What is asbestos

Asbestos is a group of naturally occurring fibrous minerals found in rock. It’s strong, heat-resistant and cheap. These properties led to its widespread use in Australian buildings and products from the early 1900s through to the late 1980s.

Asbestos was used in hundreds of products: some made of essentially pure asbestos fibre (e.g. loose-fill insulation, rope, woven textiles), and others made by combining asbestos fibres with other materials (e.g. cement sheeting, bituminous electrical boards, vinyl tiles).

In 2003, Australia banned all forms of asbestos, but it remains in many buildings. If your home or workplace was built or renovated before 1990, it likely contains asbestos.

Why is asbestos dangerous?

Asbestos is dangerous when fibres are released into the air and breathed in.

Inhaled asbestos fibres can become trapped in the lungs and cause serious diseases, including lung cancer, mesothelioma and asbestosis. These diseases often don’t appear until 20 to 30 years after exposure.

What makes asbestos materials release fibres?

Several factors can contribute to the release of asbestos fibres.

Materials that contain a higher percentage of asbestos fibre and are more loosely bound (e.g. loose-fill insulation, rope, woven textiles) can release fibre with little disturbance ('friable').

Products in which asbestos is mixed with a base material such as cement or vinyl (matrix) generally need more substantial disturbance to release fibre ('non-friable').

Even in materials where the asbestos fibre is bound in a matrix (e.g. cement, vinyl, bitumen), this matrix naturally degrades over time. This breakdown is continuous, inevitable and often invisible.

Asbestos products in Australian buildings are now 30 to 100+ years old. Their binding materials are degrading through weathering, chemical breakdown and everyday wear. A product that looks intact on the surface may already be compromised internally.

The risk of fibre release increases when materials are:

• ageing or deteriorating (even if they look okay)
• damaged, cracked or weathered
• disturbed (e.g. cut, drilled, sanded or demolished)

Identifying asbestos products

Don’t assume any asbestos material is safe based on how it looks. If it could contain asbestos, get it assessed by a professional.

Asbestos Product Guide, developed by the Asbestos and Silica Safety and Eradication Agency (ASSEA), is a visual reference to help you recognise asbestos-containing products commonly found in Australian buildings.

Classifying asbestos in registers

The ACM Dictionary, developed by the Victorian Asbestos Eradication Agency (VAEA), standardises the terminology used to describe and classify ACMs. With definitions and illustrations for more than 100 product types, it ensures consistency across workplace asbestos registers.