Possible Asbestos tile under the entire carpet of my house. Is it dangerous put in new carpet?
Question by Patricia M: Possible Asbestos tile under the entire carpet of my house. Is it dangerous put in new carpet?
The tiles are brown and off white and, look like a jig saw puzzle design the way the where put in and, they are throughout the entire house under the carpet. The house in question, was built in 1961. One tile in the kitchen cracked, the rest of the tile looks good, as far as we can see but, I haven’t seen all the tiles under the carpet. I’m am going to have it tested tomorrow to see if, it has asbestos. The reason for my awareness is, Home Depot came out to measure my carpet size. I’ve been told by Home Depot that, I need to have it tested and, if the tile does have asbestos, I have to have it removed. I’m a little confused because, on the US Environmental Protection Agency’s website, they say to leave them undisturbed because, if you do remove them, you take more chances of the product going into the air and breathing it. My question is, if the tiles are intacked under the carpet, why would I need to change them? And can’t, I just put new carpet in over them? Or, is the old pad and, carpet contaiminated because, it lays on these old tiles?
Best answer:
Answer by hannah
Did you ask the people at Home Depot about what the EPA’s site said? The EPA probably means you shouldn’t do it yourself, but you’ll be getting someone to do it professionally, which would be fine, I’m sure. Putting the carpet down on top of the tiles sounds dangerous to me, but I don’t know a lot about asbestos. I would say you should get them removed because if you’re going to be taking up the carpet it will release the asbestos into the air anyway. I wouldn’t want to risk my health just to put in new carpet though. Get it tested anyway, and if it has asbestos, either get it removed or keep the old carpet.
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You can leave them in place providing the old carpet is not glued to them. If the old carpet can be removed without disturbing the tiles they can be left. You could be opening up a can of worms by sending out a sample. Asbestos removal is quite expensive but if the tile are loose you don’t really don’t have a choice. Asbostos can be in the adhesive as well as the tile. Only a lab can really tell for sure.
Asbestos is a hair like fibre. If it is *friable, that means it can easily be dispersed into the air. When in a solid form like floor tile it is in a safe and stable form. Breaking it up for removal puts it in a friable form and it then gets into the air during removal.
If it stays down when you remove the old carpet that would be the best situation, if it comes up with carpet that can be ok as long as it does not break into pcs.
So your options will be based on if the tile comes up or stays down. You can find a floor installer who will remove your old carpet and install the new – he will just fill the voids where any of those tiles come up from the floor prior to installing your new carpet. Home Depot will not want to mess with any chance of asbestos – but a veteran floor installer will know that this tile is safe if not disturbed too much. And once your carpet is down – you won’t need to worry about any asbestos because it will still be in a solid form.
Asbestos is a big factor when demolishing buildings with it inside. Because everything gets crushed in demolition if you left materials inside that have asbestos – it would be released into the air during demolition. So, this is why there are special asbestos abatement companies that all they do is go in and remove anything in these buildings that contains asbestos. The workers wear special protective suits/masks/gloves and they bag up everything and label the bags and haul it to an approved waste site. It is all recorded and documented. Then and only then can the demolition contractor start to tear down the structure.