What are the factories near you releasing?
Every year, industrial facilities must report the chemicals they release to air, water, and land. It is public, it is detailed, and almost nobody reads it. KnowYourExposure maps the EPA's Toxics Release Inventory to your ZIP code, so you can see what is reported within five miles of your home.
Quick Answers
What is the Toxics Release Inventory? A federal right-to-know program created after the 1984 Bhopal disaster. Facilities above certain thresholds report their chemical releases annually, in pounds, to air, water, and land.
How do I check my area? Enter your ZIP code on the KnowYourExposure homepage. If reporting facilities are within five miles, your report shows how many and how many pounds they released.
Does a big number mean I am in danger?
Pounds are not exposure. A facility can report a large tonnage that goes into permitted deep-well injection or a lined landfill and never reaches a neighbor. Release volume tells you scale, not dose.
Pathway is what matters: air releases of volatile chemicals are the ones most likely to reach nearby homes, mostly within the first mile or two. Water discharges follow the receiving stream, not a circle on a map. And most reported releases are within permit limits - reporting is a transparency requirement, not an admission.
How to read your own numbers
Start with the facility names and their top chemicals. Look any facility up in EPA's TRI Explorer for its full chemical list and multi-year trend - a plant cutting releases 80% over a decade reads differently than one climbing. Then cover the two pathways you control: what reached your tap (your water report) and your indoor air (HEPA filtration plus AirNow alerts).
We count facilities within 5 miles of your ZIP's center point that reported at least 1,000 lbs of total releases in the latest TRI year.