Asbestos Awareness
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Asbestos is dangerous and damaging, as the fibres are long and can penetrate the lung if inhaled - this without the knowledge of the person who has been exposed. Fibres are very small, not visible to the naked eye, have no smell or taste and do not irritate. Asbestos fibres can cause ailments such as Asbestosis, Lung Cancers, Mesothelioma and other respiratory tract and stomach related diseases and the diseases tend to have a long latency period, often developing only several decades after exposure. Asbestos related diseases are responsible for around 4,000 deaths per year.

Asbestos has a high resistance to heat and chemical attack; its fibres can be woven; it has high tensile strength; can be used as a bonding material; and is cheap to extract and use. No other man-made material has all of these properties and hence it was used for a variety of different purposes before its detrimental affects on health became known. Any type of building built before 2000 (houses, factories, offices, schools, hospitals etc.) could contain asbestos.

There are 3 types of asbestos:-

• Chrysotile - commonly known as white asbestos (ban introduced in 1999)
• Amosite - commonly known as brown asbestos (ban introduced in 1985)
• Crocidolite - commonly known as blue asbestos (ban introduced in 1985)

It is becoming more unusual to find asbestos in domestic premises, although there are rare occurrences of its use as loft insulation and this will require removal by a licensed contractor. However, more commonly, asbestos has been used in chimney flues, ducting, roof sheeting, tiling, fire departmentalisation, artexing/decoration, textured finishes, water systems and tanks, brake linings, asbestos boarding to ceilings etc. It can be sprayed in fibrous form or used as hard fashioned material such as insulating boarding, asbestos cement, bitumen mat, bonded resin contained within vinyl strips and cardboard/asbestos boarding to ceiling, for example.

The Asbestos Industry is heavily regulated, being second only to the Nuclear Industry, and at present comes under the revised Control of Asbestos Regulations November 2006, which brings together the 3 previous sets of Regulations covering the prohibition of asbestos, the control of asbestos at work and asbestos licensing. All who work with asbestos must comply with the Regulations.

The Regulations require an assessment of all non-domestic premises to ensure that the risks of asbestos are controlled, with this assessment being the responsibility of the “Duty Holder”. In the case of farms and estates the Duty Holder can be the farmer, landowner or farm manager - whoever has clear responsibility for the maintenance or repair of the non-domestic premises, as stated in Regulation 4.

Other Regulations pertinent to Duty Holders are:

• Regulation 5 states an employer shall not undertake work in demolition, maintenance or any other work which exposes, or is liable to expose, his employee to asbestos.

• Regulation 7 states that that an employer shall not undertake any work with asbestos unless he has prepared a suitable written plan of work, detailing how the work is to be carried out.

• Regulation 8 states, subject to regulation 3 (2), that an employer shall not undertake any work with asbestos unless he holds a licence granted under paragraph (2) of the Regulation. Licences are limited to a maximum 3 year period.

• Regulation 10 states that every employer shall ensure that adequate information, instruction and training is given to those of his employees – (a) who are liable to be exposed to asbestos or who supervise such employees. This includes construction and demolition workers, architects, building surveyors, electricians, plumbers, general maintenance staff, telecoms engineers and so on. It is, therefore, important to ask contractors regarding their asbestos training when instructed.

General precautions to be taken when working with asbestos include category 5 disposable overalls and a fitted and tested personal facemask. If asbestos is found during works, work should be stopped and the area evacuated and professional advice sought. A management plan should be drawn up with areas of asbestos signed/labelled; the site should be controlled; and a Type survey (i.e. 1, 2 or 3) undertaken:

• Type 1 Presumptive: limited in scope and essentially a visual inspection and not sufficient if planning building work.

• Type 2 Sampling and Analysis: requires sampling and, like Type 1, is only suited for normal occupation and not for building works, although it does require sampling of the asbestos by trained operatives.

• Type 3 Major Refurbishment/Pre-demolition: invasive inspection and should be undertaken as part of all CDM projects. It should always be undertaken before construction work and is part of a duty of care.

Removal of asbestos can only be undertaken without licensing if it can be demonstrated by risk assessment that exposure is "sporadic and low intensity" (concentration of asbestos in the atmosphere must be less than 0.6 fibres per cm³ of air measured over 10 minutes in any working day). The activity must also fall within a "specified list", including short, non-continuous maintenance activities; encapsulation of asbestos containing materials which are in good condition; air monitoring and collection and analysis of samples; and the "removal of materials in which the asbestos fibres are firmly linked in the matrix", for example textured decorative coatings which contain asbestos and asbestos cement.

While the Regulations may seem onerous to Duty Holders, the ‘Duty to Manage’ is about taking practical steps to protect workers from the risk of exposure to asbestos fibres, it is not about removing all asbestos. Asbestos is only dangerous when disturbed so that the fibres become airborne and the Health & Safety Executive’s outlook is that unless asbestos presents a risk it can be left alone. Existing materials containing asbestos which are in good condition can therefore be left in place and their condition monitored and managed to ensure they are not disturbed.

For further information and to find out if work on asbestos containing materials needs to be carried out by an HSE licensed contractor, see The Health & Safety Executive website at www.hse.gov.uk or the RICS asbestos guidance at www.rics.org.


Richard Wakeham
richard.wakeham@agrical.com

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