With new regulations for radionuclides in drinking water, this volume will be valuable for understanding where radionuclides come from, how their prescence is determined, where humans come in contact with them, health effects consequences (both for individuals and communities), removal from water, disposal problems and cost implications.
The Safe Drinking Water Act directs the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate the quality of drinking water, including its concentration of radon, an acknowledged carcinogen. This book presents a valuable synthesis of information about the total inhalation and ingestion risks posed by radon in public drinking water, including comprehensive reviews of data on the transfer of radon from water to indoor air and on outdoor levels of radon in the United States. It also presents a new analysis of a biokinetic model developed to determine the risks posed by ingestion of radon and reviews inhalation risks and the carcinogenesis process. The volume includes scenarios for quantifying the reduction in health risk that might be achieved by a program to reduce public exposure to radon. Risk Assessment of Radon in Drinking Water, reflecting research and analysis mandated by 1996 amendments to the Safe Drinking Water Act, provides comment on a variety of methods to reduce radon entry into homes and to reduce the concentrations of radon in indoor air and in water. The models, analysis, and reviews of literature contained in this book are intended to provide information that EPA will need to set a new maximum contaminant level, as it is required to do in 2000.
This new book focuses on sampling and analysis, radon and radium in water supply wells, predictive models, geologic and hydrogeologic controls that influence radon occurrence, monitoring radon and other radioactivity from geologic sources and mining impacts on occurrence of radioactivity in ground water. Also discussed are occurrence, testing, treatment, and reduction of radon from groundwater. Because the most severe health hazard from indoor radioactivity results from inhalation of short-lived radioactive decay products of radon, the EPA scheduled a major conference early in 1987 on Radon, Radium, and Other Radioactivity in Ground Water-Hydrogeologic Impact and Application to Indoor Airborne Contamination. The result is this book.
This new book focuses on sampling and analysis, radon and radium in water supply wells, predictive models, geologic and hydrogeologic controls that influence radon occurrence, monitoring radon and other radioactivity from geologic sources and mining impacts on occurrence of radioactivity in ground water. Also discussed are occurrence, testing, treatment, and reduction of radon from groundwater. Because the most severe health hazard from indoor radioactivity results from inhalation of short-lived radioactive decay products of radon, the EPA scheduled a major conference early in 1987 on Radon, Radium, and Other Radioactivity in Ground Water-Hydrogeologic Impact and Application to Indoor Airborne Contamination. The result is this book.
This book describes hazards from radon progeny and other alpha-emitters that humans may inhale or ingest from their environment. In their analysis, the authors summarize in one document clinical and epidemiological evidence, the results of animal studies, research on alpha-particle damage at the cellular level, metabolic pathways for internal alpha-emitters, dosimetry and microdosimetry of radionuclides deposited in specific tissues, and the chemical toxicity of some low-specific-activity alpha-emitters. Techniques for estimating the risks to humans posed by radon and other internally deposited alpha-emitters are offered, along with a discussion of formulas, models, methods, and the level of uncertainty inherent in the risk estimates.
