Building group James Hardie, which left NSW taxpayers to pick up the bill last year for funding shortfalls to its asbestos victims, has found enough cash to start marketing and advertising its products in Australia after "going dark" for a decade amid the scandal.

Its Asia Pacific marketing head, George O'Neil, told Mumbrella that he is guiding the 127-year-old company back to public prominence via social media.

"We are not sitting there with hundreds of millions of dollars of media budget; we are lean," he told Mumbrella. It would also target the company at a younger demographic who would not so readily associate the company with its asbestos-tainted history.

"The younger people are, the less there is that stronger emotion, unless they are directly affected by it," said Mr O'Neil.