Out damn spot!

Post date: 2023-06-04 09:28:12

The AC failed while I was traveling during a particularly humid time which led to mold breaking out in the ceiling in two rooms. The remediation plan has been thrown off by asbestos popcorn ceiling. Details within.

The initial remediation plan was to encapsulate the affected areas and paint over them. Simple enough.

Then the asbestos report for the popcorn ceiling (1968) came back positive and the company I'd been working with is not certified to work with it.

They've proposed two possibilities.

1. Hire an asbestos company to remove the popcorn ceiling, they come in and encapsulate it, and then paint it.
2. Encapsulate it as-is (which they say won't disturb the asbestos) and add an entire new layer of drywall underneath it.

The second seems awfully fiddly - there's all kind of molding, ceiling lighting, etc. that would have to be worked around or left with a sloppy look.

It seems like a reasonable third option would be to have the asbestos certified company remove the drywall entirely and replace it. This cuts the mold-only company out of the profit loop, which is why they may not have presented it as an option.

In my mind this would also be good to make sure there's no mold above the ceiling below the attic. There's no sign of an issue in the attic (both in terms of mold and leaks that might have caused the outbreak) but it would give a little surety. It also seems like once I'm going to the expense of having asbestos certified professionals coming in, rather than grinding down dangerous popcorn that I'm not fond of to begin with and sealing mold into the existing drywall, that just replacing it with known good drywall would be the way to go.

I've reached out to the local asbestos companies for a quote but haven't heard back yet and figured I'd check the hive mind for anyone with first-person experience with this.

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