THE
1990 EMISSION INVENTORY
As
part of the Cumulative Exposure Project (CEP), USEPA prepared
a comprehensive list of air toxics emissions for the entire
country in 1990. This is the first time that such a list
(known as an emissions inventory) had ever been prepared
on a national scale. Although there are bound to be some
errors in the details of a massive undertaking such as
this, a summary of the emissions inventory can give us
some indication of what may be the most important sources
of air toxic emissions in our state. As can be seen from
the pie chart below, the group known as Area
Sources accounts for more than half (52%) of the air
toxics inventory with solvent use representing the biggest
portion (34% of the whole inventory). Mobile
Sources as a group are the second largest contributor
to air toxics (38%), with On-road Vehicles representing
29% of the whole state inventory. The Point
Source group accounts for the remaining 10% of the
inventory.
USEPA's
1990 Air Toxics Inventory for New Jersey
When
the emissions estimates are broken down by county, it
is clear that the areas with the largest air toxic emissions
are generally those with the largest population in the
smallest space. This is directly related to high concentration
of vehicle use, solvent use and other types of activities
in those counties.
USEAP
Estimated Air Toxics Emissions for New Jersey, by County
Note: The high emissions shown for Salem County in this chart
are skewed by an error in the Industrial Processes source
category. US EPA has confirmed that this could lead to
overprediction of some toxic exposures in Salem County
(by as much as 80 percent).
In
the 1990 CEP, the Point, Area and Mobile Sources are grouped
in the following way:
- Area
Sources: this list includes many types of sources
that are commonly referred to as Point Sources in New
Jersey, such as power plants:
- Solvent
Use (such as coating cans, cleaning metal parts,
and dry cleaning)
- Industrial
Processes (such as small chemical manufacturing
plants, bakeries, and making scrap metal into new
product)
- Waste
Disposal, Treatment and Recovery (including wastewater
treatment and various types of waste incineration)
- Stationary
Source Fuel Combustion (including power plants,
industrial and commercial boilers, and home heating)
- Storage
and Transport (including gas stations and large
gasoline terminals)
- Miscellaneous
Sources (such as wildfires, structure fires, and
crop orchard heaters)
- Mobile
Sources
- On-road
vehicles (cars and trucks)
- Non-road
vehicles (lawnmowers, boats, dirt bikes, etc.)
- Point
Sources: this list does not include many types of
sources that are commonly referred to as Point Sources
in New Jersey, such as power plants:
- Refineries
- Municipal
Waste Incinerators
- Toxic
Waste Transfer, Storage & Disposal Facilities
(known as TSDFs)
- TRI
Sources (those facilities that are required to report
their emissions under the Right-to-Know program)
- Other
Point Sources (that have reported emissions under
other state and federal programs)
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