I agree Wally. Here's my plan:
Step 1: Get certified
Step 2: Get licensed or accredited by your state
Step 3: Go to work and follow the standards so you don't lose your accreditation or license.
Not part of the plan: A licensing scheme that increases costs to consumers, thereby reducing mitigations, thereby increasing lung cancer deaths.

With the simple 4 component licensing scheme I endorse, whoever took this photo would call the "Bad Work Hotline", report it to the inspector, and (in theory) the power of the government would come down on whoever did this and prevent it from happening again.

Society would benefit if EVERY service provider were licensed and rigorously monitored and inspected. Tree trimmers, auto mechanics, garage door installers- the list is endless. Mistakes by any service provider could result in the death of a customer. Society would also benefit if the speed limit were 5 mph. Both ideas are of course ridiculous. Government regulations must balance benefit with cost. They must meet a “reasonableness standard”. Regulated citizens must agree that a regulation is needed and that the cost is acceptable.

In my opinion, the Minnesota law and rules overburden licensees and their clients and do not meet the “reasonableness standard”. I’m not alone. 47% of Minnesota’s NRPP certified mitigation contractors feel the law should be replaced with one that simply requires certification and compliance with ANSI/AARST standards. 19% feel the law should be repealed and not replaced. That’s 66% who don’t want the law.

Here is an example of the MDH rules Minnesota contractors have been fighting in court and at the capitol for five years:

D. An individual who fails to complete 8 hours of approved continuing education within 12 months after
the date on the last issued license may not renew the license. To qualify for a new license, the individual must successfully complete:
(1) an initial radon measurement training course required under subpart 2 and pass an examination
as specified in subpart 2; and
(2) an initial radon mitigation training course required under subpart 2 and pass an examination as
specified in subpart 2.

Yes, it really does say that. If you don’t submit your CE to MDH before your 12 month license expires, you’re going back through the week long initial training and exam process for measurement and mitigation.

In my opinion, a licensing law that meets the “reasonableness test” will have four and only four components:

1. It will require NRPP certification.
2. It will require annual evidence of workers comp and liability insurance.
3. It will have a “Citizens Hotline” to receive reports of violations of ANSI/AARST standards.
4. It will have an inspector to investigate reported violations with the ultimate power of fines and license revocation.

In my opinion, the Minnesota law and rules will cause smaller, affordable contractors to leave the business, reduce the number of new, affordable guys entering the business (we were all there once) and significantly increase the cost to all contractors. This will cause increased costs to consumers. The demand for radon mitigation is highly elastic. So; the increased cost to consumers will cause reduced demand for mitigation, (it’s a law of economics, not an opinion) which will cause an increase in lung cancer deaths. That’s the “cost” of a license law that does not meet the “reasonableness standard”. Dead people.

30 or so years ago a trainer (I believe it was Terry Brennan) in an EPA course told us that radon fans could no longer be in the basement or the exhaust at grade. He said he did a research project in a home with a radon system exhausting at grade. He injected a tracer gas into the soil below the home, and then found that he could detect the gas in the home, having been reentrained.

Later, the EPA's first mitigation protocols prohibited fans in basements and exhaust at grade, to a large degree due to his research. He protested to the EPA folks that his study predicted a reentrainment health risk in homes with unusual, extreme radon levels, but the rest of us were fine with the fan in the basement. The EPA response was essentially "You're right, but we want one standard for every home".

Very insightful. Could someone prepare a similar, vetted protocol for mitigation contractors? Some concerns:

1. We have a lot of foot traffic from the wet lawn to the wet or filthy garage to the furnace room / bedroom closet / attic / etc. We skip the booties but use drop cloths on the finished floors. Bad?

2. Tool pouches are stuffed with tools and supplies in various pockets, and are bristling with exposed screwdrivers, etc. Do they need sanitizing between jobs?

3. What about large tools- shop vac, rotary hammer, core drilling tools, extension cords, etc?

4. How about tools that were used outside versus the garage versus inside the home?

We go from house to house with a truck full of tools and supplies. If I knew that some of our clients had Ebola or the Black Plague, I wouldn't send the trucks out. It wouldn't be feasible to adequately sanitize between jobs. Is there a viable protocol for the current threat?

Check out Bill Brodhead's study at wpb-radon.com/pdf/Membrane%20Adhesive.pdf
Always check your adhesive on both sides of the poly. For example: There's a very nice reinforced blue and white poly that we run into occasionally. The white side holds poly caulk well, but the blue does not. I've been told that some Rufco poly is Corona treated on one side, which allows poly caulk to adhere to it.

Dick,
I'd call this anecdotal evidence as opposed to a study, but I think it still has some value. In the 1980's we attempted to mitigate by sealing crawl spaces, sumps, cracks, block tops etc. It didn't seem too successful, so I tallied the results of perhaps 20 or 30 jobs where "step one" was sealing only. 50% of the time the radon went up, 50% of the time it went down. Most of the changes were small and were probably due to the weather, although there were a few significant increases and decreases.