The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) has created a series of “sector notebooks” that profile the primary pollution-control challenges facing many industry sectors. In clear and easy-to-read language, each notebook explains the issues related to a sector. Chapters include a description of the industry and its process, pollutants released, applicable legal requirements, pollution-control and compliance challenges, pollution-prevention opportunities, and bibliographic resources for further research.
These profiles are widely popular to audiences including community and environmental advocates, assistance providers, inspectors and auditors, educators, engineers, public health professionals, government agencies, lawyers, and facility environmental managers. Currently, there are more than 30 profiles that cover sectors found in many nations, including agriculture, mining, metal fabrication, aerospace, oil and gas extraction, petroleum refining, chemicals, transportation, rubber and plastic, wood products, pharmaceuticals, iron and steel, textiles, electric power generation, and local-government operations.
These profiles provide a quick and inexpensive way to educate the regulated sectoral communities and to increase their understanding that compliance is economically and technically feasible. As such, they have proven very useful to achieving the high rates of “voluntary compliance” enjoyed in the United States. For a complete list of titles that are available for free from the Web, see http://www.epa.gov/compliance/
resources/publications/assistance/
sectors/notebooks/index.html
Also using the Internet, USEPA – working with industry, academic institutions, environmental groups, and other agencies – sponsors virtual Compliance Assistance Centers. To address the requirement of a specific industry sector, each Web-based center provides regulated entities with plain-language information and guidance on environmental requirements and ways to save money through pollution-control techniques. In addition to Web sites, the centers use telephone assistance lines, fax-back systems, and e-mail discussion groups to foster understanding. For more information on these virtual centers, see http://www.assistancecenters.net/