Non-production-related waste refers to quantities of Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) chemicals disposed of or released, or transferred off-site, as the result of one-time events, rather than due to standard production activities. These events may include remedial actions, such as decommissioning a heap leach pad, catastrophic events, or other one-time events not associated with normal production processes. Non-production-related waste is included in a facility’s total disposal or other releases, but not as part of its production-related waste managed, which may account for discrepancies between the two figures. The following graph shows the annual quantities of non-production-related waste reported to the TRI Program.

• Non-production-related waste from all facilities was below 35 million pounds in all years but 2013 when a mining facility reported a one-time only release of 193 million pounds due to decommissioning a heap leach pad. The facility reported zero releases in 2014 and did not report in 2015.
• In 2015, facilities reported 18 million pounds of one-time releases, of which 51% (9.3 million pounds) was reported from the federal cleanup of an old nuclear weapons production site. The chemicals released included toluene, lead, xylene, and naphthalene.

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This page was published in January 2017 and uses the 2015 TRI National Analysis dataset made public in TRI Explorer in October 2016.

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