Asbestos Felt

Asbestos in Felt Products and Other Industrial Materials

Asbestos felt is a material produced by combining felted asbestos fiber with an asphalt or elastomer base. Asbestos felt found numerous uses in construction as well as industry in the early and middle 20th century. The principal use of asbestos felt was for roofing. Roofing felt is applied to the roofs of both commercial and residential buildings as part of roof construction or renovation. It is most commonly found on flat-roofed buildings, but was used on all types of roofs. Asbestos drying felts were also commonly employed in the paper industry at pulp mills

Asbestos felt is no longer manufactured in the United States. When it was produced, prior to the 1979 ban on most asbestos-containing materials, principal manufacturers included GAF Corporation and Johns-Manville.

Asbestos Felt Products Containing Asbestos

The following partial list of asbestos felt products were known to contain asbestos:

Hazards Associated with Asbestos Felt Products

Workers in the paper industry are among those at highest risk for asbestos disease because they were working very closely with asbestos felt material in poorly ventilated conditions. More commonly, roofers, construction workers, demolition workers, and maintenance personnel working on roofs were exposed to asbestos when using, installing, repairing, or removing asbestos felt. These workers would often be working with aged asbestos felt. When asbestos-containing materials are worn or damaged the individual asbestos fibers can become loose and thus breathed in more easily, putting those working with it at risk for mesothelioma.

Sources

Bowker, Michael. Fatal Deception: The Untold Story of Asbestos (New York: Touchstone, 2003)

N/A. "Asbestos Linked to Autoimmune Diseases." Environmental Health Perspectives, vol. 113 (2004)

Hill, Cyrus E. McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Architecture & Construction (Texas: Mc-Graw Hill, 1993)