrete foundation,
radon can still seep into your home through foundation cracks or pipes or a sump tank.
Radon also changes levels when it’s cold or when you open a window allowing for ventilation,
so tracking your homes levels over a long period of time can help you figure out if
your home needs some kind of professional mitigation.
In Colorado, about half the homes have radon levels higher than the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency recommended action level of 4 picocuries per liter.
So I was tracking mine via this Wave Plus for one year. Levels fluctuated in our living
space on the first floor but were generally around 6-8 picocuries per liter. Uh, that’s
a lot. So then I got our basement finished, and that did lower the radon levels for our
first floor living area, but the levels in the basement were still 8 pci/l. That means
that I was working in an unsafe environment if I happened to be sensitive to radon, which
is not a chance that I’m willing to take.
These are the recommended levels: Good
0 - 2.6 pCi/L Fair
2.7 - 4.0 pCi/L Poor
4.0 pCi/L and up
Know how I always talk about mitigation in terms of security online? This is how you
mitigate a real world problem. By installing Radon Mitigation. In Colorado, professional
radon mitigation costs around $1200. I didn’t wanna screw it up, nor did I want to put in
the time and labor involved, so I hired a company. They did an awesome job, connecting
the radon mitigation system to my sump pump and making it unobtrusive for my studio. It
requires a fan that pumps air out of the sump tank, but I can’t hear it thanks to the
fact that I set up my sump pump under this drywall built
in shelf.
Pre-mitigation - the professional marked the basement at 8 pci/l, the same results I’d
gotten.
Post-mitigation - the amounts lowered to 0.1 to 1 pci/l. I haven’t seen anything higher
than 1 picocurie per liter.
So... I believe in data. I analyze data to determine actual real world facts. And at
first, I wasn’t sure if the Wave Plus was giving me accurate data or not because I had
nothing to compare it to. So using the professionally tested level results and comparing these to
the Wave Plus showed me that the data given to me through this sensor are indeed accurate.
And wow, seeing this graph is incredibly interesting. Here’s where I had the high radon levels
back in March of 2022 in my basement. They’ve been this high the whole time.
This sudden drop on 4/3-4/5 is when I got the mitigation system installed and the radon
levels started lowering and leveling out. They’ve been in the green “good” zone
ever since.
Here’s the thing. The Wave Plus in no way shape or form knows that I got a mitigation
system installed. The mitigation isn’t smart. It’s a dumb little fan that poops out radon
from our basement. There is no app, no server with data, it’s just a non-internet connected
fan. The Wave Plus is manufactured and managed through a third party app and the data is
collected and shown to me via this chart and has no clue that anything changed in my house.
So there is no handshaking behind the scenes to upsell me on something I didn’t need.
The mitigation system is actually working, and the Wave Plus is showing me a daily track
record of proof that my radon levels immediately dropped after getting that system installed.
If it ever rises to unsafe levels, I’ll know because of this data. If the fan ever
fails and the system dies, I’ll know because I have this daily measurement.
So is this $230 product worth it? Yes, I’d say so. I now have solid evidence from two
sources that my radon was high, and now it’s low. Was the $1200 mitigation system worth
it? Well, given I’m working in my basement where the levels are highest, yeah, I’d
say so. And with that said... I’m glad you’re watching this video because that was a price
I knew I’d have to eventually pay... but it’s still a big whopping number.
I think it’s worth it to at least test your radon levels to see if you need mitigation.
Denver is a hotbed for radon so practically every house in my neighborhood has a system
installed. Hopefully this video draws awareness to something I was never educated on before
moving to Colorado, radon.
Now that you know this thing works, go back and watch my first review of it here and don’t
forget to subscribe and check out my upcoming review of the new View Plus.
Thanks for watching!