Gaco Asbestos Roof Waterproofing in County Wicklow — Encapsulation Without Removal

Wicklow is best known for the coastal towns along the N11 and M11, Bray, Greystones, Wicklow Town and Arklow, and for harbours at Wicklow Town and Arklow. The county council’s own business profile draws a second picture too: the N81 serving the more upland west of the county around Baltinglass. Census 2022 recorded 155,851 people in Wicklow, and while many work in retail, health and education, the upland and inland parts of the county remain farm country. This page is about the farm buildings there.

Teagasc groups Wicklow with Carlow and Wexford in one advisory region, run from Enniscorthy. Its 2021 regional review recorded 8,509 farms across the three counties, spanning dairy, beef, sheep and tillage, with around 62,634 dairy cows region-wide. In Wicklow’s uplands that translates into sheep housing, cattle sheds and haybarns, and on lower ground dairies and machinery stores. Many were roofed when corrugated asbestos cement was the ordinary sheet for a farm building, and those roofs have now had decades of exposure on higher, more open ground.

The nearest Met Éireann station with a full 1991 to 2020 average is Casement Aerodrome in Co. Dublin, which recorded 783.5 mm of rain a year over about 136 wet days. Upland yards will see harsher conditions than a lowland station suggests, and wind finds every loose fixing and cracked lap. Encapsulation seals the roof as it is. Gaco urethane coatings, U91 and U92 being the grades used on asbestos cement, are applied over the existing sheets, so there is no strip-out, no asbestos waste to carry down narrow farm lanes and no gap in shelter for stock. An approved installer surveys, replaces broken sheets, cleans the surface without abrading it and coats in dry conditions within Gaco’s limits. Duratite supplies the materials and the approved installer carries out the work.

For any Wicklow farm, the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work (Exposure to Asbestos) Regulations 2006 (S.I. No. 386 of 2006, as amended) govern work that could disturb asbestos cement, and the Health and Safety Authority is the enforcing body. Fragile sheets are never walked on, and access is planned with staging and boards. Wicklow County Council, based at County Buildings in Wicklow Town, is the building control authority, and TGD L 2022 is relevant if insulation is changed. The island-of-Ireland reference project for asbestos roof encapsulation is SAICA Warrenpoint, Co. Down.

When you contact us about a Wicklow farm roof, describe the route into the yard, what the building houses and when, and whether the site is on high or open ground. A few photos of the roof and of any leaks inside will help the installer plan the survey visit.