Came across this room with broken acoustic ceiling tiles, that I have to spend time working. The tiles look kinda "modern" to contain asbestos, but then again you never know. Wondered if anyone can recognize the material(s) they're made of. Many thanks.
Do you know anything about the building you have them in? Age of the building, dates of renovations? If you can pinpoint that it might rule out the asbestos for you. Asbestos building materials were made illegal in North America and if you can find someone (an older person with some years in) at that place they might be able to help give you some information. If you haven’t been working with those tiles your exposure would be minimal, for asbestos to be dangerous it must be air born and the amount of exposure determines your health risk. So if those tiles were broken a long time ago and you didn’t disturb them in your work your exposure would be minimal. If you have been working with them it does increase your risk unfortunately.
Asbestos ceiling tiles were quite common for many years because of their ability to handle high temperatures. That looks like standard cellulose type of tile to me but the only way to know for sure is to test it. If the building was built after the 70’s you can be fairly sure that it is plain cellulose. If it is not disturbed their is no risk, my suggestion would be to ask a maintenance person. although the problems with asbestos are serious they are quite rare compared to every household had several types prior to the 60’s from flooring to insulation in ovens, furnaces, steam pipes, exhaust ducts, popcorn ceilings, siding. I could keep going for pages. Even the people that mined it and worked in the factories there entire life it was not as common as you might think. So ask maintenance, or get a test kit. But I would not worry.
