The growing Environmental Justice movement is beginning to raise awareness in communities long suffering from odors. Specifically, odors emanating from manufacturing facilities are coming to the attention of local regulators. In many cases, the offending manufacturing facilities are in compliance with the reporting conditions in their permit, so communities have historically had no tools to demonstrate quality of life issues related to the difficult subject of odor emissions. This poster presents a step-by-step procedure to assess the potential community impacts of air emissions from manufacturing plants making or using chemicals. The steps are: i) Conduct a study of the air permit, ii) Conduct a study of site geography using maps, iii) Develop a terrain map for the area around the plant, iv) Select air quality dispersion models for each source configuration, v) Review health standards for benchmarking, vi) Determine meteorological conditions for the various dates in question and vii) Compute worst-case concentrations. The procedure not only includes an analysis of potential-to-emit and actual reported emissions, but also includes an analysis of point sources such as poorly functioning air pollution control devices and an analysis of fugitive emissions from storage tanks and appurtenances, as well as uncontrolled fugitives from poorly maintained equipment and buildings. Each step will be discussed to help guide an analysis of manufacturing plants in communities with persistent odors and/or health challenges. The procedure shows that it is possible to quantify odor problems and health risks faced by communities due to air emissions from certain manufacturing facilities.
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