Tier II reporting: the annual chemical inventory, due March 1

Tier II is the annual inventory of hazardous chemicals kept at a facility, required by sections 311 and 312 of the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA). It lists each chemical that reached a reporting threshold at any point in the year, the most of it on site at one time, and where it is stored.

The report exists for emergency responders. It goes to the state emergency response commission, the local emergency planning committee and the fire department that covers your site, so they know what is in the building before they have to enter it.

Any facility that must keep safety data sheets under OSHA's hazard communication standard is covered, and it owes a report for each chemical that reached its threshold. Unlike Form R, there is no employee count and no industry test, so warehouses, hospitals, schools and small shops can all owe it.

The threshold is 10,000 pounds for an ordinary hazardous chemical, which means any chemical with a safety data sheet. For an extremely hazardous substance, one on EPA's emergency planning list, it is 500 pounds or the threshold planning quantity, whichever is lower. The test is the maximum amount on site at any single time, not annual usage. See the full applicability test.

March 1 each year, for the calendar year that just ended. There is no extension. In Arizona the report is filed through myDEQ, the state's online portal, which typically opens for the new reporting year at the start of January.

If a new chemical first reaches a threshold during the year, section 311 of EPCRA also requires you to send its safety data sheet, or add it to your list, within three months. That is separate from the March 1 report.

They come from different sections of the same law and measure different things. Tier II counts the most of a chemical you had on hand at one time, and is due March 1. Form R, the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) report, counts how much of a listed toxic chemical you manufactured, processed or otherwise used across the year, and what was released. It is due July 1.

A facility can owe one, both or neither. A warehouse that stores a chemical in bulk may owe Tier II alone, while a plant that uses a listed chemical in small daily deliveries may owe Form R alone. Tier II and Form R compared.

Yes, and they are the case facilities miss most often. The electrolyte in a lead-acid battery is sulfuric acid, which is an extremely hazardous substance with a Tier II threshold of 500 pounds. EPA does not treat batteries as exempt manufactured items, because the acid can be released during charging and handling.

A fleet of electric forklifts, a battery backup room or a bank of standby batteries can put a facility past 500 pounds of acid with no drum of acid anywhere on site. Count only the acid, not the water, and get the figure from the battery manufacturer or the safety data sheet. The lead in the batteries is a separate hazardous chemical at 10,000 pounds.

No report is owed for a chemical that never reached its threshold. We do recommend writing down how you reached that conclusion: the chemical list you checked, the peak amount for anything close to a threshold, the records you used, and the battery check.

The question comes back every year, and a new product, a bigger tank or a larger battery fleet can change the answer. A short file dated before March 1 is what you want when someone asks.

Your chemical list or safety data sheet binder, purchasing or delivery records for the chemicals you store in quantity, and details of your tanks, cylinders and battery banks. If you filed last year, send that report too, since it saves a great deal of time.

We also need a walk through the facility, because the binder rarely matches what is actually on site. Finally, we need two emergency contacts who can be reached at any hour, since the report lists them for the fire department.

It depends on the number of chemicals and the condition of your records. A facility with a short chemical list, last year's filing and clean delivery records is a quick job. A facility doing it for the first time, with a thick binder and no purchasing history, takes longer because the inventory has to be built from scratch.

The second year is faster, because the chemical list and the storage descriptions carry forward and the work is confirming what changed. We give you a written scope of work before anything starts, and the first conversation costs nothing.

Arizona charges a filing fee through myDEQ: $75 for the first facility, $20 for each additional facility under the same owner or operator, with a cap of $500 per reporting period. Check ADEQ's current schedule before you budget, since fees can change.

Form R carries no state fee in Arizona, which is one of the few places where Form R is the simpler report. More on filing in Arizona.

The federal rule requires the report to reach your local emergency planning committee and your fire department as well as the state. In Arizona, many of those agencies have signed an electronic acceptance agreement with AZSERC, the state emergency response commission, and accept your myDEQ filing as their copy.

ADEQ publishes the list of agencies that have signed. If yours is not on it, you still owe a copy, and you should keep proof it was sent. Facilities in the Gila River Indian Community must send paper copies to the Community's Office of Emergency Management regardless.

File now. The penalty provision for Tier II is the same one that covers Form R, and it runs per violation, per day. The maximum is currently $71,545 per violation after EPA's January 2025 inflation adjustment, and each day a report stays unfiled counts separately. EPA adjusts the figure each year, so check the current one.

EPA's Audit Policy can waive the punitive part of a penalty if you find the violation yourself, disclose it within 21 days and correct it within 60 days of discovery. Whether to disclose is a legal decision for your attorney. We do the technical work: the inventory, the filing and the copies. What to do after a missed deadline.

We file in Arizona, through myDEQ. Every state runs its own Tier II portal, with its own fees and its own rules about copies, and they differ more than people expect.

If you have facilities in other states, we can build the inventory, which is the same everywhere, and advise on what that state's portal expects. Tell us where the facilities are and we will say plainly what we can and cannot do for each.

Yes. Form R, the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) report due July 1, is one of our services, along with the Arizona Toxic Data Report and pollution prevention plan that go with it. When we prepare your Tier II, we tell you whether any chemical on it looks like a Form R chemical as well.

If you do both, the purchasing records that give annual throughput for Form R also show delivery sizes, which is where the Tier II peak comes from. We build both reports from one chemical list. Our Form R reporting service.

You receive the report as filed, the myDEQ confirmation, the chemical-by-chemical inventory with the basis for each peak amount, and the list of chemicals we evaluated and ruled out, with the reasons. Keep all of it, since the rule sets no retention period and the files are small.

The fire department may use the report to plan a pre-incident visit, and the local emergency planning committee may ask follow-up questions about storage locations. Both are normal. The next job is in January, when the inventory is confirmed for the new year.

SECA is a small Arizona firm, and you deal directly with the person doing the work. Ron Fleming has been walking plant floors since 1993. He holds a master's degree in the management of hazardous materials, and he plans every project himself. His son Marcus has joined the business and is learning it on site with him.

We are sized for facilities with one site or a few. If you want to know how many Tier II reports we have prepared, ask and we will tell you the number.