Arizona Pollution Prevention Plan and Toxic Data Report

This page explains what the rules and common practice call for. Every site is different, and what a survey or a filing needs at your facility is something we work out with you after we see it.

If you filed a Form R for an Arizona facility, you owe the state a second report with the same July 1 deadline. You also owe a third item, the pollution prevention plan itself, on a later date.

Form R is the full reporting form for the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), the annual report on toxic chemical releases that facilities file with EPA. Form A is the shorter form.

Most facilities find this out late. The requirement is not federal and it does not appear in any of EPA's TRI guidance, so it does not come up unless someone tells you.

What triggers the requirement

Arizona law requires a Toxic Data Report if either of the following applies (A.R.S. § 49-962(A)):

• You were required to file a federal TRI report. During the preceding calendar year, you were required to file the annual toxic chemical release form under federal law (Section 313 of SARA), which means a Form R or Form A. (A.R.S. § 49-962(A)(1))
• You generated enough hazardous waste. During the preceding calendar year, the facility generated an average of 1 kilogram per month of acutely hazardous waste, as that term is defined in EPA's hazardous waste regulations (Title 40 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Part 261). Alternatively, the facility generated an average of 1,000 kilograms per month of hazardous waste. This excludes episodic, accidental or remediation-related events. (A.R.S. § 49-962(A)(2))

Separately, any facility that uses more than 10,000 pounds of a "toxic substance" in a calendar year must file a pollution prevention plan with ADEQ, the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality. The plan is due by December 31 of the following year (A.R.S. § 49-963(D)).

Arizona law defines "toxic substance" by reference to the federal TRI chemical list, which it reaches through the federal Pollution Prevention Act (A.R.S. § 49-961 and 42 U.S.C. § 13102(3)). The result is the same chemical list with a much lower trigger, and the plan must be filed, not just kept on a shelf. Note that the law excludes materials from mining and metallurgical operations (A.R.S. § 49-963(A)).

The law also ties the two together. A facility that meets the Toxic Data Report triggers must prepare a pollution prevention plan and implement it. The plan must address reducing both the use of toxic substances and the hazardous waste the facility generates.

Once you are in, you stay in. The obligation recurs every year until the facility ceases operation, or until it fails to meet both report triggers for 2 consecutive years (A.R.S. § 49-962(B)). One year below the triggers does not release you.

What you file, and where

There are three filings here, in two online systems, on two dates. Two of them are due July 1, and the plan itself is not.

ADEQ says state pollution prevention law requires Arizona facilities to submit their annual TRI reports to it, and filing through TRI-MEweb satisfies that. The Toxic Data Report is a separate filing in myDEQ, and filing your Form R does not satisfy it.

Submitting the plan is the step most often missed. Writing the plan and keeping it on site is not enough. The law requires it to be filed with ADEQ, and two neighboring subsections use the same word (A.R.S. § 49-963(B) and (C)). Plan amendments are submitted through myDEQ in the same way.

TRI-MEweb therefore does not cover all of your Arizona obligations, and myDEQ is not where the federal report itself is filed. You need both systems, and you have two dates, not one.

What goes in the Toxic Data Report

Arizona law names two components (A.R.S. § 49-962(C)):

1. The report form EPA requires under the federal Pollution Prevention Act (42 U.S.C. § 13106)
2. Any annual progress report required by the state plan statute (A.R.S. § 49-963)

Read the first item carefully. It refers to section 6607 of the Pollution Prevention Act, which covers the source reduction and recycling report. In practice that means Section 8 of Form R, not your entire federal filing.

The annual progress report assesses how far you have come toward the goals in your plan and sets out any amendments to the plan (A.R.S. § 49-963(L)).

What a pollution prevention plan has to do

The plan addresses reducing the use of toxic substances and the hazardous waste you generate. This is source reduction, which means generating less in the first place instead of treating or disposing of it afterward.

The plan has to be implemented, not just written, and the annual progress report is where you demonstrate that. The plan and its amendments are filed with ADEQ by December 31 of the following year.

How we do it. We build the plan from the same chemical use and waste data that went into your Form R, and we look for source reduction measures that are realistic at the scale of your process, not generic ones. We write the plan to cover what the law requires. We then file it and any amendments through myDEQ, and carry the progress report into the next July's Toxic Data Report.

While you're here: Arizona Tier II is a separate requirement

Tier II, an annual inventory of the hazardous chemicals you store, is often confused with the reports above, but it runs on a different schedule. It is work we do as well, and the dates are worth knowing. → Our Tier II reporting service · Filing Tier II in Arizona

Worth knowing: one federal penalty provision, 42 U.S.C. § 11045(c)(1), covers both Tier II (EPCRA section 312) and Form R (section 313). A Tier II violation therefore carries the same penalty as a late Form R: up to $71,545 per violation, per day. The two deadlines differ, but the penalty provision does not.

Tier II also requires copies to your local emergency planning committee and the fire department that covers your site. The exception is where those agencies have signed the electronic acceptance agreement with AZSERC, Arizona's emergency response commission. ADEQ publishes the list of participating agencies. Facilities in the Gila River Indian Community must send paper copies to the Community's Office of Emergency Management, even if they file electronically.

The dates are conveniently spread through the year: Tier II in March, the annual TRI report and the Toxic Data Report in July, and the plan filing in December.

Why this requirement gets missed

It is small, specific to Arizona and easy to overlook. An Arizona facility that files a Form R and stops there still owes the state something, and usually two things once you count the plan filing date.

We are based in Phoenix, and this is work we do.

→ Do you have to file a Form R? · Our Toxics Release Inventory (Form R) reporting service