The Toxic 100 is a list of one hundred companies in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, ranked by the amount of air pollution

Air pollution

Air pollution is the introduction of chemicals, particulate matter, or biological materials that cause harm or discomfort to humans or other living organisms, or cause damage to the natural environment or built environment, into the atmosphere....

 produced and the relative toxicity of the pollutants, as determined by the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst

University of Massachusetts Amherst

The University of Massachusetts Amherst is a public research and land-grant university in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States and the flagship of the University of Massachusetts system...

. The March 2010 list was based on 2006 data.

The top 10 members of this list, as of March 2010, were Bayer Group

Bayer USA

Bayer Corporation is the Pittsburgh-based American arm of Bayer. Its headquarters are located in Robinson, a western suburb of the city...

, ExxonMobil

ExxonMobil

Exxon Mobil Corporation or ExxonMobil, is an American multinational oil and gas corporation. It is a direct descendant of John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil company, and was formed on November 30, 1999, by the merger of Exxon and Mobil. Its headquarters are in Irving, Texas...

, Sunoco

Sunoco

Sunoco Inc. is an American petroleum and petrochemical manufacturer headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, formerly known as Sun Company Inc. and Sun Oil Co. ....

, E.I. du Pont de Nemours

DuPont

E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company , commonly referred to as DuPont, is an American chemical company that was founded in July 1802 as a gunpowder mill by Eleuthère Irénée du Pont. DuPont was the world's third largest chemical company based on market capitalization and ninth based on revenue in 2009...

, ArcelorMittal, Steel Dynamics Inc.

Steel Dynamics

Steel Dynamics is the fifth largest producer of carbon steel products in United States.Steel Dynamics, Inc. is the USA’s fifth largest producer of carbon steel products with 2010 revenues of $6.3 billion on steel shipments of 5.3 million tons. Based in Fort Wayne, Indiana, SDI employs about 6,100...

, Archer Daniels Midland Co. (ADM)

Archer Daniels Midland

The Archer Daniels Midland Company is a conglomerate headquartered in Decatur, Illinois. ADM operates more than 270 plants worldwide, where cereal grains and oilseeds are processed into products used in food, beverage, nutraceutical, industrial and animal feed markets worldwide.ADM was named the...

, Ford Motor Company

Ford Motor Company

Ford Motor Company is an American multinational automaker based in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. The automaker was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. In addition to the Ford and Lincoln brands, Ford also owns a small stake in Mazda in Japan and Aston Martin in the UK...

, Eastman Kodak Co.

Eastman Kodak

Eastman Kodak Company is a multinational imaging and photographic equipment, materials and services company headquarted in Rochester, New York, United States. It was founded by George Eastman in 1892....

, and Koch Industries

Koch Industries

Koch Industries, Inc. , is an American private energy conglomerate based in Wichita, Kansas, with subsidiaries involved in manufacturing, trading and investments. Koch also owns Invista, Georgia-Pacific, Flint Hills Resources, Koch Pipeline, Koch Fertilizer, Koch Minerals and Matador Cattle Company...

. This presented the highest toxic-score companies that appeared on recent Forbes, Fortune, and Standard & Poor's large company lists. Individual facilities were assigned to corporate parents on the basis of current information on the ownership structure.

The toxic score levels were calculated by number of pounds released X toxicity X population exposure. The population exposure component was calculated by nearby residents, and factors such as prevailing winds and height of smokestacks. The pounds released portion were calculated by the number of millions of pounds of toxic chemicals released. The toxicity of the chemicals were as computed by the US EPA's Risk-Screening Environmental Indicators.

According to a 3 April 2010 article published by "Truthout.org", the 2010 publication has the following additional information:

"For the first time, the Toxic 100 Air Polluters includes information on the disproportionate risk burden from industrial air toxics for minorities and low-income communities. This makes it possible to compare corporations and facilities in terms of their environmental justice performance as well as overall pollution. For example, the data reveal that minorities bear 65% of the air toxics risk from facilities owned by ExxonMobil, while minorities make up 38% of the U.S. population."