Browsing by Author "United States Environmental Protection Agency"
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Item 1987-1996 Toxics release inventory: Community-Right-to-Know.(1999) United States Environmental Protection Agency; ;No abstract availableItem Aiming for Excellence - Actions to Encourage Stewardship and Accelerate Environmental Progress(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 1999-07) United States Environmental Protection AgencyShortly after taking office, Vice President Gore took charge of a new National Partnership for Reinventing Government to radically change the way our government performs. The challenge given to all agencies was to be more efficient, less bureaucratic, and to provide better service to the American people. At the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), that challenge led us to rethink how we go about achieving environmental and public health protection goals. In March 1995, we launched a small set of high-priority porjects that quickly evolved into a broader reinvention agenda for the Agency. Today, we have numerous reinvention efforts under way. Many focus on improving well-established programs, such as permitting and compliance assurance. The emphasis is on streamlining regulatory processes and introducing innovations that can make these programs more efficient and effective. Others focus on finding fundamentally new approaches for the future. Our reinvention initiatives are designed to address environmental problems that have yet to be solved through the current system. We'd like to tell you about all of our reinvention efforts, but for this brief overview, we'll focus on a few programs we think are especially signicant.Item America's Children and the Environment - Measures of Contaminants, Body Burdens, and Illnesses(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2003-02) United States Environmental Protection AgencyThis report has three principal objectives. First, it presents concrete, quantifiable measures for key factors relevant to the environment and children in the United States. These measures offer a basis for understanding time trends for some factors and for further investigation of others. Second, the report can inform discussions among policy-makers and the public about how to improve federal data on children and the environment. Third, America's Children and the Environment includes measures that can be used by policymakers and the public to track and understand the potential impacts of environmental contaminants on children's health and, ultimately, to identify and evaluate ways to minimize environmental impacts on children. The authors and sponsors hope this report will contribute to the effort to integrate the environmental health needs of children into the nation's policy agenda.Item Clean Water Action Plan: The first year. The future.(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 1999-02) United States Environmental Protection Agency; United States Department of AgricultureNo abstract available.Item Clean Watersheds Needs Survey 2000: Report to Congress(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2003-08) United States Environmental Protection AgencyThis report, the Clean Watersheds Needs Survey 2000 Report to Congress, presents the results of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) survey of water quality programs and project eligible for funding under the Clean Water State Revolving Fund (CWSRF). EPA prepared this report to meet the requirements set forth in section 516 of the Clean Water Act (CWA). Because of water quality problems associated with nonpoint source (NPS) pollution, EPA has elected to include NPS pollution control projects as well. The Clean Watersheds Needs Sruvey (CWNS) 2000 is a collaborative effort between 48 states and the District of Columbia, and EPA. States entered data into the CWNS database over a 21-month period to be evaluated and analyzed by EPA. The results of the data entry are presented in this report. The name of survey was recently changed from the Clean Water Needs Survey to the Clean Watersheds Needs Survey to recognize the increasing number of water pollution control activities, such as developing Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs) and setting certain Safe Drinking Water Act objectives, that are managed on a watershed basis. Among other benefits, identifying needs by watershed promotes water pollution control strategies that optimize water quality investments in a watershed. This report presents the capital costs for publicly owned municipal wastewater collection and treatment, combined sewer overflow (CSO) correction, municipal storm water management, and NPS pollution control. This report presents the cost data in the CWNS database as "needs". A need is a water quality or public health problem and an associated abatement cost that is eligible for funding under the CWSRF. The needs must have existed as of January 1, 2000, to be included in the CWNS 2000. In addition, technical data, such as population, flow, and effluent, are summarized and presented in this report. The CWNS 2000 Report to Congress presents the total needs estimates in two ways. The first methods is based entirely on documented needs. These documented needs are entered by a State and validated by appropriate documentation. This is the first time, since the beginning of the CWNS, that the report to Congress presents only the documented total need for the Nation. In past surveys, EPA used a second method of determining needs estimates. That method modeled needs data to supplement the survey results. For this report EPA believes that the data entered into the CWNS adequately represent the Nation's needs for wastewater treatment and collection. For diffuse sources of pollution (such as nonpoint sources, sanitary sewer overflows [SSOs}, and municipal storm water), however, data limitations preclude complete reliance at this time on a documented needs approach. Therefore, this report includes a modeled national needs estimate for these diffuse sources. (See Chapter 4 and Appendices D and E for details.) EPA expects that during the next decade, as improved information is derived in the course of developing TMDLs and other watershed plans, the States' and EPA's ability to document needs for all source categories will improve. EPA expects, therefore, that its estimates of documented needs will continue to be improved, ultimately enabling complete replacement of the modeled needs estimates by documented needs.Item Communities and Environmental Laws(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2004) United States Environmental Protection AgencyThis DVD contains English and Spanish-language video and text documents: 1. VIDEO (20 MINUTES) "Communities and Environmental Laws; 2. DOCUMENT (TEXT ONLY) "A Citizen's Guide to Using Federal Environmental Laws To Secure Environmental Justice".Item Environmental planning for small communities: A guide for local decision-makers(U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Research and Development, Office of Science, Planning and Regulatory Evaluation, Center for Environmental Research Information, 1994) United States Environmental Protection Agency;An environmental planning guide for small communities offers a guide to planning an environmentally friendly community. The plan acknowledges the overwhelming amount of jobs that are necessary to complete this task and breaks them down into realistic steps. The focus of the community plan is on how to set priorities and decide how to make the best use of your resources to protect the population. The plan provides ideas on how to save your communities money including how to prevent pollution in the cheapest way possible. It offers a blueprint for compliance with environmental regulations. The importance of community awareness and support is needed and discussed in the plan.Item EPA/OSHA Joint Chemical Accident Investigation Report - Shell Chemical Company, Deer Park, Texas(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 1998-06) United States Environmental Protection Agency; United States Occupational Safety and Health AdministrationAn explosion and fire took place at the Shell Chemical Company Complex in Deer Park, Texas, on June 22, 1997, resulting in injuries, public sheltering, closure of transportation routes, and property damage both on and off site. EPA and OSHA undertook an investigation of this accident because of its severity, its effects on workers and the public, the desire to identify those root causes and contributing factors of the event that may have broad applicability to industry, and the potential to develop recommendations and lessons learned to prevent future accidents of this type. This investigation was conducted in conjunction with an investigation by OSHA to determine if violation of occupational safety and health laws occurred.Item Estuaries: Where Rivers Meet the Sea - Ten Ways to Protect Estuaries(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2003) United States Environmental Protection Agency; National Oceanic and Atmospheric AdministrationNo abstract available.Item Final Report of the National Watershed Forum(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2001) United States Environmental Protection Agency; Meridian InstituteThis Report highlights the Forum delegates' recommendations for advancing cooperative actions to sustain the health of our nation's watersheds. These recommendations address issues of concern identified by the Regional Watershed Roundtables that met over a two-year period prior to the Forum, as well as new issues identified by delegates at the Forum. The recommendations do NOT necessarily represent a consensus of all the delegates who participated in the Forum or in any particular discussion group. Every watershed faces a different set of opportunities and challenges. Each functions in the context of its own geographical and political setting. Therefore, recommendations contained herein represent a range of alternatives intended to help bolster capacity at the national, regional, state, tribal and local level to support the vital work of watershed partnerships. These innovative ideas represent the collective wisdom and successful strategies shared by Forum delegates and serve as a written history of a landmark even designed to foster collaborative watershed efforts across the nation.Item Greenscaping Your Lawn and Garden(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2003-04) United States Environmental Protection AgencyNo abstract available.Item Living Waters of the Chesapeake(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2000) United States Environmental Protection Agency; Chesapeake Bay ProgramSystem Requirements: 400 MHZ Pentium Computer with 64 megs of RAM or higher (PC only) For Teachers: We have included classroom activities about the Chesapeake Bay Watershed on the CD-ROM. To access the activities, click on the EXIT function. All documents are available .PDF and .PPT downloads.Item Methods for Measuring the Toxicity and Bioaccumulation of Sediment-associated Contaminants with Freshwater Invertebrates - Second Edition(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2000-03) United States Environmental Protection AgencyProcedures are described for testing freshwater organisms in the laboratory to evaluate the potential toxicity or bioaccumulation of chemicals in whole sediments. Sediments may be collected from the field or spiked with compounds in the laboratory. Toxicity methods are outlined for two organisms, the amphipod Hyalella azteca and the midge Chironomus tentans. Toxicity tests with amphipods or midges are conducted for 10 d in 300-mL chambers containing 100 mL of sediment and 175 mL of overlying water. Overlying water is renewed daily and test organisms are fed during the toxicity tests. The endpoints in the 10-d toxicity test with H. azteca and C. tentans are survival and growth. Procedures are primarily described for testing freshwater sediments; however, estuarine sediments (up to 15‰ salinity) can also be tested in 10-d sediment toxicity tests with H. azteca. Guidance is also provided for conducting long-term sediment toxicity tests with H. azteca and C. tentans. The long-term sediment exposures with H. azteca are started with 7- to 8-d-old amphipods. On Day 28 of the sediment exposure, amphipods are isolated from the sediment and placed in water-only chambers where reproduction is measured on Day 35 and 42. Endpoints measured in the amphipod test include survival (Day 28, 35, and 42), growth (on Day 28 and 42), and reproduction (number of young/female produced from Day 28 to 42). The long-term sediment exposures with C. tentans start with newly hatched larvae (<24-h old) and continue through emergence, reproduction, and hatching of the F1 generation (about 60-d sediment exposures). Survival and growth are determined at 20 d. Starting on Day 23 to the end of the test, emergence and reproduction of C. tentans are monitored daily. The number of eggs/ female is determined for each egg mass, which is incubated for 6 d to determine hatching success. The procedures described in Sections 14 and 15 include measurement of a variety of lethal and sublethal endpoints with Hyalella azteca and Chironomus tentans; minor modifications of the basic methods can be used in cases where only a subset of these endpoints is of interest. Guidance for conducting 28-d bioaccumulation tests with the oligochaete Lumbriculus variegatus is also provided in the manual. Overlying water is renewed daily and test organisms are not fed during bioaccumulation tests. Methods are also described for determining bioaccumulation kinetics of different classes of compounds during 28-d exposures with L. variegatus.Item National Pollution Prevention Resource Guide(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2001-07) United States Environmental Protection AgencyThese resources will help you learn about pollution prevention approaches and innovative technologies. Most of the resources listed here will provide you with free, confidential, and personalized assistance to identify and implement cost-effective pollution prevention measures. Other tools and resources allow you to perform a self-assessment. Good luck in pursuing your pollution prevention and waste reduction goals!Item Pollution Prevention - Resources for EPA Region 4(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2001) United States Environmental Protection AgencyNo abstract available.Item Proceedings and Summary Report: Workshop on the Fate, Transport, and Transformation of Mercury in Aquatic and Terrestrial Environments(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2002-06) United States Environmental Protection Agency; United States Geological SurveyThe Workshop on the Fate, Transport, and Transformation of Mercury in Aquatic and Terrestrial Environments was held on May 8-10, 2001 in West Palm Beach, Florida. The workshop was conducted by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) Office of Research and Development (ORD) and cosponsored by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Toxics Program, the USEPA Science to Achieve Results (STAR) Program, the South Florida Mercury Science Program, and the USGS/USEPA Mercury Roundtable. Representatives from industry, academia, environmental organizations, consulting firms, and government attended. The purpose of the workshop was to bring researchers, decision makers, government representatives, and others together to discuss the state of the science regarding the fate and transport of mercury in aquatic and terrestrial systems, mercury transformation processes (biotic and abiotic), and methods for managing ecological and human exposures to methylmercury (MeHg). Five technical sessions were presented during the 2 1/2-day workshop. These sessions addressed the following topics: Mercury and Methylmercury Transport in the Environment; Methylmercury Production in the Environment; USEPA STAR Mercury Research Program Review; Bioaccumulation of Mercury in Food Webs; Managing Mercury Contamination in Terrestrial and Aquatic Systems. The presentations were followed by a panel discussion at the end of the workshop. After each technical sessions was summarized, participants were given an opportunity to comment on some of the critical issues or concerns associated with the material presented for each technical session. Two very successful and well-attended poster sessions also took place during the workshop. The poster sessions covered a number topics/areas that could not be included in the workshop due to time constraints. These sessions expanded both the breadth and scope of the workshop and were a key element of the workshop's success. This document contains a more detailed description of the scope and objectives of the workshop, followed by bulleted summaries of the plenary session, the technical presentations, and the panel discussion. The final agenda, speaker abstracts, and poster abstracts are presented in Appendices A, B, and C, respectively.Item Proceedings of the First Gulf of Mexico Hypoxia Management Conference(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 1997-08) United States Environmental Protection Agency; Gulf of Mexico ProgramNo abstract available.Item Protecting Wetlands for Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Fact Sheet(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2003) United States Environmental Protection AgencyNo abstract available.Item Quest for Less: Activities and Resources for Teaching K-6(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2000-11) United States Environmental Protection AgencyThe Quest for Less provides hands-on lessons and activities, enrichment ideas, journal writing assignments, and other educational tools related to preventing and reducing trash. Each chapter includes one or more fact sheets providing background information on each topic. In addition, each chapter includes an index showing the grade ranges, subject areas, and skills used for each activity to help teachers select the appropriate activities.Item Reuse + Recycling = Waste Reduction - A Guide for Schools and Groups(United States Environmental Protection Agency, 2003-07) United States Environmental Protection AgencyNo abstract available.