Asbestos Surveys

Asbestos Surveys Types

Management survey 

A management survey is the standard survey. Its purpose is to locate, as far as reasonably practicable, the presence and extent of any suspect ACMs in the building which could be damaged or disturbed during normal occupancy, including foreseeable maintenance and installation, and to assess their condition. Without architectural information about asbestos use, an asbestos management surveys forms the bedrock of an asbestos management system. They are used to identify asbestos in premises and, if asbestos is located, establish a material assessment score that is used to go on and create a priority risk assessment

Pre-demolition surveys

Although similar in nature to refurbishment asbestos surveys, demolition asbestos surveys are fully intrusive and will require access back to the shell of the building throughout. The location, condition and extent of all asbestos within the premises should be recorded, as far as safely and reasonably practical to do so. However, given the inherent dangers sometimes encountered, specialist access equipment or contractors may be required to facilitate the inspection. Due to the extent of the intrusive inspection required, the premises must have been fully vacated before our surveyors embark on site.The objective of this type of survey is to provide the location and quality of asbestos containing materials for the basis of a removal specification.

Pre-refurbishment surveys

The surveys are normally required prior to commencing building refurbishment work. As refurbishments normally involve significant disturbance, or demolition of the building fabric, a greater level of intrusive inspection is required. In order to do this, some damage is inevitable during the survey process and careful planning is required to ensure that all affected areas are included and premises are vacated and safe to work in. An essential part of this planning is an up to date scope of work to make sure that the areas involved and only those involved are subject to intrusive inspection. Where occupants need to return before the refurbishment commences, thoughts should be given to ‘making good’ any damage caused. Depending on the findings, the use of an asbestos removal contractor may be required to facilitate an inspection behind existing asbestos containing materials (ACMs) as they may themselves hide further ACMs behind. The objective therefore is to catalogue all asbestos within the affected area and quantify it, whether this is to form the basis of an asbestos removal programme, to amend the refurbishment specification, or a mixture of both.