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DEVELOPING A CONSISTENT DECISION-MAKING FRAMEWORK BY USING THE U.S. EPA'S TRACI
Citation:
Bare*, J C. DEVELOPING A CONSISTENT DECISION-MAKING FRAMEWORK BY USING THE U.S. EPA'S TRACI. Presented at AIChE, Indianapolis, IN, 11/08/2002.
Description:
The most effective way to achieve long-term environmental results is through the use of a consistent set of metrics and decision-making framework. The U.S. EPA has developed TRACI, the Tool for the Reduction and Assessment of Chemical and other environmental Impacts, which allows the characterization of potential effects, including ozone depletion, global warming, acidification, eutrophication, tropospheric ozone (smog) formation, ecotoxicity, human particulate effects, human carcinogenic effects, human non-carcinogenic effects, fossil fuel depletion, and land use effects. To develop TRACI, impact categories were selected, available methodologies were reviewed, and categories were prioritized for further research. Impact categories were characterized at the midpoint level, for various reasons, including a higher level of societal consensus concerning the certainties of modeling at this point in the cause-effect chain. Research in the following impact categories - acidification, smog formation, eutrophication, land use, human cancer, human non-cancer, and human criteria effects - was conducted to construct methodologies for representing potential effects in the US. Probabilistic analyses allowed the determination of an appropriate level of sophistication and spatial resolution necessary for impact modeling for several categories, yet the tool was designed to accommodate current inconsistencies in practice (e.g., site specific information is often not available.). The methodologies underlying TRACI are presented along with a discussion of the application of TRACI methodologies in various decision-making frameworks. TRACI is available for incorporation into other environmental tools, and is currently downloadable at the following website: http://epa.gov/ORD/NRMRL/std/sab/iam_traci.htm