Managing asbestos roofs across North Yorkshire starts with the law
Whoever controls maintenance of a non-domestic building in North Yorkshire carries a duty to manage asbestos under Regulation 4 of the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012: identify the material, assess its condition, keep a written record and manage the risk. We know that a sound asbestos cement roof doesn’t always need ripping out. If it’s stable, we can seal it, record it, and monitor it, all as part of your management plan. Encapsulation means doing that decision right.
Where asbestos cement roofing sits across North Yorkshire
North Yorkshire blends commercial centres with vast farmland. Asbestos cement roofs sit on the York and Harrogate trade estates, the Selby and Sherburn industrial parks, and in great quantity across the agricultural buildings of the Vales of York and Pickering.
We’ve seen countless roofs like these, put up for thirty years and still going. That’s why so many are now letting water in at the fixings, covered in moss, or just plain porous, even when the sheets themselves are solid.
Encapsulation, repair or removal: the honest choice
If the roof is suitable, we’ll tell you to encapsulate it. That’s the responsible way to go. We’ll survey the roof in detail, clean it properly without releasing fibres or cracking the sheets, fix what needs fixing, then put down a coating system designed for asbestos cement. You get a sealed, watertight surface, a longer working life for your roof, and the building stays in use. It’s a fraction of the cost of taking the whole thing off and starting again.
Around North Yorkshire we encapsulate asbestos cement roofs with encapsulating paint systems made for the job, applied after low-pressure cleaning that leaves the fibres undisturbed.
When we will tell you to remove instead
Look, not every roof is right for coating. We won’t pretend it is. If the sheets are crumbly, badly cracked, full of holes, or if the roof itself has moved, then coating it is a waste of money. And remember, we only encapsulate asbestos cement. If you’ve got insulation board, lagging, or sprayed coatings, that’s a job for an HSE-licensed contractor. If removal is the right call for your building, we’ll tell you straight away.
Survey-led across North Yorkshire
We survey commercial, industrial, managed and agricultural buildings across the county, including York, Harrogate, Scarborough, Northallerton and Selby. The route is the same wherever the building is:
- A condition survey of sheets, fixings, rooflights, gutters and structure
- A photographic record for your asbestos management plan
- A plain written recommendation: encapsulate, repair first, or refer for removal
- A specification and price only where coating is genuinely appropriate
- Work carried out under controlled, documented conditions
If a building in your portfolio dates from the 1960s to the 1980s and the roof has never been assessed, a free asbestos roof encapsulation survey answers the compliance question and the cost question together.
We carry out asbestos roof encapsulation across North Yorkshire. For the full survey-led service and how we assess each building, see our Asbestos Roof Encapsulation service, or request a free site survey.
Recently — July 2026
Recent work around here has been a mix of profiled metal roofs, cladding and ageing asbestos cement, each assessed on its own condition before anything was specified.
With surfaces staying dry for longer, summer lets us prepare and coat a roof in a single planned visit rather than working around showers.
