Asbestos At Its Best
by Cory Zellers


Tremolite, an asbestos mineral.

History
This website was created to provide information on asbestos and was a project for a mineralogy course at Emporia State University. Asbestos has been known to society for over 2,000 years. It has many uses, from toothpaste to insulation, but recently asbestos has gotten a bad reputation.
Asbestos has a long history dating back to 300 B.C. when Theophrastus wrote about it in his work On Stones. He called it, "an unnamed substance resembling rotten wood that, when doused with oil, would burn without being harmed." (Alleman and Mossman, 1997, p. 70). Through the years people found asbestos to be very useful because of it's flexible fibers and resistance to fire.
Because of its special properties, asbestos became a very significant part of society. Some of the earliest uses include handkerchief, tablecloth, and other woven cloth items. With this material being flame resistant it can be cleansed by fire. Around the turn of the century asbestos was so popular that at the New York World's Fair there was an "Asbestos Man" statue to greet visitors.
World War II brought about the last asbestos rush. This mineral was used to fireproof highrise buildings and even toothpaste was made with it's fibers. Asbestos was in movies, such as The Wizard of Oz, the witch's broom which was set on fire without burning.
Asbestos use reached an all-time high in 1973, but health problems from inhalation of asbestos fibers was recognized at this time. Along with lung disorders, asbestos was linked to mesothelioma, a tumor found in the chest or gut. The EPA banned all forms of asbestos.

Actinolite, an asbestos mineral.

Scientists discovered that of the six types of asbestos minerals, five of them are amphiboles which seem to cause most of the problems. The amphiboles, with the strongest and stiffest fibrous forms, include actinolite, tremolite, amosite, anthophyllite, and crocidolite. The sixth type of asbestos mineral is chrysotile, which is significantly softer in texture and has a snake-like crystal structure. Because chrysotile is softer and more flexible, it can be broken down by the body easier than the other forms.

Chrysotile, an asbestos mineral.

In 1991, the EPA lifted it's ban on asbestos, but this did not change the public's perception that all asbestos is dangerous. Studies showed that inhaling asbestos does cause problems, but just asbestos itself is basically harmless. Most asbestos mixed in the walls and tiles are safe until the fibers are released in dust.
Asbestos use overall has dropped 95% since 1973. Chrysotile is still fairly common in some situations. The space shuttle program uses it in liners to protect the solid fuel booster from the heat of takeoff. It is also a filter in submarines to get oxygen from the water. The biggest use today is in mixing asbestos minerals in cement. Much of our water runs through underground asbestos cement pipes. There has been enough asbestos cement pipe used, since 1930 in the U.S., to circle the earth eight times and still run to the moon and back!<
The future for asbestos does look grim, not only from a health related perspective, but also from dwindling supplies of these minerals. Scientists are still searching for a replacement, but none has been found yet.

Other Related Links

Mineral Gallery
The Mineral and Gemstone Kingdom
Chad Rawalt's Asbestos

Bibliography

Alleman, J.E. and Mossman, B.T. "Asbestos Revisited," Scientific American, July 1997, p 70-75.

All images were taken from The Mineral Gallery at http://mineral.galleries.com

This site was created on November 24, 1998, by

Cory "Fuzzy" Zellers
E-mail me at Zellersc@esuvm.emporia.edu

Return to the GO 336 Mineralogy index or the Student Webpage Index

copyright 1998 © Cory Zellers and Emporia State University. All rights reserved.