Asbestos disposal
How is asbestos from a garage roof disposed of in Kent?
Where the sheets go depends on who takes them down. A householder's own small load follows one route in Kent, and a roofer's waste follows another.
The short answer
Asbestos cement sheets come off a garage roof whole, go into a lockable skip or double-wrapped sacks, and travel to a site that accepts them. In Kent, householders can take their own small amounts to the household waste recycling centres, apart from Sheerness, at up to 5 sacks a month free. A roofer's sheets are trade waste moved on a consignment note, and the household exemption for those notes leaves asbestos out.
4 min read · Part of Garage roofs
Two routes for the same sheets
The route turns on who lifts the sheets and who carries them away. A householder with a small amount of their own material and a roofer stripping a whole roof are treated differently, even though the sheets are identical.
| Who | Where it goes | Paperwork |
|---|---|---|
| Householder, own garage | Kent household recycling centre | A declaration at the gate |
| Roofer taking the roof down | Lockable skip, then a carrier | Consignment note |
GOV.UK's guidance on consignment notes exempts the movement of domestic hazardous waste "other than asbestos waste" from a household to an initial collection point. Asbestos waste sits outside that exemption. Waste carriers have to register on GOV.UK, so before the skip leaves your drive, ask whoever is taking the sheets to show their registration. Keep every piece of paper you are given, because it shows where the sheets finally went. If a roofer is arranging the removal, the registration and the consignment note are theirs to supply, and you are entitled to see both before any work begins on your garage.
What the Kent recycling centres ask of you
Kent County Council sets terms for a householder's own small amounts, and they are specific. Miss one and a site can turn you away at the gate with the sheets already in your car.
- Asbestos is taken at the Kent household waste recycling centres, but not at Sheerness.
- Wrap it twice, in thick plastic bags or sheeting, and tape the wrapping shut.
- No piece can be bigger than 3 metres by 1.5 metres (10 feet by 5 feet).
- Keep the material damp.
- The free allowance is no more than 5 sacks, or equivalent, per month.
- Staff will ask you to state that the load comes from your own home.
Those are Kent County Council's own terms for householders. A garage roof can run past five sacks quickly, so count the sheets before you decide which route to take. A roof that goes over the limit is a job for a roofer's skip and carrier, not for repeated trips in a car. Rye and Camber addresses sit outside Kent County Council's area: ask the county that covers you what it accepts before you load anything.
Lockable skips, whole sheets and broken sheets
For asbestos, HSE's waste guidance names a lockable skip, and it rules out the habit of laying sheeting across a standard skip. An open skip is not acceptable, whatever the size of the garage, and a lid that is not locked does not change that.
How the sheets come down matters as much as where they go. In HSE's scheme, lifting cement roof sheets off in one piece, without snapping them, is non-licensed work, and that holds for weathered sheets that are not otherwise badly damaged. Sheets that have been smashed or badly cracked, in a fire or a flood, say, fall into notifiable non-licensed work, a separate HSE category with its own steps.
HSE's A14 guidance uses the word fragile for every AC roof, so stay off the sheets, and any lift needs a plan for working safely before it starts. Where a roof has already cracked, the job and its waste route change with it. Our page on how to tell if a garage roof contains asbestos covers the first step, which comes before any of this. Ask any roofer you invite how the sheets will come down and what they will be laid on, before the first one moves.
What a quote for the removal should say
MyJobQuote's average for removing asbestos from a roof is about £2,750 (page dated September 2026), and an asbestos survey averages around £325 in 2026. Both are third-party averages, not our prices, and the written quote for your roof follows a survey as one total price.
Before you accept any quote that includes removal, check that it states:
- who takes the sheets down, and whether they come down whole
- that the waste goes in a lockable skip
- who carries it away, with the carrier's registration
- that a consignment note is provided and handed to you
- whether VAT and scaffold are included
A quote that is silent on where the waste goes is leaving out part of the job. Ask the question in writing, ask for the answer inside the quote itself rather than in conversation, and keep a copy. The garage roofs page shows how we run these jobs, and the asbestos garage roofs post sets out HSE's wider rules on who can do what. Pricing questions are answered on the garage roof replacement cost page.
More questions
Is a household bin or an ordinary skip ever fine for asbestos sheets?
No. HSE's waste guidance names a lockable skip for asbestos, and it says laying sheeting over a standard skip is not good enough. For your own small amounts in Kent, the household recycling centres are the route: wrapped twice, kept damp and stated as coming from your home.
Do I need a consignment note for asbestos from my own garage?
GOV.UK's household exemption covers domestic hazardous waste other than asbestos waste, so asbestos is not exempt. Ask whoever carries it away about the paperwork. For your own small load, Kent's recycling centres set their own terms: wrapped twice, kept damp, no more than 5 sacks a month free.
Tell us what's wrong with the roof.
You'll get one written total price.