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Over the past twenty years, Massachusetts manufacturers have worked with government to implement the TURA program to protect the Massachusetts environment. The progress of Massachusetts industries in reducing toxic chemical use, waste and emissions is significant.
Since 1990, over 1000 Massachusetts firms have participated in the Toxics Use Reduction Program. Over 450 of these firms have dropped out of the program for a variety of reasons, most often because they have reduced or eliminated the use of any of the listed toxic chemicals.
The Core Group of TURA filers consists of industries and chemicals that have been subject to yearly reporting requirements since 2000. In 2007, 541 Large Quantity Toxic Users reported under the TURA program. Between 2000 and 2007, Core TURA filers reported an overall 19% decrease in production. The TURA data is adjusted to eliminate the effects of changes in production using facility reported TRI production ratios.
When the reported data has been adjusted for production, TURA filers have decreased their toxic chemical use by 14% from the 2000 base year to 2007. Using the same method of adjustment, TURA filers are generating 34% less byproducts or waste per unit of product and have reduced releases of TRI reported on-site chemicals by 44%. Quantities of chemicals shipped in product have varied over the past years, yielding a production adjusted reduction of 14% since 2000.
The graphs below illustrate these results.
RESULTS 2000-2007
RESULTS 1990-2005
If you have questions concerning the method used to calculate progress, contact Heather Tenney at TURI by phone at 978-934-3275 or via email at Heather_Tenney@uml.edu
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