The Environmental Protection Agency recently announced plans to gut its premier program for informing the public about toxic pollution. The Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) provides detailed information annually about toxic chemicals released by U.S. facilities into the surrounding. The program empowers concerned citizens to call for improvements and enables local and state governments to identify and address environmental and chemical security risks.

Despite the program's widely hailed successes, in order to reduce the "burden" on industry, the EPA has proposed:

• Moving from annual reporting to every other year reporting for all facilities;
• Allowing companies to release ten times more pollution before requiring detailed reporting;
• Creating an unprecedented exemption on full reporting of low-level disposals of persistent bioacculuative toxins (PBTs), including lead and mercury, which have been proven to be dangerous even in the smallest quantities.

Environmental groups, first responders, workers and public officials will call upon the EPA to abandon the plan, and will release a state-by-state analysis detailing the risk the plan poses to emergency preparedness.

WHAT: Media teleconference of pollution reporting cutbacks. State and local rankings of effects.

WHERE: Via telephone. Call 800-853-3895, code “EPA.TRI.” Credentialed media MUST REGISTER BEFORE 10AM ON DEC. 1.

WHEN: 12:30 to 1:30 PM EST, Thursday, December 1, 2005.

WHO:

• Tom Natan, Ph.D., chemical engineer and NET Research Director (moderator).
• Alan Finkelstein, Assistant Fire Marshall, Strongsville, Ohio, and Chair, Emergency Response, Cuyahoga County Emergency Planning Committee.
• Idell Hansen, Director, Hazardous Waste and Toxics Reduction, Washington State Department of Ecology.
• Michael R. Harbut, M.D., M.P.H., Chief, Center for Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute, Royal Oak, MI.
• Richard Prete, Maintenance Mechanic and Health and Safety Advisor, United Steel Workers (11th District).
• Reverend Fred Withers, Rubbertown Emergency Action (REACT), Louisville, KY.

ANALYSIS: The data and map will be available on the web at www.net.org on Dec. 1 at Noon. Embargoed copies are available to media in advance by calling Tony Iallonardo at NET at 202-887-8855.