Workers at Industrial Gas Products in Sauget, Illinois — along with those who rotated through neighboring facilities including Monsanto Chemical, the Shell Oil Roxana Refinery, and the Clark Refinery — may have been exposed to asbestos-containing materials decades ago. Mesothelioma, asbestosis, and asbestos-related lung cancer typically take 20 to 50 years to appear after initial exposure. A diagnosis today almost certainly traces back to work performed in the 1950s, 1960s, or 1970s.

Illinois venues — particularly Madison County and St. Clair County — are well established as plaintiff-friendly jurisdictions in asbestos litigation, with Madison County carrying one of the highest asbestos filing volumes in the country. An experienced asbestos attorney can evaluate whether your claim is best pursued in Missouri or Illinois and ensure you meet every applicable deadline.

General Equipment at Industrial Gas Products Sauget Illinois

The equipment below represents the systems and infrastructure documented or typically present at this facility during the era when asbestos-containing materials were specified in industrial construction. This is general facility-equipment reference — not a legal attribution of any specific product, manufacturer, or exposure event to this facility. Material-category and manufacturer information is addressed in the AsbestosIndex Product Crosswalk linked under the records table below.

Reactor Vessels View crosswalk › Process Boilers View crosswalk › Industrial Mixers View crosswalk › Heat Exchangers View crosswalk › Cooling Towers View crosswalk › Pipe Insulation View crosswalk › Valves View crosswalk › Gaskets View crosswalk › Storage Tanks View crosswalk ›

Documented Asbestos Evidence

The records below are verified, state-documented asbestos removals at this facility. Each entry represents a regulated abatement project where the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (Illinois EPA) was notified under federal NESHAP rules, the work was logged, and the asbestos-containing material was confirmed and removed under regulated conditions. These are not allegations or estimates — they are paper records tying documented asbestos-containing material to this specific site.

No Illinois EPA NESHAP abatement notifications have been identified for this facility in current public records. Per the framing above, absence of state-agency documentation should not be read as absence of asbestos — only as absence of a formal, regulated abatement event meeting reporting thresholds. Workers who recall encountering pipe insulation, block insulation, gaskets, or other asbestos-era construction materials at this facility may still have viable claims regardless of whether a state record exists.

Material Categories in Documented Records

The materials documented above (and similar asbestos-containing materials commonly encountered in records of this type) appear in the AsbestosIndex catalog with historical manufacturer and trust-fund information. Click a category to view manufacturers historically associated with that material:

Thermal System Insulation View crosswalk › Asbestos-Cement Board View crosswalk › Pipe Insulation View crosswalk › Roofing & Flashing View crosswalk › Spray Fireproofing View crosswalk › Floor Tile & Mastic View crosswalk › Ceiling Tile View crosswalk › Gaskets & Packing View crosswalk ›

Who May Have Been Exposed at Industrial Gas Products Sauget Illinois

High-Risk Trades and Job Classifications

Insulators and Pipe Coverers Members of Heat and Frost Insulators Local 1 (St. Louis) who worked at Industrial Gas Products were directly involved in installing, repairing, and removing asbestos pipe insulation, block insulation, and insulating cements — including products like calcium silicate pipe insulation, Thermobestos, and calcium silicate. Industrial hygiene research and trial evidence consistently establish that insulators experienced the highest fiber exposures of any trade in industrial plant work.

Pipefitters and Pipe Welders Members of Plumbers and Pipefitters UA Local 562 (St. Louis) and UA Local 268 who installed, repaired, and removed piping systems may have been exposed to asbestos-containing gaskets from gaskets and packing, asbestos rope packing, and pipe insulation throughout their work at Industrial Gas Products.

Boilermakers Boilermakers who constructed, maintained, and repaired boilers and pressure vessels at Industrial Gas Products may have regularly worked with asbestos block insulation, asbestos cement, and asbestos-containing gaskets and other manufacturers.

Electricians Electrical workers installing and maintaining switchgear, panel boards, motor controllers, and wiring may have come into contact with asbestos-containing insulation and arc chutes in equipment and other manufacturers.

Maintenance Mechanics and Equipment Operators Facility maintenance personnel may have frequently disturbed legacy asbestos-containing insulation and gaskets during routine equipment repair — often without adequate respiratory protection, particularly before OSHA’s asbestos standards took effect.

Millwrights These skilled tradespeople, tasked with installing and aligning process equipment, routinely worked alongside insulators and pipefitters and may have encountered asbestos-containing materials throughout their assignments at Industrial Gas Products.

Laborers and General Facility Workers Workers who never directly handled asbestos-containing materials may still have been exposed through ambient fiber releases from nearby insulation work, renovation activities, or deteriorating legacy insulation in their work areas. Bystander exposure is a well-documented and legally cognizable category of asbestos exposure.

Contractors and Itinerant Tradespeople The Sauget corridor attracted union insulators, pipefitters, and electricians from St. Louis-area union halls for construction, maintenance, turnaround, and repair projects across multiple sites. A worker who rotated through Monsanto Chemical, the Shell Roxana Refinery, Clark Refinery, and Granite City Steel — in addition to Industrial Gas Products — may have accumulated significant cumulative exposure from dozens of employers and hundreds of asbestos-containing products over a working lifetime.

Critical Filing Deadline & Next Steps

Illinois law gives mesothelioma and asbestos-disease claimants 2 years from the date of medical diagnosis to file a personal-injury lawsuit (735 ILCS 5/13-202). For wrongful-death claims after an asbestos-related death, the filing window is 2 years from the date of death (740 ILCS 180/2). The two deadlines run on separate tracks — preserving one does not extend the other.

The personal-injury clock runs from diagnosis, not from exposure. Mesothelioma latency is typically 20 to 50 years, so workers exposed in the 1950s–1980s are being diagnosed today.

Practical first steps

  1. Document what you remember. Pay stubs, W-2s, union cards, photographs, coworker names, and dates of employment. The WorkChain widget on this page can save a copy you can email yourself.
  2. Preserve medical records. Pathology reports, biopsy results, imaging, and pulmonary-function tests are central to both civil claims and trust-fund filings.
  3. Identify household members. Spouses who laundered work clothing and children of plant workers are eligible for secondary-exposure claims when diagnosed with an asbestos-related disease.
  4. Speak with an asbestos attorney with Illinois experience. The first conversation is free and confidential. Asbestos trust-fund claims and civil claims run on different tracks — both can be pursued in parallel.

Asbestos-Related Diseases

Asbestos fiber exposure can cause several specific diseases that typically appear decades after the original exposure. The latency period — the gap between exposure and diagnosis — usually runs 20 to 50 years. That's why workers exposed in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s are receiving diagnoses today.

Mesothelioma

A rare, aggressive cancer that affects the lining of the lungs (pleural mesothelioma), abdomen (peritoneal), or heart (pericardial). Mesothelioma is almost exclusively caused by asbestos exposure, which is why a mesothelioma diagnosis often points directly to historical workplace exposure. Average latency from first exposure to diagnosis is 30-50 years.

Asbestosis

A chronic, non-cancerous scarring of lung tissue caused by inhaled asbestos fibers. Asbestosis causes progressive shortness of breath, persistent cough, and reduced lung function. It does not improve with treatment, and it is a recognized basis for compensation under most trust schedules and civil claims.

Lung Cancer

Asbestos exposure significantly increases the risk of lung cancer, particularly when combined with a history of smoking. Asbestos-related lung cancer is compensable under the same trust schedules and civil claim avenues as mesothelioma.

Other Recognized Diseases

Pleural plaques, pleural thickening, laryngeal cancer, ovarian cancer, and certain gastrointestinal cancers are also recognized as asbestos-related under various trust schedules and case-law authorities, though eligibility and proof requirements vary by claim type.

If you have any of these diagnoses and you worked at this facility, lived with someone who did, or were exposed in any documented capacity, you may have a claim worth pursuing. Speak with an attorney before assuming you don't qualify.

Data Sources

Information about facility equipment, industrial materials, and occupational records referenced on this page is drawn from publicly available sources where applicable, including:

If specific equipment or product claims in this article are sourced from a non-public database, the source is identified parenthetically within the text above.