Gerrie van Beljouw is a mechanical engineer and has been the Owner of an asbestos removal company in Uden (the Netherlands) since 1991. He is a board member at trade association VVTB and uses his technical knowledge to make asbestos remediation safer and more efficient through innovation. For example, he has developed an asbestos separator for cleaning soil and debris and has shown through his own research that clean areas of airlocks and decos are not always clean. These findings have led to changes in the flushing and comfort requirements in the Dutch remediation guidelines.
In his presentation, he will demonstrate how various procedures lead to inefficient remediation and entail unnecessary risks to the health and safety of remediators and the environment. This presentation is a plea for a more critical view of asbestos removal, actual testing of assumptions and an increase of knowledge concerning fluid mechanics and physics of small particles within the asbestos removal sector.
Gerrie will present his speech both on behalf of his own company and on behalf of the Dutch association of asbestos remediation companies, the VVTB.