Mapping environmental pollution, contamination, and waste in the United States

Abstract

Businesses operating facilities with environmental focus dealing with waste, contamination, or pollution are legally required to detail their degree of compliance with environmental rules and regulations, and to report on their activities to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Such activities include substances related to air pollution, land or water contamination, waste disposal, and toxic or radioactive materials. Due to the ongoing nature of reporting, the EPA established a repository where all reported data related to business activities can be found. EPA developed EnviroMapper, a search engine that can be used to map, for any given area, the facilities dealing with issues related to air, water, waste, land, toxics, and radiation. The interactive nature of the search is very convenient and makes it easy for the user to learn about business activities and get more information from filed reports. Furthermore, the system has several features including information on air emission, superfund sites, toxic release, hazardous waste, water dischargers, brownfields, and toxic substances. This is supplemented with an extensive searchable list of chemicals used in the activities of various industries such as agriculture, forestry, manufacturing, mining, transportation, communications, and electric, gas, and sanitary services. This elaborate system is designed to help researchers, planners, developers, and the public in general learn about environmentally-related activities in a given location. In addition, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) data can be downloaded and used to plot maps necessary for variety of purposes such as research studies, environmental impact assessment, public health, planning, and development. This presentation intends to use GIS data downloaded from the system for the city of Albany, the Capital of New York State, to illustrate how this data can be used as a research tool to study the factors that lead to the concentration of environmentally-related businesses in a specific area and their effect on the standard of living and quality of life in that area.