Use Toxic Risk Maps to learn more and protect children from toxic air pollution near schools in the U.S.
"Our job is to protect the American public where they live, work and play - and that certainly includes protecting schoolchildren where they learn." ...
EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson
Toxic Pollution & Children's Health News - Resources
ToxicRisk.com Pollution & School Maps -
Updates
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 Welcome to ToxicRisk.com
Introduction
ToxicRisk.com is a map-based website that enables users to investigate facilities listed in the EPA Toxic Release Inventory (TRI), number of schools within 1 mile and within 5 miles of the facility, plus links to a database about the toxic history of the facility. Users can also research a chemical to learn more about associated risks, and can find icons on the maps naming individual schools. If you have any questions, suggestions or comments, please email me. I'd love to hear from you. If you have any questions,
suggestions or comments, please email
me. I'd love to hear from you.
Toxic Chemical Pollution Releases and Schools As you zoom in you will see a change in the icons of the
facilities near the center of the map - these are the ones that you can
click on and find the facility name, number of schools within 1
mile and number of schools within 5 miles of the facility
plus a link to a database about the toxic history of the facility. You can also
click on a chemical to learn more about associated risks. The
schools will appear as you zoom in. As you zoom in further, you will see
the school icon change - at that point you can click on the school to
view its name. Click
here for a graphical mini-tutorial. If you have any questions,
suggestions or comments, please email
me. I'd love to hear from you.
Using the Maps Zoom in or enter some search
criteria to begin your discovery of toxic chemical risks near your schools and in your community. Note
that a search brings you to a fairly zoomed in map. You may wish to zoom
out a bit to see what toxics might be in the surrounding region.
2007: 21,996 Facilities, 4.1 BILLION Pounds For 2007,
21,996 facilities, including federal facilities, reported to the TRI
Program. They reported 4.1 billion pounds of on-site and off-site
disposal or other releases of the almost 650 toxic chemicals. Click here for more about EPA's Toxic
Release Inventory.
Sponsors
Very Short History of the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) The
Bhopal disaster or Bhopal gas tragedy was an industrial disaster that
took place at a Union Carbide subsidiary pesticide plant in the city of
Bhopal, India. On 3 December 1984, the plant released 42 tons of toxic
methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas, exposing more than 500,000 people to toxic
gases. The first official immediate death toll was 2,259. A more
probable figure is that 8,000 died within two weeks, and it is estimated
that an additional 8,000 have since died from gas-related diseases. Read
more about Bhopal at WikiPedia.
The short story is that the U.S. responded to this disaster by
introducing the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) in 1987. While the TRI
does not cover all of the toxic risks we face in our neighborhoods, it
is a good place to start to build a community toxic inventory. See below
for the other data that will soon be
added to the maps allowing you to build a more comprehensive community
toxic inventory.
Shapefile Downloads To enable you to create your own
community toxics inventory, we have prepared Toxic Release
Inventory GIS shapefiles for you to download. These come packaged
with base layers like state boundaries, waterways, roads, etc. You don't
have to be a GIS professional to use these. They also come packaged with
instructions for using these with our free Lear2Map GIS Tutorial and Atlas.
TRI with Google Earth We have also prepared Google Earth
maps based on the TRI data.
Click here to access those maps.
Missing Data Unfortunately, after all these years and with
the availability of GPS technology, there are still hundreds of
facilities that report no latitude or longitude. We have prepared Excel
spreadsheets for you to download so that you can see the facilities
that are not on the maps at present. If you have information about the
location of facilities that are missing or mis-located, please email
me. With your help, we'll make the data more accurate for
everyone.
Community Toxic Risk Maps Currently we have two projects at
ToxicRisk.com. The first is map-based using the latest Toxic Release
Inventory (TRI) data released March 19, 2009. The second is a searchable database of EPA Risk Management Plans
(RMP) submitted to EPA in 1999. In the near future we will be adding
this data to the maps as well as the more recent 2004 RMP submissions.
For more about the Risk Management Plan, visit EPA's Risk
Management Plan website.
Click here to begin your search of the
1999 RMP reports and come back soon for the most recent data and
maps.
More Coming in our Community Toxic Risk
Mapping Series In the near future we'll be adding the following
to our database and maps. Be sure to also check out our
Google Earth Maps of the recenlty released Toxic Release Inventory
data. Note that all of our data is obtained from publicly available
websites provided by RTK Net and the
U.S. EPA:
Risk Management Plans (RMP) The RMP includes an accident
history, chemicals stored on-site, emergency response plans and much
more. This data is much more useful but is not nearly as available to
the public as the TRI. In fact, the most important portion - the worst
case scenarios in case of an accidental release - were never distributed
widely. Check our resources for more about
this. We have provided a data search of the
RMP that is based on the 1999 submissions - the first round of
reports. In the near future we will be adding this data plus the latest
(2004) submission to the toxic risk maps.
Water Pollution (PCS) The EPA PCS is a national computerized
management information system that automates entry, updating, and
retrieval of National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES)
data and tracks permit issuance, permit limits and monitoring data, and
other data pertaining to facilities regulated under NPDES. The NPDES
permit program regulates direct discharges from municipal and industrial
wastewater treatment facilities that discharge into the navigable waters
of the United States. Wastewater treatment facilities (also called
"point sources") are issued NPDES permits regulating their discharge.
Reports for those facilities identified by EPA as "Major" include the
names and amounts of chemicals and other substances that are
discharged.
Superfund Sites NPL Information on Superfund sites was
obtained from the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and
Liability Information System (CERCLIS), which is the official repository
for site and non-site specific Superfund data in support of the
Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act
(CERCLA, or Superfund). Sites are placed on the National Priorities List
(NPL) by EPA if they have uncontrolled releases of hazardous substances
that are priorities for long-term remediation and response.
Superfund Sites "No Further Action" There are approximately
24,000 sites that have been included in CERCLIS in the past, but for
which EPA requires no further action under the Federal Superfund
program.
Superfund Sites NOT on NPL These are Superfund sites where
there is ongoing Federal interest or potential Federal activity, but
where the hazard posed is not sufficiently significant or time-critical
for the site to be placed on the NPL.
Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) The TRI System (TRIS) contains
data submitted to EPA by regulated facilities concerning chemicals and
chemical categories listed by the Agency under Section 313 of the
Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act. Data contained in
the system include chemicals present, amount of on-site use, releases
and off-site transfers (including Publicly-Owned Treatment Works,
POTWs), on-site treatment, and minimization/prevention actions. TRIS
contains information about releases and transfers of more than 600 toxic
chemicals and compounds to the environment. We have included data for
TRI facilities that reported their 1997 releases and transfers. Further
data and information about the facility and chemicals released and
transferred are provided through links to RTK Net.
Hazardous Waste Facilities Information contained in the
Hazardous Waste information is taken from the EPA Biennial Reporting
System (BRS). It contains information on facilities that treat, store,
or dispose (TSD) of RCRA hazardous wastes or are classified as Large
Quantity Generators (LQGs) under RCRA. A RCRA hazardous waste is a waste
that is both (a) described by one or more federal RCRA waste codes, and
(b) is not exempted from RCRA regulations. RCRA classifies as LQG a
facility that either (a) generated 1,000 kg or more of RCRA hazardous
waste in a single month; (b) generated in a single month or accumulated
at any time 1 kg of RCRA acute hazardous waste; or (c) generated or
accumulated at any time more than 100 kg of spill clean up material
contaminated with a RCRA acute hazardous waste. Reports for those
facilities identified by EPA as "Waste Managers" list amount and type of
disposal.
AIRS Facilities EPA's Office of Air and Radiation stores
information on air quality, point source emissions, and area/mobile
source data required by federal regulation from the 50 states in its
Aerometric Information Retrieval System (AIRS). States are required by
the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) to report to EPA annual emissions
estimates for point sources emitting greater than or equal to 100 tons
per year of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), nitrogen dioxide (NO2),
sulfur dioxide (SO2), particulate matter less than 10 microns in size
(PM-10); 1000 tons per year of carbon monoxide (CO); or 5 tons per year
of lead (Pb). The Clean Air Act Amendments also require states to report
emissions data for point sources in areas where air pollution exceeds
Federal standards (nonattainment areas). Please note that this
website does NOT provide the Offsite Consequence Analysis section of the
Risk Management Plans as provided by law. Please see our resources for more about this important
issue.
How We Did It With well over 100,000
data points, schools and toxic facilities included, we found that the Google Maps
became unbearably slow. We programmed in-house using Javascript, Perl and Ajax to
speed up the maps as much as possible. We will soon be adding many more thousands
of points of data. Our programming will be up to the task.
Update: September 16, 2009 A.M. - Zeros Count Using the raw EPA data, many facility
reports show zero releases. RTK Net has a different (and we think, better) approach to this. We
will be switching to the RTK Net TRI data over the next few days. Click here
for more about this.
Update: April 28, 2009 P.M. - Chemicals linked to Scorecard.org
Each chemical a facility released is now linked to the Scorecard.org
website. At Scorecard.org you will be able to find out much more about
the chemical released near your schools and in your neighborhoods.
Details include such things as: human health hazards, hazard rankings,
chemical use profile, ranking of chemicals by reported environmental
releases in the United States, regulatory coverage, basic testing to
identify chemical hazards, and information still needed for safety
assessment.
Update: April 20, 2009 P.M. - Schools Added to Maps We have
added schools to the maps. The maps are now a bit faster and easier to
navigate. As you zoom in you will see a change in the icons of the
facilities near the center of the map - these are the ones that you can
click on and find the facility name, number of schools within 1
mile and number of schools within 5 miles of the facility
plus a link to a database about the toxic history of the facility. The
schools will appear as you zoom in. As you zoom in further, you will see
the school icon change - at that point you can click on the school to
view its name. Click
here for a graphical mini-tutorial.
Mike Meuser
Right-To-Know-More
Mapcruzin.com
mike@mapcruzin.
com
Didn't find what you are looking for? We've been online since 1996 and have created 1000's of pages. Search below and you may find just what you are looking for.
Michael R. Meuser
Data Research & GIS Specialist
MapCruzin.com is an independent firm
specializing in GIS project development and data research.
We created the first U.S. based
interactive toxic chemical facility
maps on the internet in 1996 and we
have been online ever since. Learn more about us and our services.
Have a project in mind? If you have data, GIS project or custom shapefile needs contact Mike.
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