About the Data

Area Search

Facility Search

Industry Search

Parent Search

Offsite Search

Field Information

Help is available for the following fields:

CAS Number Field

Fill in the CAS number of a TRI covered chemical here. Do not use blanks or dashes in your CAS number. The class of "compounds" in TRI do not have CAS numbers, but instead have CAS number equivalents that begin with N.

Chemical Name Field

City and County Fields

Fill in the name of the county or city that you want - do not fill in the word "county" after counties. Some Form R submissions have their county or city misspelled; others have two varient spellings for the same city or county. For instance, there are Form R's that spell their city name either ST. LOUIS or SAINT LOUIS. If you think this may be a factor, you can either run your search twice or use "*" to represent any characters. In the case above you could enter "S*LOUIS" and find both spellings. Watch out for FORT/FT., SAINT/ST., and MOUNT/MT.

Level of Detail Field

This field selects the level of detail you want in your report:

Summary

The report will produce totals only. For facility reports, only the facility name and total pounds released/transferred will be given, for area reports, only the total pounds and name of each facility in the area, etc. This gives very little information but makes a fast, short report that is easy to read.

Low

The report will produce a header of basic facility information for each facility. This information includes name, address, parent, public contact, release total, and various ID numbers. Total releases and transfers for the facility are broken down by environmental medium (air, land, water, etc.) but not by chemical.

Medium

The report gives all the data that Low would plus a breakdown of releases by chemical for each facility found. If you need to know what chemicals the facilities in your search are releasing you should select either this option or HIGH.

High

The report gives all the data that Medium would plus additional data on the Pollution Prevention Act waste generated quantities. In addition, most explanatory TRI codes are shown and translated. This option gives most details that anyone has requested from TRI to date EXCEPT methods used for on-site treatment. Use this option if you want the maximum detail available through this program -- but be warned that this option often takes a lot of time and produces a large amount of output. It is best used only for a search that you expect to find only a few facilities, if possible.

Output Type Field

Text

The report will produce human-readable ASCII text.

Comma-delimited ASCII

The report will produce a table of data with the columns separated by commas. Character fields will by surrounded by double quotes so that any commas in them won't be read as column delimiters. This style of output is suitable for loading into a database such as Dbase.

Tab-delimited ASCII

The report will produce a table of data with the columns separated by tabs. This style of output is suitable for loading into databases such as Excel.

Database Type Field

In previous years, EPA would "freeze" the database at a particular date – in other words, they would not enter revisions into the database for a short period, during which the data would not change. EPA used to use this "frozen" database to make the tables used in the Public Data Release documents; they would also send the frozen database out to RTK NET, NLM, and other TRI data providers. In this way, all of the different providers of TRI data would produce numbers that matched each other.

For its Envirofacts project, EPA started to no longer use a frozen database, and to update the TRI data available through Envirofacts with revisions. This was good for data reporters, because it meant that corrections of their previous errors would be available before the release of next year’s frozen database. It could be considered to be good for data users for this same reason. However, it meant that TRI numbers from Envirofacts would no longer match numbers obtained from other sources.

This year, the situation is somewhat more complicated. EPA has effectively released three different versions of the data:

1. The set that it used to make the Press Release documents. This is the same set that is provided through EPA’s new TRI Explorer Web access program. It includes revisions made through March 31, 2000.

2. The set used to make the upcoming Public Data Release documents. This is almost exactly the same as the first set, except that one record has been deleted. This set is the "frozen" set. The single record that was deleted was document control number 1398125285890, TRI Facility Id 91752MTLCN10980, and reported 1633 lbs of air releases, 1 lb of water releases, 1,187,989 lbs of transfers, and 1,162,692 lbs of waste Lead in California.

3. The "current" database with the latest revisions, as represented by EPA’s version of the TRI data on Envirofacts.

In order to provide maximum flexibility for data users, RTK NET will now permit users to search either the Frozen or Current version of the database. You should use the Frozen version if you wish your results to match the Public Data Release and other EPA documents, or if you wish to ensure that you will get the same results if you do a search as you got from the same search done a month ago. You should use the Current version if you wish your results to include revisions made since March 31, 2000.

In order to match the Public Data Release, the Frozen version of the database does not include records for chemicals that have been deleted from the TRI list. The Current version of the database does include such records. So if you wish your search to include chemicals, reported in previous years, that were later deleted from TRI, you should use the Current version of the database.

Type of Offsite Transfer

TRI classifies shipments of waste off-site into two broad categories. First are shipments of water-based waste to POTWs (publically owned treatment works, or sewerage plants). All other transfers offsite -- to recyclers, storage, incinerators, landfills, etc. -- are in a second category. This field lets you choose whether you want transfers to POTWs or all other off-site transfers.

Treatment Type

Off-site shipments of waste are coded by the shipper to indicate what kind of recycling, treatment, or disposal is going on at the destination. You can limit your search by one of these codes in order to, for instance, find only shipments of waste to incinerators.

These codes are unreliable, however. Many of the shippers of the waste appear to have a poor idea of what is going on at the destination; in addition, some of the codes are vague. Use this feature with caution.

Destination Country

Off-site shipments of waste can be sent to countries outside the U.S. If you wish to find shipments going to one of these countries, fill in this field. Be carefull about filling in the Zip code, city, county, or state fields; these are U.S. geographic descriptions that may or may not have a clear meaning outside the U.S.

Dun & Bradstreet Number Field

The Parent company Dun & Bradstreet number is a 9-digit number that is supposed to uniquely identify the company. You may be able to find the D&B number for the company you are interested in by doing a search on one of the company's facilities that you know about or by outside research. Specifying the D&B number of a company will usually produce a more accurate search than searching by compnay name, although some D&B numbers in the database are misspelled or blank. You will usually want to leave the name field blank if you are searching by D&B, although you can search on both for greater assurance that the facilities you are finding really do belong to the company that you are interested in.

TRI Facility ID Field

TRI facilities are assigned facility ID codes by EPA. These IDs are supposed to remain constant for a facility from year to year, even if the facility is sold or changes its name. The TRI IDs are 15 character codes that combine both letters and numbers. If you suspect that you can't find info on a facility because its name has changed, you can try searching by TRI ID. To get its ID in the first place, you will have to run a Standard Report which finds it either in one of the TRI years or in the Master report. Then, you can copy down the TRI ID and fill it in on this screen. If you do search by TRI ID, you shouldn't fill in anything for the facility name or city.

Facility Name Field

Fill in the facility name in this field if you know it.

Warning! Facility names are often misspelled when submitted to EPA. In addition, many facilities change their names from year to year. For these reasons, enter as few letters as are necessary to specify the facility, followed by a "*" to represent any number of letters. This will help you find the facility even if its name changes or is misspelled. Example: You want to find a Du Pont facility. Possible spellings of facility name:

1. DU PONT CO.
2. E. I. DU PONT DE NEMEURS
3. DUPONT
4. DU PONT MICHIGAN PLANT

Parent Company Field

Fill in the parent company name here if you know it. Warning! Parent compnay names are often misspelled when subm itted to EPA. In addition, some companies change their names from year to year. For these reasons, enter as few letters as are necessary to specify the company, followed by a "*" to represent any number of letters. This will help you find the company even if its name changes or is misspelled. Example: You want to find facilities owned by Du Pont. Possible spellings of company name:

1. DU PONT CO.
2. E. I. DU PONT DE NEMEURS
3. DUPONT
4. DU PONT MICHIGAN PLANT

State Field

If you wish to search on the entire US, select the "ALL" value for this field.

Year Field

The TRI database currently has information for the reporting years 1987 through 1996. To search through all years, select the ALL value from the selection list. There is currently no way to select only two or three years, although this can be implemented if many users want it.

SIC Field

SIC codes are 4-digit numbers that represent specific industries. More general industrial categories are represented by the first 2 digits of the SIC codes. For instance, "Primary production of aluminum" is SIC code 3334, in the category 33, "Primary Metal Industries". You can fill in either a 4-digit or 2-digit code in this field; if you fill in a 2-digit code the program will automatically add a "*" to the end of it to find all 4-digit codes that start with those digits.

Sorting Order Field

You can now choose how you want your output to be sorted. For all reports except the Offsite report, the choices are:

D - Default Order

This choice gives you an alphabetic sort by facility name if you choose a text report, or no sort if you choose delimited report output. This was the default behavior before users were allowed to choose sort order.

F - By facility name

An alphabetic sort by facility name

R - By total facility releases

This puts the facility with the most total releases at the top of the search (within each year), then the facility with the second most releases, and so on. You can use this report to make a Top Ten list of facilities (ranked by total release) within the area of your search.

T - By total facility releases and transfers

This puts the facility with the most total releases and transfers at the top of the search (within each year), then the facility with the second most releases and transfers, and so on. You can use this report to make a Top Ten list of facilities (ranked by total releases and transfers) within the area of your search.

W - By total facility production-related waste

This puts the facility with the most total production-related waste at the top of the search (within each year), then the facility with the second most production-related waste, and so on. You can use this report to make a Top Ten list of facilities (ranked by total production-related waste) within the area of your search. Production-related waste is waste that the facility generates or brings on-site as part of its production processes -- it includes amounts that are managed by recycling, treatment, disposal, and release. Warning: production-related waste was not reported until the 1991 TRI reporting year, so if you select 1990 or earlier with this sorting method, the data will effectively not be sorted at all.

S - By state, then by facility name within each state

This method sorts the facilities first alphabetically by postal state abbreviation, then alphabetically by facility name within each state.

N - No sort

Choosing no sort makes your search slightly faster.

Sorting Order Field

You can now choose how you want your output to be sorted. For the Offsite report, the choices are:

D - Default order

This choice gives you an alphabetic sort by receiving facility name if you choose a text report, or no sort if you choose delimited report output. This was the default behavior before users were allowed to choose sort order.

F - By shipping facility name

This gives an alphabetic sort by the names of the facilities that sent the waste.

R - By receiving facility name

This gives an alphabetic sort by the names of the facilities that received the waste.

T - By transfer amount

This sorts the transfers in descending order of transfer amount, so that the largest transfer is first.

C By chemical name

This sorts the trnasfers by chemical. Within each chemical, the transfers are sorted by descending transfer amount.

N No sort

Choosing no sort gives you a slightly faster search.

Zip Code Field

Fill in the zip code for the area that you want. If you fill in a 5-digit zip code, the program will automatically put a "*" after it. The "*" represents any number of characters and will let your search find 9-digit zip codes that start with the 5 digits you entered. Don't fill in dashes.
Example:
If you enter 20740*
this will find

• 20740
• 207401122
• 207403465
• etc.