Making manufacturers come clean.

Making manufacturers come clean

The Environmental Protection Agency plans to require manufacturers to air more of their dirty laundry,

Industries have had to tell EPA how much of 330 toxic chemicals they dispose of, recycle, or discharge into the environment. The agency lists this information in its Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) database, which the public may review. At a Jan. 6 press conference, EPA Administrator Carol M. Brownet proposed making manufacturers report 313 additional chemicals. The public has 90 days to comment on the proposed rule, which EPA intends to make final on Nov. 30.

In a separate action, the agency also plans this year to expand the types of industries that must report TRI chemicals, Browner said. Currently, only manufacturers must do so.

The most commonly discharged chemicals that EPA would add to the TRI are carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen dioxide. The list also includes common drugs such as tetracycline hydrochloride, an antibiotic believed to harm fetuses, and phenytoin, an anticonvulsive that may have carcinogenic effects. EPA anticipates receiving about 26,000 more reports and hearing from 2,400 more facilities after the rule change.

Environmentalists at the press briefing said that to avoid bad publicity, industries try to reduce their discharges of the chemicals they must report. The TRI, begun in 1989, has provided community activists access to previously unavailable information about local industries.

Expanding the list would "discourage companies from substituting one chemical for another that doesn't happen to appear on the list," said Deborah A. Sheiman of the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The pesticide industry has complained to EPA about the proposal, saying that the active ingredients in pesticides would make up more than half the additions. The amount of pesticide manufacturers discharge "is too small to be of interest to anybody," Kevin Bromberg, a lawyer for two associations representing pesticicle companies, told SCIENCE NEWS. EPA only needs to include about 10 of the 170 pesticide ingredients it proposes adding to TRI, he says.

Under the proposed new rule, EPA may excuse from the reporting requirement those companies that have very small or no releases of TRI chemicals, Browner said.

Manufacturers don't have to make public tiny discharges of certain chemicals, but this may change, Browner added. Substances such as dioxins and radionuclides are very toxic even at levels that companies need not report, Sheiman contends.