(659d) Assessing Environmental Performance in the Chemical Industry: A Comparative Study with Emerging Tools

The SB 1916 chemical industry project challenges individual facilities within the chemical industry in California to reduce hazardous waste generation and other multi-media releases. With the purpose of identifying pollution prevention opportunities within chemical facilities in California, we have utilized various established assessment methods (e.g., Scorecard risk assessment systems, Economic Input-Output Life Cycle Assessment (EIO-LCA) model, eco-efficiency benchmarking tools, CalTox model, Tool for the Reduction of Environmental and Chemical Impacts (TRACI), and Chemical Process Simulation for Waste Reduction (WAR) algorithm) to identify target industry sectors on the basis of potential environmental burden in terms of specific midpoint or endpoint environmental categories, rather than quantity of waste released. The linkage between different chemical manufacturing processes along the supply chain has also been taken into account in the assessment. Although each assessment method uses different underlying data or assumptions about chemical toxicity and environmental risk, four of the nineteen industry sectors consistently demonstrated significant environmental burden. The methods used in this study can be applied to any industrial sector (not just within the chemical industry), thus providing concrete and quantitative metrics for evaluating the sustainability of processes and products before detailed materials inventory data and ecotoxicological studies are available, which can furthermore provide a foundation for multi-objective decision making to evaluate potential opportunities for green chemistry.