You Can View Official EPA Radiation Readings → Washingtons Blog
You Can View Official EPA Radiation Readings - Washingtons Blog

Friday, March 18, 2011

You Can View Official EPA Radiation Readings



Update: The EPA's servers have either been crashed by too much traffic generated by this post, or the EPA has taken down the radiation data. Check back later to see if the EPA's servers are working.

Please note that the radiation readings I looked at were NORMAL when the site was still up.

As I've previously noted, the San Jose Mercury News reports:

EPA officials, however, refused to answer questions or make staff members available to explain the exact location and number of monitors, or the levels of radiation, if any, being recorded at existing monitors in California. Margot Perez-Sullivan, a spokeswoman at the EPA's regional headquarters in San Francisco, said the agency's written statement would stand on its own.

Critics said the public needs more information.

"It's disappointing," said Bill Magavern, director of Sierra Club California. "I have a strong suspicion that EPA is being silenced by those in the federal government who don't want anything to stand in the way of a nuclear power expansion in this country, heavily subsidized by taxpayer money."

Many people assume that - if you can't find your own geiger counter - you don't have many choices, other than relying on vague government announcements or scattered sources of information.

However, even if the EPA won't publicly discuss radiation levels, we can go look at the EPA's numbers ourselves. ... and we don't need Anonymous to hack into the EPA's site to do it.

Specifically:

1. Click on the following link: https://cdxnode64.epa.gov/radnet-public/query.do

2.In the bottom right box labeled "Fixed Monitor Location", click on the location of the monitor that you want to see results from

3. In the lower left box labeled "Time Range Criteria", specify the date range for the desired radiation readings

4. The upper left box labeled "Available Parameters" gives various beta and gamma radiation readings. Highlight as many as parameters as you wish. Click the right arrow (to the right) to put them in the "Selected Parameters" box, or the double right arrow to select all.

5. Hit the "Submit" button at the bottom of the screen. If there are no results, hit the back button on your browser, select " Deployable Monitor List" to the right of "Monitor Type", and then manually highlight one of the monitors in the "Deployable Monitor Id" box.

6. Once you get results, you can create charts or graphs of the information. Just scroll down on the results page to the box labeled "Custom Graphical Plot", and choose your x-axis. I like "Measurement Start Date/Time".

7. Click either the "Scatter Plot" or "Line Graph" button at the bottom of the results page.

See this if you need further directions.

3 comments:

  1. As of 10:14pm MST March 18 the EPA link returns a HTTP 500 error which begins "javax.servlet.ServletException" and runs about 20 lines in two chunks.

    Oddly, their mapview https://cdxnode64.epa.gov/radnet-public/showMap.do still works, you can click on the station to get the current data.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I wouldn't advise messing with the epa.gov link up there--here's the warning splash:

    This is a United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) computer system, which may be accessed and used only for official Government business. Unauthorized access or use of this computer system may subject violators to criminal, civil, and/or administrative action. All information on this computer system may be monitored, recorded, read, copied, and disclosed by and to authorized personnel for official purposes, including law enforcement. Access or use of this computer system by any person, whether authorized or unauthorized, constitutes consent to these terms.

    ReplyDelete
  3. A bunch of tools and resources I have compiled to help you track and assess the dangers facing the US.

    http://www.adtorrent.com/2011/03/26/assess-the-fukushima-danger-for-your-self-tools-and-resources-for-an-informed-decision/

    ReplyDelete

→ Thank you for contributing to the conversation by commenting. We try to read all of the comments (but don't always have the time).

→ If you write a long comment, please use paragraph breaks. Otherwise, no one will read it. Many people still won't read it, so shorter is usually better (but it's your choice).

→ The following types of comments will be deleted if we happen to see them:

-- Comments that criticize any class of people as a whole, especially when based on an attribute they don't have control over

-- Comments that explicitly call for violence

→ Because we do not read all of the comments, I am not responsible for any unlawful or distasteful comments.