Calculate Your Radiation Dose

[Dogmudgeon]

Your Tax Dollars At Work ...
Calculate Your Radiation Dose

This is a handy radiation dose calculator from the EPA that will allow you to calculate your yearly dose of radiation. It works like the carbon footprint calculators that have been showing up on-line; you plug in your personal data, click on the button, and Bob's your uncle.

I got a 6919.219 mrem (millirems) per year. If I received 50 times that dose at one time, I would have a 50% chance of dying.

The calculator does not account for the effects of smoking, CAT scans, or the use of depleted uranium for sexual purposes, so you're on your own there.

Use it in good health!

--p!

[Greyskye]

1. Damn Pigwidgeon

I only get 319.173 mrem/year according to that calculator. At least you save on nightlights.





(kidding, kidding)

[Dogmudgeon]

2. Oops, I calculated wrong!

This is why I keep telling people not to blindly trust my math, but to read the original and double-check for themselves.

My score: 417.219

What did I do wrong? It said "X-rays, 40 mrem each" so I typed in "40". It calculated for 40 X-rays (40 x 40).

Ditto for the nuclear medicine section.

I'm down to half a millirem, about a thousandth of the dose to reach the LD₅₀ level.

So, yes, your Kentucky Bluegrass lawn still emits 5 pCi per second, not each blade of grass!

--p!

[Betsy Ross]

3. 357.180 n/t

[hunter]

4. They need to update the television and computer monitor question...

LCD televisions and computer monitors are not spewing out x-rays as Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) televisions and monitors do.

[piedmont]

5. Last two questions are interesting.

Do you live within 50 miles of a nuclear power plant? No (0 mrem) Yes (.009 mrem)

Do you live within 50 miles of a coal fired power plant? No (0 mrem) Yes (.030 mrem)

[NNadir]

6. Almost 500. I am calling for 5 or 6 new nuclear plants in my state, but

if I had my way, I still wouldn't get quite there.