Reading recent news concerning a radiation plume over the Nordic countries, and remembering not too distant memories of nuclear accidents in living memory… (3 mile island, fukoshima, Chernobyl, UK.) it occurred to me that smart citizen project could have an option for radiation sensor, allowing citizens to measure radiation in their own environment, not reliant upon government to make an announcement. Enough distributed sensors would allow a plume to be tracked and traced.
A lot of countries have nuclear power plants and they are getting old now, leakage and accidents are more likely. Nuclear weapons remain a risk.
(#businesscase #fearfactor)
I searched google for arduino radiation sensors/Geiger counters and I found a few but only one with I2C interface, but its no longer stocked by Seeed.
The characteristic of all those I found is that the electronics board generates a 400v supply for a Geiger counter tube made by GE. Radiation readings are a simple count of detection events over a specified time interval, converted mathematically to microSievert units.
The GE detection tube costs ~$60 US. total cost of the order $US150
So I am just guessing that this type of counter falls outside the scope of an inexpensive citizen science project, while it may have been considered, its likely to have been dismissed.
Also perhaps it falls outside the range of things governments might support citizens knowing about. (#paranoia) and SC is/was EU funded. So there is political risk too. Seeed operate in China and subject to oversight by Chinese government and impacted by US trade embargoes.
Anyway FWIW I seek other people’s views on this idea.