ECHO Clean Air Targeting Tool (eCATT)

September 23, 2016

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 1

eCATT Background

• The Enforcement and Compliance History Online (ECHO) website has

introduced a series of successful Clean Water Act interfaces.

– Allow users to combine pollutant release data with information about water quality and

compliance.

• The purpose of eCATT is to provide similar functionality for the Clean Air Act

program.

– Allowing users to work back from hotspots and areas of high risk to possible causes.

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 2

Questions eCATT is designed to answer

• Which facilities release pollutants?

• Which facilities fit the profile of high pollutant releases, but do not

have a major permit status?

• In a geographic area, which monitoring stations exist?

• Which facilities could be key contributors to air monitoring

hotspots?

• What industries or pollutants are contributing to overall pollutant

loadings and/or risk?

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 3

eCATT Development to Date

• Methods developed in National Enforcement Initiative (NEI)

– Compared monitoring data to pollutant release information

– Concepts incorporated into eCATT

• Alpha version

• The next version will incorporate wider stakeholder comments.

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 4

eCATT Status

• Integrating data from across multiple data systems has already

been completed.

• eCATT has several well-developed reports.

• We would love your comments (contact point is

yourish.jesse@epa.gov).

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 5

Ways to Search eCATT• Emission Screener

– Single query tool for emissions data sorted by facility, industry, and pollutant. Allows for definition of parameters such

as location, data year, pollutant category, facility characteristics, compliance history, and more.

• Non-Identifier Finder

– Compares emission data with permit data to find facilities with potentially incorrect permit type

– 5 types of search, each with default settings to guide users.

• For example, when using the Potential Title V Major search, tool prepopulates emission threshold of 100 TPY

• Air Monitoring Station search

– Data from air monitoring stations, not facilities

– Monitoring station reports show pollutants detected and rank nearby emitters

– Search options incorporate NATA data so user can screen by hazard level/cancer risk

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 6

Key Reports

• Air Pollutant Report (launched in 2015)

– Allows trend view of Greenhouse Gas Data, Acid Rain Data, National

Emissions Inventory and Toxics Release Inventory – air releases.

• Air Monitoring Report (NEW)

– Interactive report identifies monitoring stations, shows biggest nearby

HAP or pollutant sources, then allows users to choose pollutants

monitored and analyze likely nearby sources based on emissions and

wind readings.

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 7

Air Pollutant Report

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 8

Air Monitoring Station Data with Nearby Facilities

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 9

MONITORING

STATION at > 50 in a

million cancer risk

Caveats/Known Issues

• Age of data– TRI is up to date from 2014, NEI is only up to date from 2011. 2014 update coming,

hopefully this fall

• Linkage Data– eCATT relies on the Facility Registry System (FRS) to properly link all data systems

together at the facility level. If linkages are missing, then a facility may appear to have

very high releases of a pollutant in one program (e.g., TRI), but no releases in another

program (e.g,. NEI). eCATT makes it easy to spot those problems and users can

submit error reports.

• ICIS-Air– eCATT assumes ICIS-Air is the definitive source of facility permit status information,

so any data quality problems will confound results.

– ICIS-Air currently does not have complete violation data.9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 10

Expected Development Cycle - eCATT

• 2016 (Beta Version for Government Review)

– Expected training to Regions and States on How to Use.

– Expected feedback from Regions and States on what other features are

needed.

• 2017

– Comment review and development/release of Version 1 with key changes.

– Expected “shake-out” period for data quality and linkage issues.

– Improved Integration with CAA targeting strategies and policies.

– Develop best practices/use cases for training.

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 11

Wish List/Comments Not Yet Incorporated

• Two additional searches (tabs) have not yet been built

1. Pollutant Comparer - objective is to compare pollutants reported in multiple datasets

(i.e. TRI and EIS) to identify anomalies between the data.

2. Mapping component

• Other

• Monitoring stations sized or color coded by cancer risk.

• Improved methods to visualize which facilities or pollutants are driving high risk scores at

monitoring stations.

• Bringing in more detailed information about stack heights, etc from National Emissions

Inventory.

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 12

How to Access and Test eCATT

• Go to echolab.epa.gov

– Requires a sign in, and can be

accessed by anyone with an

echogov account – https://echolab.epa.gov/trends/emission-screener

• Send comments to:

– yourish.jesse@epa.gov

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 13

9/23/2016 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 14

DEMO/Screen Shots