Early Findings of the Pollution Prevention Program - June 1995

Part II: Preliminary Results of Industrial Reporting

Background
The Department of Environmental Protection estimates that 486 facilities were required by the Pollution Prevention Act to prepare Pollution Prevention Plans and Plan Summaries by July 1, 1994. Of these facilities, 408 facilities had submitted Plan Summaries; and were entered into the Department's pollution prevention database as of April, 1995. Of the 78 facilities that had not submitted Plan Summaries, 36 had stated in writing their intent to submit a Plan Summary in the near future. The remaining 42 facilities were unresponsive. Counting those who have submitted Plan Summaries or who have stated in writing that they will do so in the future, the compliance rate for submittal of Plan Summaries is approximately 90%.

The Department is currently undertaking a detailed analysis of the data submitted on the Pollution Prevention Plan Summaries and will issue a report in fall 1995 that will outline pollution prevention trends. These preliminary data are intended to give a brief overview of some of the general findings, to date, from a cursory review of the Plan Summaries. The Department's fall 1995 report will combine its analysis of Plan Summaries with analysis of relevant data reported under the federal Toxics Release Inventory and the Environmental Release and Pollution Prevention Report of the Department's community Right-to-Know Program (also known as the DEQ-114).

Preliminary Results
Outlined below are some basic findings from the Plan Summaries:

• Ten of the 408 facilities that submitted Plan Summaries made a confidential information claim. Pursuant to the Department's Pollution Prevention Rules, the confidential version of the Summary is automatically treated as confidential and a company-sanitized version of the form is entered into the database.
  
  
• Approximately 75% of the facilities that submitted Plan Summaries had reduction goals greater than zero for at least one chemical. Approximately 48% of the facility-wide chemical-specific reports, however, showed reduction goals of zero. Of the 408 facilities which reported, 111 had reduction goals of zero for all chemicals. The charts below show distributions of facility-wide use and nonproduct output (npo) goals for individual chemicals and for all chemicals reported
  by each facility.

• The mean number of covered chemicals per reporting facility is 4. Of the 405 facilities in the database, 29 reported more than 10 chemicals, and 114 reported only one chemical.
  
  
• The total goal for the reporting facilities for reducing the use of hazardous substances over five years is approximately 120 million pounds. However, in its review of Summaries of those facilities contributing the largest quantities to this total, the Department determined that some facilities erroneously included reduction quantities in their goals which represent processes which have been, or are planned to be, shut down. These quantities have been removed from the totals outlined in this report. The Department intends to conduct additional quality checks to determine any other facilities which may have made the same reporting error. The 5-year 120 million pound use reduction goal translates to reductions of approximately 24 million pounds per year (assuming uniform progress). Total statewide use of hazardous substances by covered facilities is approximately 4 to 5 billion pounds per year.
  
  
• The projected 5-year NPO reduction goal is approximately 66 million pounds. This number also may be inflated by inclusion of quantities from processes which have been, or will be, shut down. The 5-year 66 million pound NPO reduction goal translates to reductions of approximately 13 million pounds per year. (assuming uniform progress). Total statewide generation of hazardous substance NPO by covered facilities was 320 million pounds in 1993.
  
  
• Approximately 13.4 percent of the facilities took advantage of the opportunity to fill in the optional section indicating reductions between 1987 and the base year. The total use reductions in the optional section were 32.2 million pounds. The total NPO reductions were 30.0 million pounds, and the total release reductions were 9.3 million pounds. Most facilities calculated their reductions in this optional section from 1987; a few started with a later year.
  
  
• Nearly half of the total use goal is accounted for by one facility, the DuPont Chambers Works, in Deepwater. Over half of the NPO total is also accounted for by the same DuPont facility. In the case of both use and NPO totals, several other very large firms contribute most of the remaining total; small contributions from many smaller facilities make up the balance.
  
  
• The mean number of production processes at facilities was 4.3.
  
  
• According to the data reported on the Summaries, most production processes in New Jersey are batch processes. Of 1874 manufacturing processes, only 209 (11%) are continuous. Of all manufacturing processes reported, approximately 60% produce chemicals and approximately 30% produce articles. Of the 60% that produce chemicals, almost all (93%) are batch processes. Of the 30% that produce articles, 83% operate in the batch mode.
  
  
• Overall, about 50% of the processes use more than one chemical. The average goals per unit of product for all chemicals for each type of process do not differ significantly except for one type of fairly uncommon process. This type is "separate storage and handling". In the database, there are 62 processes described in this way. For these processes, the average per unit of product npo reduction goal is 44%, which is significantly higher than the use and npo reduction goals for all other types of processes.
  
  
• The 6 chemicals with the largest total USE reduction goals are:

  Chemical 5-year USE Reduction Goal (millions lbs)
  Sulfuric acid 29.1
  Benzene 13.3
  Nitric acid 12.2
  Benzyl chloride 6.6
  Copper compounds 5.2
  Toluene 4.9

• The 6 chemicals with the largest total NPO reduction goals are:

  Chemical 5-year NPO Reduction Goal (millions lbs)
  Sulfuric acid 22.9
  Hydrochloric acid 14.6
  Methanol 5.8
  Toluene . 4.1
  Methyl Ethyl Ketone 2.3
  Dichloromethane 2.2

• Process-specific data differs from facility-wide totals, in that it does not aggregate across all processes at a facility. Facilities reported that some production processes had greater opportunities for pollution prevention. The types of processes for which NPO reduction goals per unit of product averaged more than 35% include:

  C11 (neutralization)
  CP1 (purification)
  AA6 (coating, adhesive application)
  AB4 (etching)
  CP2 (separation)
  AA9 (degreasing)

• Certain combinations of specific chemicals and production processes are associated with large use reduction goals per unit of product. The three combinations associated with the largest average use reductions are:

  1,1,1-trichloroethane/AA9(degreasing)
  acetone/UA8(distillation)
  toluene/CP4(chemical synthesis)

• The three combinations associated with the largest average NPO reductions are:

  1,1,1-trichloroethane/AA9 (degreasing)
  acetone/UA8 (distillation)
  ethylbenzene/CP3 (formulation blending)

• In their Summaries, facilities report the pollution prevention methods that they intend to apply to achieve their goals. Facilities report some pollution prevention methods are associated with higher average reduction goals. The pollution prevention methods associated with the highest use reduction goals are:

  * raw material substitution
  * substituting different coating materials
  * changing to aqueous cleaners.

• Pollution prevention methods associated with the highest NPO reduction goals per unit of product are:

  * modification of stripping and cleaning equipment
  * reuse and recovery procedures
  * substitution of different coating materials.

• The average use and NPO goals per unit of product for each chemical among all targeted processes was calculated. One chemical has much higher reduction goals than all the others; 1,1,1-trichloroethane (methyl chlorofo).rm This chemical is among those whose production will be phased out by the end of 1995 pursuant to international agreement. For chemicals reported by 25 or more facilities, those with the 10 highest percentage reduction goals for both use and npo per unit of product are shown in the graphs below.