Asbestos removal in Wonthaggi, Inverloch and Bass Coast

The housing you'll find here

Wonthaggi's older streets carry the mining-era cottages and the post-war houses that followed, with fibro eaves and sleepouts and super six sheds. Inverloch, Cape Paterson, Cowes, Rhyll, San Remo and Grantville have a large stock of fibro holiday houses, often entirely clad in asbestos cement inside and out, with vinyl floors over fibro. Coastal fibro is often chalky and brittle. Where it crumbles by hand it's friable, and the removalist decides the class on site.

Knock-down rebuilds are common on the coast now. That means a whole-house strip-out before demolition; see demolition with asbestos.

Disposal in Bass Coast

Ring before you load. Grantville Transfer Station and Landfill accepts asbestos in Bass Coast Shire, and only from domestic properties inside the shire, Monday to Friday. Wonthaggi, Inverloch and Cowes facilities do not take it. As Bass Coast Council specifies, the material must be double-wrapped in building plastic (concrete underlay), taped with waterproof tape, with nothing poking through, marked "CAUTION ASBESTOS", no longer than 1,200 millimetres and no heavier than 25 kilograms a bundle. Bring a Bass Coast rate notice; if you rent, ring first. Maximum load 110 kilograms; book on 5678 8739. Loads from commercial operators, which includes a licensed removalist's load, are refused. Council waste services are on 1300 226 278.

So for anything beyond a couple of sheets, the removalist takes the waste to an EPA-licensed facility and it's in the quote.

Asbestos removal Wonthaggi and Inverloch: how a licensed job runs on the coast

• Send photos through the form, and we keep your job on file and your details with us. For a holiday house where you're not on site, a key arrangement works.

If you engage a licensed removalist:

• Written quote with the licence class, WorkSafe notification, disposal destination and clearance.
• WorkSafe is notified before the job starts: at least five days ahead for friable material or more than 10 square metres of bonded sheeting, at least 24 hours ahead for a smaller bonded job.
• Weathered coastal sheets are handled wet and slowly. Brittle sheets that break are wrapped as they are.
• A clearance certificate from an independent person where the job needs one, then the builder.

Common Bass Coast jobs

• Whole fibro shack strip-outs ahead of a rebuild.
• Wet-area walls and vinyl floors in weekend houses being made year-round.
• Fibro fences and super six shed roofs in Wonthaggi's older streets.
• Storm damage along the coast. See storm and fire damage.
• Pipe lagging and heater flues in cottages that predate ducted heating.

Getting a holiday house ready

For a holiday house, arrange a key or a neighbour and make sure the power and water are on; the crew needs water to wet the sheets. Clear the house of anything you want to keep before a strip-out, because once the enclosure goes up nothing comes out unwrapped. Let the neighbours on both sides know the dates. Any crew will watch the forecast, and weathered fibro is handled slowly.

What the quote covers on the coast

Area measured rather than guessed. How brittle the sheets are, because chalky coastal fibro that crumbles by hand on removal is priced and handled as friable. Vinyl floors and their backing, which are the trap in old shacks. Fixings, access, and where the truck parks on a narrow beach street. And the disposal destination, which on Bass Coast is never the council for a removalist's load.

The quote should name the area, the licence class, the WorkSafe notification, the waste destination and whether an independent clearance is included. For a whole-shack strip-out, ask for the clearance in writing; the builder will want it.

Shacks, renovations and knock-downs

Bass Coast's fibro shacks are being renovated into year-round homes or replaced outright. Renovating means testing every material before a trade touches it, and a licensed strip-out of the wet areas, eaves and floors first. Replacing means a full strip-out, clearance, and then the demolition crew; see demolition with asbestos. Either way the asbestos is the first job on site, not something the builder finds in week three.

Mining cottages first, holiday estates second

Wonthaggi exists because the state needed coal for the railways. The State Coal Mine opened in 1909, the miners lived in tents, and the government let a housing tender in February 1910. The Mines Department built 50 cottages to start and had 100 houses let to miners by the end of June 1910; alongside those, fifteen acres were cut into quarter-acre blocks and leased to miners to build their own. The mine closed in 1968. Some of the surviving government cottages on Broome Crescent and Dunn Street are heritage-listed. The town's next layer is the post-war housing, squarely in the cement sheet decades.

The coast is younger. Cowes took off after the 1940 bridge, with holiday houses going up estate after estate for thirty years; Silverleaves alone was 250 lots between 1955 and 1962. Summerlands was cut into 437 blocks in the 1950s with the last subdivisions in 1958 and 1961, though by 1974 only 11 per cent of its 986 blocks had been built on. Cape Paterson grew from 400 dwellings in 1984 to 700 by 1992. Inverloch's Golden Sand (1990) and Ruttle (1996) estates are post-1990 stock, so unlikely, but the national ban is 2003, so test before you cut.

Two facts from that history drive the work. Most of the coastal fibro was built before 1990 as cheap weekenders, often fibro inside and out with vinyl on the floor. And a lot of it stands empty most of the year: two thirds of Cape Paterson's dwellings and about half of Inverloch's were unoccupied on the 2011 census night, and only 38 per cent of Cowes' were occupied.

Running a job on a house you only visit at Easter

Most Bass Coast asbestos work is on houses whose owners live in Melbourne, so the paperwork has to do the travelling. The written quote, with the area measured, the licence class and the commercial facility the waste is going to, should reach you without you standing in the yard, and so should the four documents a licensed job produces, listed on the friable asbestos page. A shack strip-out is always over the 10 square metre line, so the clearance is required.

Your side is small: a key or a neighbour with one, the water on so the crew can wet the sheets, the house cleared before a strip-out, and a booking outside school holidays, when a narrow Cape Paterson street has nowhere to put a truck.

If a weathered sheet comes down in a blow, don't sweep it, don't pressure-hose it, don't skip it. Mist it with the garden hose, keep people away, photograph it, ring the insurer, then a licensed removalist from WorkSafe's directory.

Inverloch and the coast houses

Searches for asbestos removal Inverloch come from holiday houses as often as from homes. Fibro beach shacks from the 1950s to the 1970s are common along this coast, and the salt air has usually weathered the sheets, so a licensed removalist wets them down and wraps them on site the same way as anywhere else. Cape Paterson, Cowes and the Phillip Island side would be a natural fit for the same run, once a removalist is confirmed.

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