Exactly！
[quote=“Tempo Gain”]Taking a look at the wiki on background radiation and came across this interesting aside:
[quote]
The highest levels of natural background radiation recorded in the world is from areas around Ramsar, particularly at Talesh-Mahalleh which is a very high background radiation area (VHBRA) having an effective dose equivalent several times in excess of ICRP-recommended radiation dose limits for radiation workers and up to 200 times greater than normal background levels. Most of the radiation in the area is due to dissolved radium-226 in water of hot springs along with smaller amounts of uranium and thorium due to travertine deposits. There are more than nine hot springs in the area with different concentrations of radioisotopes, and these are used as spas by locals and tourists.[15] This high level of radiation does not seem to have caused ill effects on the residents of the area and even possibly has made them slightly more radioresistant, which is puzzling and has been called “radiation paradox”. It has also been reported that residents have healthier and longer lives.[14] On the basis of this and other evidence including the fact that life had originated in a much more irradiated environment, some scientists have questioned the validity of linear no-threshold model, on which all radiation regulations currently depend.[15] Others point out that some level of radiation might actually be good for health and have a positive effect on population based on the controversial radiation hormesis model, by jump starting DNA repair mechanisms inside the cell.[16][17] Background radiation doses in the immediate vicinities of particles of high atomic number materials, within the human body, have a small enhancement due to the photoelectric effect.[18][/quote][/quote]
Good find, fluctuations in Taiwan could be linked to hot springs/geothermal activity.
I think some people are exaggerating here too much. That level of “radioactivity peak” can be caused even by a single banana. Maybe someone dropped a peel on the sensor? 
Some coal (especially Chinese one) naturally contains quite some radioactive particles, maybe a street vendor grilling some meat or corn nearby? Burning other things (wood, paper, god money) can bring some heavy particles to the sensor too!
This xkcd quote is VERY misleading, it doesn’t take into account exposure over time. one dose in 1 second is not the equivalent to the dose over a few hours, days, or years.
[quote=“plasmatron”]Some food for thought…
[/quote]
[quote=“pqkdzrwt”]This xkcd quote is VERY misleading, it doesn’t take into account exposure over time. one dose in 1 second is not the equivalent to the dose over a few hours, days, or years.
[quote=“plasmatron”]Some food for thought…
[/quote][/quote]
Nonsense. That graph shows MANY examples of doses over time, from hours to weeks and yes, to years.
“Living within 50 miles of a nuclear power plant for a year, 0.09 μSv.”
Go say that to the Japanese.
Since I didn’t receive any answer from my email posted on their website, I decided to phone them today. After a few indirections and the usual few “my phone number is …”, someone called me back. This person checked the numbers he has and told me that the radioactivity didn’t go over 0.100 μSv/h. When I repeated him that I saw a value of 0.141 at 15:25 on july 11th, he told me that on his hourly logs it is not going over 0.100. My question to him was not how high or how long the spike was but what could be the cause of this spike. He didn’t answer my question so far, ending the discussion on a “you will see on the data that I am sending you via email”.
I am still waiting for his email with his data after a few hours. Maybe he didn’t note my email correctly, his English was not really good. I will phone again tomorrow, and if needed I might pay him a visit at his office, with the screenshots I took from their website on a USB key.
I am very surprise that they only keep the hourly average of their data, knowing that their detectors are providing a new value on their website’s map every 5 minutes. It is normal that citizens are more aware than them by keeping track of a more precise data than their? It is normal that their first reaction was to tell me without checking that the value I was talking about was below the natural background? Is it normal that they are not looking for the cause of this radiation spike?
Because you got more radiation from the computer screen checking every five minutes and from the phone calling them than you ever could from your “peak” (or even, realistically, from its source)… 
[quote=“sandman”][quote=“pqkdzrwt”]This xkcd quote is VERY misleading, it doesn’t take into account exposure over time. one dose in 1 second is not the equivalent to the dose over a few hours, days, or years.
[quote=“plasmatron”]Some food for thought…
xkcd.com/radiation/
[/quote][/quote]
Nonsense. That graph shows MANY examples of doses over time, from hours to weeks and yes, to years.[/quote]
I think you are missing the point. For example, it implies that four dental xrays are the equivalent to a flight. I can assure you that getting four dental xrays over the course of a few minutes, is not the equivalent of setting on a plane for a few hours!
Perhaps a better analogy would be to consider water. Holding your arm in boiling water for one minute does not do the equivalent damage that holding your arm in water half as hot for one hour.
You cant just combine example sources of radiation by adding up the numbers and comparing it to another source!
I don’t think I am missing the point at all. I DO think I have no intention of pursuing this any further on here, though.
Hi guys,
I got an answer from a person from the Department of Radiation Protection, I will let you know once our email-based conversation is over.
–
4d9ef53e6794283ef91ac7f68c09a006
6313c8ea47134731bc8b1729313b5c18
I didn’t receive an answer yet, and my contact’s coworker told me at the phone that he is out of the office (“出差”). In the mean time here is the graph that I received yesterday, which are supposed to convince me that “there was no radioactivity spike, and that everything was under 0.100 μSv/h” on July 11th around 15:25, and that there was an error somewhere (or maybe that I have shit in my eyes?) :
If you look closer, you will see that 3 pixels of the green curve are missing at what I believe to be the exact time of my observation. The month-long graph can make people easily believe that this gap it is not important, but still, those 3 pixels correspond to about 3 hours.
Now take a look at the other graph that I received in the same email. A similar spike was observed by the detector in Ali mountain, with an intensity a lot smaller.
I am not specially scared by the radioactivity spike, but now I am really wondering why the AEC is hiding it.
Radiation detectors, monitors and alarms can also be bought at reasonable prices yet. =)