The Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA)
The Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA), also known as SARA Title III, was enacted in November 1986. This law provided an infrastructure at the state and local levels to plan for chemical emergencies. Facilities that have spilled hazardous substances, or that store, use, or release certain chemicals are subject to various reporting requirements. All of this information is made publicly available so that interested parties may become informed about potentially dangerous chemicals in their community. Common EPCRA topics include: emergency planning; hazardous chemical inventory reporting; public access to chemical information; toxic chemical release reporting and the Form R; and the toxics release inventory (TRI) database.
The Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act (EPCRA, or SARA Title III) is one of the most far reaching in a series of laws passed in the 1980s to provide citizens with substantial new information on chemical hazards. The law represents a rare victory for citizens and the environment. A key provision, the Toxics Release Inventory, passed the House of Representatives by a one vote margin on December 10, 1985. Three basic factors helped pass EPCRA:
- The grassroots movement for local workplace and community right-to-know laws;
- The lack of useful information on facilities' toxic waste generation;
- The December 1984 Bhopal tragedy, in which thousands of people were poisoned, many fatally, by the sudden release of toxic gas from an Indian pesticide factory.
EPCRA has three major functions:
- Emergency Notification and Planning provisions require companies to disclose potential toxic hazards and ensure that local communities to plan for chemical emergencies;
- Community Right-To-Know provides the public with access to critical information about toxic chemical inventories held by businesses in the community;
- The Toxics Release Inventory requires certain large manufacturing facilities to report routine releases of some 320 listed toxic chemicals to the public and EPA.
The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) establishes the first on-line, publicly accessible computer database ever mandated by federal law for dissemination of government information. The TRI data must be augmented by currently undisclosed information on chemical use and production to track pollution prevention.
The TRI data are:
- multi-media;
- publicly accessible;
- chemical specific;
- designed for data management.
Citizens are beginning to seek equivalent data worldwide to address the international aspects of chemical contamination.
Citizens:
Community right-to-know brings needed attention to critical toxic pollution problems and increases citizens' voice in environmental policy. The law provides the public with specific chemical emissions data from industrial neighbors and can be used to obtain information on the risk of sudden chemical releases.
Right-to-know broadens public participation in environmental decision making by transferring information from previously inaccessible corporate files to ordinary citizens. The information helps community groups voice their concerns and expectations of U.S. companies and to link local industrial activities to global environmental issues.
