Asbestos Roofing

[silentbrown]

Just been to view a house with "substantial" barn and garage, both covered in corrugated asbestos roofing sheets dating from - at a guess - the late 70's. Roughly 400 square M of the stuff.

Would it be a case of just leaving it in situ and hoping it never needs to be touched, or should it be replaced pronto? If so, does anyone have any idea of costs for removal?

It's mostly idle curiosity at this stage, as I've never had to deal with asbestos before.

[silvagod]

Unless you go smashing it up, the risk from it being there is quite low. It degrades very slowly and should be good for many years to come. There is no reason to replace it if you are not actually coming into direct contact with it on a daily basis.

I recently carried out some air testing for a client in a 25 sq m building with an asbestos cement roof, prior to their occupation. 6 air tests ran for 35 minutes, only 16 respirable fibres counted in total (that is all fibres, not just asbestos). Well under any control or safe limits.

The building was built in the 1970s and no work ever done to the roof.

Hope that helps you.

[King Herald]

Leave it alone, it has been there decades and is essentially harmless, unless you decide to take a grinder to it.