Licensed Asbestos Contractor Fined for Improper Removal

Apparently, hiring a licensed asbestos contractor doesn't mean the job of removing the toxic material will be done properly. That's what happened to a homeowner in Worcester, Massachusetts who employed a designated asbestos abatement professional to remove asbestos-containing shingles from his home. An article in the Telegram and Gazette reports that the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has fined a licensed asbestos contractor, Envirogreen, more than $18,000 for failing to properly remove and dispose of asbestos-containing shingles at the home of a resident who believed they were doing the right thing by hiring someone who knew how to deal with the toxic material. Instead, the shingles were removed from the Worcester home without any attempt to minimize breakage, the article reports, and were simply allowed to fall to the ground, where they broke and released dangerous asbestos dust into the air. Inspectors who were summoned to the site found the tiles lying on the ground uncontained. According to Massachusetts state laws, the shingles should have been wet before there was an attempt to remove them from the house. As such, the dust from the material would have been minimal. In addition, additional asbestos handling precautions should have been taken to keep breakage to a minimum, including placing them on the ground by hand rather than allowing them to randomly fall. Finally, fines were also imposed for improper disposal of the material and the failure to seal the waste in leak-proof containers labeled to warn others of their toxic content. A negotiated settlement with the DEP will allow Envirogreen to pay only $10,000 of the $18,312 penalty as this time, but the company will need to pay the remainder if any repeat asbestos removal violations are discovered.

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