People have used asbestos in the home for a long time.  One of its earliest known usages was in Egypt.  The queen would amuse guests by tossing an asbestos woven table cloth into the fireplace.  The table cloth would not burn but all the food and drink stains would disappear leaving the table cloth like new.

Today most products made do not contain asbestos. Those few products which still contain asbestos that could be inhaled are required to be labeled as such. However, until the 1980’s, many types of building products and insulation materials used in homes contained asbestos. Common building products that might have contained asbestos in the past include: 

       Steam Pipes                       Boilers                                      Furnace Duct Tape
       Resilient Floor Tile             Vinyl Sheeting (linoleum)        Adhesives or Mastics
       Cement Sheet                    Millboard                                  Door Gaskets
       Door Caulking                    Window Frame Caulking          Window Glazing Putty
       Soundproofing                   Ceilings Popcorn Texture         Patching, Joint Compounds
       Textured Paints                  Asbestos Cement Roofing        Roofing Shingles and Siding
       Underground Water Pipe   Fireproofing                             Mirror Mastic
       Stove Top Pads                  Artifical Embers                       Roof Penetration Mastic

Homes built between 1930 and 1950 may have attic insulation that contains asbestos.

Asbestos was used in homes because of its thermal, fire protection, and strengthening properties. Insulating materials will resist both heat and cold thats why they were used in ceilings, roofs, walls, furnaces, and pipe covering.

Floor coverings like vinyl tile and linoleum gain strength and are resilent to temperature changes and humidity. They also resist scrathes and scuffmarks.

Many older household appliances used asbestos because of its resistence to heat, like hairdryers, ironing board covers, oven gloves, toasters, and many others. But the ban on asbestos in household appliances has eliminated this worry.

Recently there has been new information concerning vermiculite. Vermiculite is a light weight, fire resistent naturally occurring mineral that expands when heated, and was used in attic insulation and garden products. Vermiculie may contain asbestos. It has been discovered that some vermiculite mines had cross veins of asbestos minerials, and when they mined the vermiculite the asbestos became mixed in. This appears to be centered around one specific area mined in Idaho. The EPA has made a determination that all vermiculite is asbestos contaminated. This is because there is no good method for determining the amount of asbestos within the vermiculite mixture. We have links to the EPA site that gives more details, check it out on our Related Links Page.

Asbestos has been used for many decades in many uses and there is only one way to positively identify asbestos, and that is analysis with special microscopes.                       

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Where was Asbestos Used