You borrowed a radon monitor from the library, set it on the rec room shelf, and three days later it’s showing a number well over 200. Now what? If you live in Regina, you’re in good company. Radon in Regina homes comes up more often than in almost any other Prairie city, and the fix is usually less dramatic than the first reading makes it feel.
This guide walks through what the local numbers actually say, how to test so the result means something, what a mitigation system is, and what Regina homeowners can expect to pay. Every figure below comes from a published source. Where a number doesn’t exist, we say so.
How common is radon in Regina?
Radon is a radioactive gas that comes out of the soil. You can’t see it, smell it or taste it, and it gets into houses through cracks in the foundation, floor drains, sump pits and gaps around pipes. It’s measured in becquerels per cubic metre, written Bq/m3. (If you’ve read American material, they use picocuries per litre. 200 Bq/m3 is about 5.4 pCi/L.)
Health Canada’s position is plain: radon is the leading cause of lung cancer in non-smokers and the second leading cause overall, linked to more than 3,000 lung cancer deaths in Canada each year. That’s the health case, stated once. The rest of this article is about what to do.
Here’s what the Regina data shows:
- Of the Regina homes tested for the 2024 Cross-Canada Survey, 46.6% were at or above 200 Bq/m3. The average across those homes was 182.7 Bq/m3, and the highest single result was 11,333 Bq/m3.
- The City of Regina’s June 2024 radon advisory cites research finding that “50% of homes tested in Regina exceeded 200 Bq/m3”.
- For comparison, 17.8% of homes tested nationally in the 2024 survey were at or above 200.
One caution about those city figures. The 2024 survey used volunteer homes, not a balanced sample, so 46.6% is a description of the Regina homes that were tested, not a prediction for your house. Your neighbour’s result doesn’t tell you yours. The survey itself notes that no area of Canada is “radon-free”, and the only way to know your number is to measure it.
If you want to start with a proper test, call (204) 555-0173 or send us a note through the form. We’ll point you to a long-term test and, if you need one, put you in touch with a C-NRPP certified measurement professional.
Radon testing in Regina: why the long-term test comes first
The number that matters is your home’s average over months, not days. Radon levels swing with the weather, the furnace, the wind and whether the ground is frozen. A short reading catches one slice of that.
Health Canada’s testing advice, boiled down:
- Test for at least 3 months (a minimum of 91 days), ideally during the heating season. Anywhere from 3 to 12 months is fine.
- Put the detector in the lowest level of the house that someone uses for 4 or more hours a day. For most Regina families that’s a finished basement: a bedroom, a rec room, a basement suite.
- Place it in the breathing zone, at least 30 cm above the floor and 30 cm from walls.
- Keep it away from sump pits, vents, windows and heat sources.
- If your test ran shorter than 91 days, repeat it.
Long-term alpha-track kits are cheap. HomeRadonTest.ca sells them for $70.00 per kit before tax. Late September is a good time to order one, because a test started in October runs through the heating season, which is when Health Canada recommends testing.
For more on the difference between the kit and the gadget, see our guide to long-term vs short-term radon tests, or our radon testing page.
Field scenario: the library monitor in the rec room
A Regina family borrows a digital monitor from the Regina Public Library. The library has 30 kits, lends them free with a card to Regina residents for three weeks, and doesn’t allow renewals. They put it on a shelf in the basement rec room where the kids watch TV, and after a few days it reads 480 Bq/m3.
That reading is worth taking seriously, but it isn’t a verdict. Digital monitors and short tests are screening tools. The honest next step is a $70 long-term kit placed in the same room, following the rules above, left for at least 91 days. If the long-term average comes back over 200, that’s the number you take to a mitigation professional. If it comes back well under, you’ve spent $70 and a winter’s patience instead of a few thousand dollars on a system you may not have needed.
One useful detail: the library kit comes with a coupon toward an analog radon test kit. Use it.
Reading your Regina radon result
Health Canada’s guideline is 200 Bq/m3, averaged over a year in the normal occupancy area. A few points people get wrong:
It’s a guideline, not a law. No Saskatchewan law requires homeowners to test or mitigate. The City of Regina says the levels “are guidelines only, as there is no legislated maximum level or enforceable level”. The decision is yours.
Above 200, Health Canada recommends fixing it within 1 year. Older documents, including a table still reproduced in some local material, gave a two-step timeline based on how high the reading was. Current Health Canada guidance gives a single timeline: within one year.
Below 200 isn’t “safe” either. Health Canada says there is no level considered risk free. Whether to act on a result under 200 is your call, not a requirement.
Crawl spaces and furnace rooms don’t count. The guideline is about rooms people use. A high reading in an unfinished crawl space isn’t your exposure number.
The full wording is on Health Canada’s radon guideline page, and the City’s view is in its radon gas advisory (PDF).
One thing we won’t tell you: that your house is fine, or that it isn’t. Nobody can say that without a test.
Radon mitigation in Regina: how the fix works
The standard fix is called sub-slab depressurization, sometimes active soil depressurization. A professional drills through the basement slab, sets a pipe into the gravel or soil underneath, and connects it to a fan. The fan pulls soil gas from under the floor and pushes it outside before it can get into the house.
A few things are part of a proper job:
- Sealing the sump pit. An open sump is a direct line from the soil into your basement. Health Canada says sump pits must be sealed. More in our piece on radon sump pit sealing.
- A pressure gauge (manometer) on the pipe so you can see the fan is working.
- A retest after installation. Health Canada recommends testing again once the system is running. That result is how you know it worked.
What the system can’t do is promise a specific number. How far levels drop depends on the soil under the slab, the foundation, how many suction points the house needs, and how tight the basement is. Anyone quoting you a guaranteed reduction before seeing the house is guessing.
Opening windows or running a basement fan is not a fix, and we won’t suggest it as one.
Health Canada recommends a C-NRPP certified mitigation professional. C-NRPP is the Canadian National Radon Proficiency Program, run by CARST with Health Canada oversight. Certification is voluntary, since no province regulates radon contractors, and measurement and mitigation are separate certifications. You can check any professional’s name in C-NRPP’s online directory. See our radon mitigation page for what the process looks like from call to retest.
Field scenario: the 1960s bungalow with a basement suite
Picture a 1960s Regina bungalow with a rented basement suite. The owner runs a 91-day test over the winter in the suite’s bedroom and gets a result well above 200. The furnace room has an open sump pit, and there’s a crawl space under a later addition at the back.
A Regina installer advertises systems at $2,500 to $3,500, and says crawl spaces or multiple suction points can push a job higher. This house has both an open sump and a crawl space, so the owner should expect the quote to be driven by those details rather than by the low end of anyone’s range. The only way to get a real number is a site visit from a certified professional. Ask the quote to spell out how the sump will be sealed, where the fan and discharge will go, and whether the crawl space is included.
What radon mitigation costs in Regina
Here’s what’s published. None of these are our prices, and none are a quote for your house.
| Item | Published figure (CAD, before tax) | Source and scope |
|---|---|---|
| Long-term test kit (91+ days) | $70.00 per kit | HomeRadonTest.ca |
| Library digital monitor (screening only) | Free with a library card, 3-week loan | Regina Public Library, Regina residents |
| Mitigation system, Regina | $2,500 to $3,500; crawl spaces or multiple suction points higher | One Regina installer’s advertised range |
| Mitigation system, Winnipeg (for comparison) | About $1,500 to $3,000 | Winnipeg installers’ advertised ranges |
| Mitigation system, national | $2,000 to $3,000 | Health Canada, 2014 |
| Replacement fan | $200 to $300 | Health Canada, 2014, national |
| Fan electricity | About $50 to $75 a year | Health Canada, 2014, national |
The fan and electricity numbers are old national estimates, not Regina or SaskPower figures. Treat them as a rough idea.
Getting two quotes is reasonable. Ask each professional for their C-NRPP number and check it in the directory yourself.
If your long-term result is over 200 and you want a quote, call (204) 555-0173 or use the contact form. We put Regina homeowners in touch with certified radon mitigation professionals who look at the house and quote the job.
Money help in Saskatchewan
There isn’t much, but there’s some:
- Canadian Lung Association, Lungs Matter. Up to $1,500 toward mitigation for low- or moderate-income households (income below the provincial median). You need a long-term test of at least 90 days from a C-NRPP certified kit showing a result above 200, plus a quote from a C-NRPP certified mitigation professional. It doesn’t cover work already done, and funding is limited, so apply before you book.
- Lung Saskatchewan has offered reimbursement in the past. The program is paused right now; check its site for when it reopens.
- Saskatchewan Home Renovation Tax Credit. This is a 10.5% provincial credit on up to $4,000 of eligible expenses (up to $420), or up to $5,000 for seniors (up to $525), for work on your principal residence from 1 October 2024, with only expenses above a $1,000 base amount counting. The government’s list doesn’t name radon. Lung Saskatchewan says radon mitigation counts as an eligible expense; confirm with CRA before you rely on it. Details in our Saskatchewan radon tax credit guide.
- Federal help. There is currently no federal radon tax credit that we could find.
Radon in newer Regina homes and at sale time
Field scenario: the capped pipe in a newer build
A Regina family buys a house built under the 2020 building code, which has been in force in Saskatchewan since 1 January 2024. In the basement utility room they find a capped, labelled pipe coming up through the floor. That’s the radon rough-in: the code requires a pipe below the basement floor, commonly 100 mm, sealed and labelled, so a system can be added later.
What it isn’t is a working system. The code’s own wording is that “the depressurization rough-in does not actively reduce radon levels”. Nothing moves until a fan is connected and the pipe is run outside. The right move is the same as for any other house: a long-term test first. If the result is high, a certified professional can quote activating the rough-in. We don’t have a published price for that, so let them quote it. The City of Regina checks radon details at plan review for new construction, but that checks the rough-in, not your radon level.
Buying or selling
We found no Saskatchewan rule requiring radon testing or disclosure when a house is sold. A property condition disclosure statement isn’t required, but sellers must disclose known latent defects. Whether a known high radon result falls under that, and how to handle radon conditions or holdbacks in an offer, is a question for your realtor or lawyer, not for us.
The practical problem is time. A proper test runs 91 days, which is a long time to hold a deal open. Talk it through with your realtor early.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is radon worse in Regina than in Saskatoon?
In the 2024 Cross-Canada Survey, 46.6% of the Regina homes tested were at or above 200 Bq/m3, compared with 17.8% of the Saskatoon homes tested, roughly 1 in 6. Those are volunteer samples, not city-wide averages. Your own house can be high in either city, so test regardless of which one you live in.
Can I use a library radon monitor instead of a long-term test?
Use it as a screening tool, not a final answer. The Regina Public Library loan runs three weeks, and Health Canada’s guideline is based on a test of at least 91 days. If the monitor reads high, follow up with a long-term kit in the same spot before spending money on mitigation.
Do I have to fix radon if my test is over 200?
No law in Saskatchewan requires it. Health Canada recommends fixing a home within 1 year when the long-term average is above 200 Bq/m3. Whether and when to act is the homeowner’s decision.
How much does radon mitigation cost in Regina?
A Regina installer advertises $2,500 to $3,500, with crawl spaces or multiple suction points costing more. Health Canada’s 2014 national range was $2,000 to $3,000. Your price depends on the house, so get a written quote from a C-NRPP certified mitigation professional after a site visit.