Asbestos (paper type) behind recessed radiator - who can help?

centuryhomeprobs

We recently bought a 100+ year old house which has regular radiators in all but two rooms - those two rooms seem to be an addition from sometime from the 50s to the 70s, and each have a *recessed* radiator (both working fine). When going to paint the room we noticed they both have what I am pretty sure is asbestos paper behind and on top of the radiator within the wall (see pics below). Not sure what to do to get rid of this. An asbestos company can't remove the radiator (they're not plumbers), so maybe we need a plumber? My questions are:

-Will a plumber remove this (safely) in order to get the asbestos paper out or is that beyond their scope because it's asbestos?
-Can/should I do this myself? (If so, can you point to a resource that tells me how to remove the radiators? I don't even understand the structure of recessed radiators.)
-Anyone know a steam heat specialist in Central NJ who I can call?
-Any other info or tips??

Thanks in advance!

EBEBRATT-Ed

Try @EzzyT , @clammy , or @JohnNY

You need someone to remove the convector cover and maybe the finned element. The get the asbestos company to remove the material.

pecmsg

Is It Asbestos? 

The only way to know is to have it analyzed. A sample is taken and sent out to be tested. 

My other  questions are Was it picked up by your building inspector and was it disclosed by the previous owners. 

KarlW

Once the radiator is removed, paper asbestos is relatively easy to remediate as a homeowner (if you even need to, it may not be doing any harm, as is excellent insulation).

Materials
• Wear neoprene gloves, an N95 mask, (and a Tyvek suit if you are concerned) - all available in the paint section of a store.
  
• Get a HEPA filter for your shop (or regular) vac
  
• Get a water spray bottle of the type used to mix cleaning material
  

Remediation is simple: spray the asbestos paper with water - it gets soft and clingy (not dusty), then put it in a garbage bag. Then, clean up everything left with the vacuum.

As asbestos is only a health hazard, not an environmental hazard, it can be thrown in regular trash.

The regulation (leading to cost) of asbestos remediation is primarily a relic of contractors not doing what they were supposed to do in the early days of remediation. This included plain old not doing it or exposing a new generation of workers to asbestos by having them work without protection.

pecmsg

Negative 
it cannot be thrown out!
It must be properly disposed of in a special land fill!

KarlW

pecmsg said:

My other  questions are Was it picked up by your building inspector and was it disclosed by the previous owners. 

In NY at least, there's a standard disclosure for all houses built before 1979 (or so) that mentions asbestos and lead paint. I'd imagine NJ is similar.

I'm sure it is read as thoroughly as terms of service.

KarlW

pecmsg said:

Negative 
it cannot be thrown out!
It must be properly disposed of in a special land fill!

Paper asbestos is friable. But in NYS, it just needs to be sent to a municipal landfill.

I did self-abatement a couple of years ago, and I did my research.

I do live in a city with excellent waste management policies - they'd pick up all my construction debris and whatnot for no fee as long as I do the work myself.

pecmsg

KarlW said:

Negative 
it cannot be thrown out!
It must be properly disposed of in a special land fill!

Paper asbestos is friable. 

Exactly. 

Unless they changed the law since I got my certificate it must be treated as such. Special handling and landfill. 

heathead

The idea that all you need is a hepa filter on a vacuum cleaner is plain wrong.  The whole vacuum has to be built for this and not just the filter.  The area needs to be tarpped off and then it wetted and removed.  First is to test and see what it is 

KarlW

@pecmsg

As a handler, the rules are different than with a homeowner - blame the (all too young) dead men who either didn't abate or abated without proper protection.

Here are NYS rules - I realize the poster is in NJ, but I strongly suspect very similar rules:



Homeowners abating their owner-occupied home is absolutely legal in NJ and NY. You should follow all precautions and guidelines when doing it.

Mad Dog_2

Treat it as if it is ACM (asbestos containing material).  Is that steam radiators?  If so, the Abatement companies are capable of disconnecting a radiator.  No biggie.  Mad Dog 🐕 

Mad Dog_2

Don't chintz on THIS please. Save yourself $1500 bucks now...LUNG CANCER ♋ 30 years from now...is it really worth it?  Mad Dog 🐕 

Mad Dog_2

Leave it to the Pros. Asbestos abatement 25 years ago was a fortune.   Today they're are some much competition...its very reasonable.  You're in NJ?  I have a Real Pro out there.   PM me...Mad Dog 🐕 

pecmsg

KarlW said:

@pecmsg As a handler, the rules are different than with a homeowner - blame the (all too young) dead men who either didn't abate or abated without proper protection. Here are NYS rules - I realize the poster is in NJ, but I strongly suspect very similar rules: Homeowners abating their owner-occupied home is absolutely legal in NJ and NY. You should follow all precautions and guidelines when doing it.

Friable is STILL a Controlled Substances!

mattmia2

I thought they got rid of the "just kidding, it isn't asbestos if it is less than 1% asbestos" rule.

centuryhomeprobs

pecmsg said:

Is It Asbestos?

Highly likely, as it was elsewhere in the house, the age of the radiators, it looks exactly like paper asbestos, and it's unlikely any other material would have been used like that as a heat shield at that time, so we are treating is as if it is.

centuryhomeprobs

Also, no our inspector was trash and found nothing, and no it was not disclosed. Sellers sucked too, and hid lots of things.

centuryhomeprobs

Mad Dog_2 said:

Treat it as if it is ACM (asbestos containing material).  Is that steam radiators?  If so, the Abatement companies are capable of disconnecting a radiator.  No biggie.  Mad Dog 🐕 

Yes, steam radiators (recessed type, though). This is helpful, thanks - we have an asbestos company that two friends recommended, but I was not sure if they would do the radiator removal to be able to actually get at the asbestos paper.

centuryhomeprobs

KarlW said:

pecmsg said:

My other  questions are Was it picked up by your building inspector and was it disclosed by the previous owners. 

In NY at least, there's a standard disclosure for all houses built before 1979 (or so) that mentions asbestos and lead paint. I'd imagine NJ is similar.

I'm sure it is read as thoroughly as terms of service.



I mean...they're supposed to disclose, but there is generally no recourse when they don't (and they don't). You can't really prove they knew - even if it's obvious.

centuryhomeprobs

Thanks folks. Appreciate all the comments!

trivetman

Homeowner here.  I’ve had to deal with asbestos abatement a couple of times.  Both were much less painful on the wallet than I had anticipated.

Its probably not worth the cost of testing if it looks like it and is from the time period.  Like you said,  just assume it is.

DIY asbestos abatement is legal in a number of places.  Doesn’t mean it’s a good idea,  even if it’s done to the letter of the law.  The law is often written to be not overly restrictive to individual rights regardless of public health concerns.  Just my 2 cents.

Leaving it in place is potentially an safe option for now if its not in friable condition.  But….you’ll be really sorry the day you have an emergency leak at the radiator and have to schedule emergency asbestos abatement before you can get your emergency hvac work scheduled.

I would start with the asbestos abatement company.  I am sure those guys see all sorts of situations and will tell you if they can handle the rads or need an additional guy for the HVAC.  Or they might tell you the safest thing is to leave it alone.

My first asbestos abatement was in Burlington County NJ.  PM me if you want a name to call.

Mad Dog_2

The ACM contractor I know, is ready, willing & able to remove and disconnect anything in containment area that needs to be. As long as we isolate & if needed, drain the unit in question (say a boiler, huh, tanks) they will gladly do it. It only makes sense as they are fully donned up in MOPP gear and Respiratory apparatus.  Mad Dog 🐕 

BobC

Forty years ago a neighbors old snowman gave up the ghost. one of the other neighbors could get us a new boiler at cost (he worked for the gas company) and had a line to an installer but the asbestos had to go before he would go near it. Her husband had passed a few months earlier and she worked as a lab assistant at Boston College and had a 6 year old son so there were not a lot of funds available. We both knew asbestos was a hazardous and had to be handled with care, the key was to contain it and not allow loose fibers to float around.

About that same time they discovered a large block of asbestos on the site of the old Squantum Naval Air Station (very marshy area) , that site was used as an auxiliary ship yard during WWII to build 40-60 ft navy boats. This area was on a peninsula well away from anything else, the powers that be wasted no time in erecting barriers to contain this 3ft cube of soggy asbestos and had people stumbling around in moon suits wondering what to do with it. In the end they hauled it off to a secure disposal site with a convoy of emergency vehicles. Now this cube was found when they were preparing the site for some mew condo's so they had all sorts of earth moving equipment on site. As I said this was a very soggy bale of asbestos, why not just dig a good size hole and entomb it under a parking lot and indicate on thee deed plot plan exactly where it is buried?

I told her to bring a bottle of surfacant home and we would remove the asbestos on a Saturday. The night before i mixed up a batch of warm water and surfacant and gave the boiler a good spray down. The next day we up a box fan in the exterior cellar door and opened the windows on the other side so we had good cross ventilation. We both had good face masks and while she sprayed I scraped the set insulation off and put it into heavy bags which were doubled up before being sealed. We ended up with 8 or 9 bags of soggy insulation which her father disposed of in some factory dumpsters.

This was an example of people coming together to help out someone who was in a tight spot, by working together we solved a problem - sad to say that does not happen a lot these days. I'm not suggesting that anybody follow my example unless you know exactly what your doing, that said we are all healthy 40+ years later so I think our prep work was enough for that particular job.

i worked at the post office repairing mail sorting machines for 8 years before i retired (old job went to China) , this was huge old building (10 acres) and had 2 thick asbestos tiles on the floor because they were so resilient. They used to coat those floors a few times a year to make sure no fibers got free and if they had to drill through them to install new machinery they would make a 2" high clay dam around the area fill it with water and slowly drill through - that water had some soap on it so the water was extra slippery

Bob

ethicalpaul

This is a nice feel-good story except that some factory had hazardous waste put into its dumpsters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSZd6MnEuLw

mattmia2

ethicalpaul said:

This is a nice feel-good story except that some factory had hazardous waste put into its dumpsters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSZd6MnEuLw

That was a time when we weren't still selling the more friable forms of asbestos but didn't quite have a process to contain it worked out. Still not clear to me why the asbestos that got everywhere when they installed it isn't a problem.

CLamb

In New Jersey asbestos waste must be transported by a registered carrier to one of nine licensed sanitary waste landfills. You can read the New Jersey asbestos FAQ at https://www.nj.gov/health/ceohs/asbestos/asbestos-faq/

ratio

It's amazing how dangerous things are once they're regulated.

A1Boss

Paint it ...Leave it

pecmsg

ratio said:

It's amazing how dangerous things are once they're regulated.

I’ve buried 2 Union brothers due to mesothelioma. 2 out of many but still 2 too many!

BobC

i lost my older brother do to COPD. He worked residential construction so between roofing and demo he was awash in dust of all kinds. Most of that work was done before good masks were in wide use.

Bob

CLamb

pecmsg said:

ratio said:

It's amazing how dangerous things are once they're regulated.

I’ve buried 2 Union brothers due to mesothelioma. 2 out of many but still 2 too many!

Mesothelioma killed my Father.

Voyager

I won’t offer any advice as asbestos laws vary greatly state to state, but I will offer some things I learned many years ago as the asbestos officer for my kids’ private school.

I had to take several hours of training and most of the training made it sound like handling asbestos was more dangerous and complicated than handling plutonium. I forget the details, but I was allowed to remove a certain amount of ACBM without calling in a certified contractor. I could remove so many square feet of floor tiles, so many linear feet of pipe insulation, etc. and dispose of it myself. The disposal had to be one specific local landfill that was certified to receive it and I had to double bag the material and tape the bag shut with duct tape. I also believe the outer bag had to be red colored or something like that.

The first time I removed some pipe insulation on our boiler for a plumber to do some work, I followed all of the precautions for PPE, wet down the material, removed in carefully and double bagged and taped it. I drove it to the landfill myself as the place wasn’t that far away and the alternative was to schedule a special pickup by the disposal agency and pay a huge cost per bag. When I got to the landfill, I expected they would take the bags to a special place and carefully bury them without disturbing the bags. What actually happened was the many at the landfill threw the bags onto the pile with all of the rest and a dozer came buy and tore them open is it leveled the last dump load of garbage and spread asbestos insulation everywhere. Needless to say, I wasn’t quite as concerned about disposal after that.

I also got curious about asbestos after taking the very alarmist training and since I worked then as an engineer in a research lab, I had easy access to many research paper sources. What I found, and this was 30 years ago so there may be later research that changes this, was that asbestos hazards had been GREATLY exaggerated by our government and law firms seeking large class action lawsuits.

Every documented case of mesothelioma or asbestosis was in a worker who had been exposed to asbestosis at high levels, over long periods of time and without any PPE. There simply was no evidence at all that casual exposure to low levels of asbestos was a significant hazard. And there was no evidence that anyone who used even reasonable PPE ever got asbestosis or mesothelioma. My conclusion was that asbestos wasn’t the radioactive material like hazard that the state made it out to be and, like with most of life, the best approach was common sense and “don’t be stupid.”

I was careful when removing ACBM to minimize damaging it which can release fibers into the air. I wet down insulation before removing it just as you wet down a dusty construction site to minimize dust. I bagged it well, but didn’t worry about double bagging or special expensive colored bags once the landfill workers told me that they didn’t do anything special with the red bags once they arrived. Common sense still goes a long way with things like this.

AlanBrase

I'd agree with the comments by "Voyager" and many others. As a general contractor and remodeler that has come into contact with lots of asbestos over the years, I've removed it double bagged it and taken to local landfill (in IOWA). They wanted to know that it was asbestos, so they buried it well, but nothing else.
For soaking it down, I use a garden sprayer, surfactant, I use Dawn dish soap.
I think the main danger of the stuff was the factory workers either at J-M Johns-Manville, apparently the main asbestos manufacturer in the US, or others that were exposed to the dust a lot.
That included steamfitters, and ship builders and some electrical equipment manufacturers (Square D here locally).
apparently smoking or exposure to other air borne chemicals might compound the risk. Some of my exposure was 40 years ago.
Also, advice on CONTAINING it is spot on. THIN paint that will really lock the loose fibers down will do a great job. Problem is the best paint for the job is solvent based, NOT water as it won't soak into the fibers. I personally LOVE the smell of alkyd enamel curing, but you will be smelling it a while at the beginning of heating season.
Steam and hot water heated houses are not the only residential incidences of asbestos use. Damned near every heated air residence had asbestos covered ductwork in the walls and basement.

Dennis1679

I would get an industrial hygienist to do an environmental test. If it’s not in the air or getting out, just leave it alone. Disturbing it is when all these other comments come into play.

realliveplumber

My neighbor worked in the shipyard, and he told me he used to scoop asbestos out of 55 gallon drums with his arms.

Died in his sleep at around 85.

gmcinnes

Im usually the safety Sally, but even here homeowners are permitted to remove a small amount of asbestos by themselves.  2 linear feet I think.  Or 3 square feet.

In an old house worry more about lead paint than asbestos.

That said, tape 6 mil poly 10' in every direction from the work site.  Imagine everything inside that poly is contaminated with Ebola.  Wear a respirator inside there.  Remove your shoes and clothes when you leave there, and wash them immediately.

Once you've done that, soak the material with water with soap/surfactant.  Really soak.  Until it's goo.  Remove into a heavy duty garbage bag and wash the crap out of the walls and floor.  Then wash it again.  And again.  DO NOT VACUUM.  As a homeowner you do not have a vacuum good enough to prevent it spraying fibers throughout your house.  Just keep everything wet and wash those fibres up.  Then put the poly in the garbage bag.

Dump your garbage bag containing 6"x6" of mostly paper in the regular landfill and let it return to Gaia.

I absolutely wouldn't want to go near asbestos if I was a plumber in the North East, where if you did agree to do it you would be dealing with it all day every day. Or as a steamfitter, or mechanic etc.  But the risk is dose dependent.  For a homeowner dealing with a couple of square feet, once or twice in their life, and wetting down the material first, the risk extremely low.

scott w.

My grandmother lived in an old house that had cracked plaster. Family purchased it in the late 1930s. I think it was in the late sixties when my mother  removed all the old layers of wall paper down to the   plaster to repaper the room.  Someone had previously  used asbestos paper (probably family) as a base to cover the cracks in the plaster. Asbestos paper was removed simply by tearing it off the wall. My grandmother lived 20 more years after that and died at the age of 97 in 1983.  Mom  grew up in that house, she   removed  that old asbestos paper odf the wall was a smoker and never had any lung problems. 

mattmia2

there are lots of people here that worked with asbestos and are ok. There are also several people who are no longer here that died because they worked with asbestos.