Pollutant Release and Transfer Register
Encyclopedia
Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers (PRTRs) are systems to collect and disseminate information on environmental releases and transfers of toxic chemicals from industrial and other facilities.

They were established in several countries after the 1984 Bhopal Disaster
Bhopal disaster
The Bhopal disaster also known as Bhopal Gas Tragedy was a gas leak incident in India, considered one of the world's worst industrial catastrophes. It occurred on the night of December 2–3, 1984 at the Union Carbide India Limited pesticide plant in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, India...

, and the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro, which affirmed the "right-to-know" of communities and workers about toxics chemicals and other substances of concern.

PRTRs and Community Right to Know

In many countries industrial facilities need a permit to operate processes that are causing environmental pressures. Authorities have to balance the interests of different actors when issuing such permits and will reflect this balance in the conditions and requirements put down in the permit. Companies and civilians living near to the facilities generally have quite different levels of understanding and information on the processes and the environmental impact. In a democratic context however a level playing field for all actors involved in permitting decisions is paramount to acceptance of the decisions. Against this background, the Aarhus Convention
Aarhus Convention
The UNECE Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters, usually known as the Aarhus Convention, was signed on June 25, 1998 in the Danish city of Aarhus. It entered into force on 30 October 2001...

 requires the parties to this convention to set up PRTRs as a tool to provide the general public this type of information UNECE (2003) Protocol on Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers.

PRTR data quality

PRTRs are a type of emission inventories
Emission inventory
An emission inventory is an accounting of the amount of pollutants discharged into the atmosphere. An emission inventory usually contains the total emissions for one or more specific greenhouse gases or air pollutants, originating from all source categories in a certain geographical area and within...

, typically containing data on emissions to the environment from individual industrial facilities. Data collection methods for individual facility emission data in PRTRs typically consist of questionnaires, sent to individual facilities or industries. The answers are validated upon receipt by the competent authorities and published on a public web site. This procedure for the case of EPER
European Pollutant Emission Register
The European Pollutant Emission Register is a Pollutant Release and Transfer Register providing access to information on the annual emissions of industrial facilities in the Member States of the European Union , as well as Norway...

 includes the following steps
  • The competent authorities in each European Union Member State select all facilities that operate at least one of the activities listed in the European Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control
    Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control
    Directive 2008/1/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 January 2008 concerning integrated pollution prevention and control is a directive of the European Union. It replaces the Council Directive 96/61/EC of 24 September 1996 on the same subject matter; both are commonly...

     (IPPC) directive with a capacity above a threshold as defined in the EPER decision and notifies these facilities;
  • The facilities determine emissions following the provisions of the EPER Guidance document and report these to the competent authorities using a prescribed format.
  • The authorities validate individual facility reports and combine the information from all facilities within the country into an electronic report to the European Commission.
  • The Commission publishes the data on the EPER website and initiates an evaluation of the reporting process that results in a review report (the latest of these is the.

In accordance with the ideas of Community right to Know, this procedure ensures that data are published as soon as they are available. Despite the validation by competent authorities, the data remain essentially the facilities' estimates and data quality control essentially depends on data users asking questions.
Since facilities are by definitions only a part of all activities in a country, the sum of the emissions reported in a PRTR should for each pollutant be less or equal to the total emissions reported in national inventories. This nis not always the case (see the EPER Review Report).

Examples

PRTRs include those of
  • Australia National pollutant inventory
    National pollutant inventory
    National Pollutant Inventory or NPI is an Australian pollution database of emissions managed by the Australian Government on behalf of the Australian States and Territories...

     (NPI),
  • Canada National Pollutant Release Inventory
    National Pollutant Release Inventory
    The National Pollutant Release Inventory , established in 1992, is the national Pollutant Release and Transfer Register of Canada. The publicly-accessible inventory is used to track and catalogue the release of pollutants, their disposal, or their transfer to recycling and other facilities across...

     (NPRI),
  • EU European Pollutant Emissions Register (EPER).
  • Mexico Registro de Emisiones y Transferencia de Contaminantes
    Registro de Emisiones y Transferencia de Contaminantes
    The Registro de Emisiones y Transferencia de Contaminantes is Mexico's Pollutant Release and Transfer Register , similar to Canada's National Pollutant Release Inventory and the US Toxics Release Inventory.-External links:*...

     (RETC),
  • US Toxics Release Inventory
    Toxics Release Inventory
    The Toxics Release Inventory is a publicly available database containing information on toxic chemical releases and other waste management activities in the United States.-Summary of requirements:...

    (TRI),

External links

Further reading
National PRTR websites:

Regional PRTR websites

PRTR Resources

Non-Governmental Organizations
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