PlainEnviro

Top 10 US States by EPA Reported Toxic Releases

EPA Toxics Release Inventory ranking of U.S. states by total reported toxic-chemical release pounds (all media combined). Every figure is drawn from PlainEnviro's EPA TRI extract and refreshes when that extract updates.

Research period:

Compiled by PlainEnviro on 2026-08-10

Research question

Across U.S. states in the EPA Toxics Release Inventory, which report the largest total toxic-chemical release mass (pounds, all media), and how concentrated is that distribution relative to Superfund site counts?

Methodology

This ranking orders U.S. states by total reported TRI toxic-chemical release pounds (air + water + land + underground injection) from PlainEnviro's EPA Toxics Release Inventory extract. Facility, water-system, and Superfund columns are contextual inventory counts from the same portal corpus; they do not decide rank. Every release total is auditable through the linked state profile.

States with no positive release total in the extract are omitted rather than shown as zero. Pound totals treat chemicals equally by mass and are not toxicity-weighted. Display formatting only adds SI-style suffixes (K/M/B) and thousands separators.

Figures reflect the current portal EPA extract. When that extract is rebuilt from a newer EPA release, this page updates with it. Aggregate context below covers all states with a positive release total so the top-ten share of national mass is visible.

See the methodology page for the full source list, data vintages, and how each metric is defined.

Top 10 US States by EPA Reported Toxic Releases

States ranked by total TRI release pounds (all media), DESC

million lbs

What this shows Total pounds combine pathways and chemicals with different toxicities; this is not a health-risk or per-capita score.

Source U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, TRI As of 2023

The ranked top 10

All 10 ranked states, drawn directly from the EPA dataset.

# State Abbr Total release lbs TRI facilities Superfund sites
1 Alaska AK 3.85B 57 9
2 Nevada NV 1.84B 186 2
3 Texas TX 1.09B 2,342 70
4 Utah UT 1.06B 246 24
5 Louisiana LA 690.1M 467 29
6 Indiana IN 555.5M 1,028 53
7 Ohio OH 485.0M 1,546 50
8 Alabama AL 411.6M 661 16
9 Tennessee TN 380.1M 740 26
10 Arizona AZ 362.3M 355 13

Source: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Toxics Release Inventory state release totals. Ranking metric = total reported pounds; facility and Superfund columns are contextual inventory counts from the same portal corpus.

Findings

Top entity in the ranking

The top-ranked state by total TRI release pounds is Alaska, at 3.85B lbs. The full top-10 set is shown in the table above. Facility counts in the adjacent column are inventory context only; they do not decide this ranking.

Distribution shape

The leader, Alaska, reports 3.85B lbs – about 10.6× the 10th-ranked state (362.3M). Release mass is highly concentrated: a few states account for a disproportionate share of reported pounds. The secondary Superfund chart below is a separate NPL-count cut, not a toxicity-weighted restatement of these pounds.

Aggregate context

Across all 51 states with a positive release total in this extract, combined reported mass is 16.58B lbs (average 325.2M per state). The top-10 states above account for 64.7% of that combined total.

Source provenance

Release totals originate from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Toxics Release Inventory. PlainEnviro presents the portal's processed EPA extract with display formatting only. The methodology page documents source URLs, vintage, and preparation.

Why this ranking matters

Total release pounds answer a different question than facility counts: industrial footprint size versus reported discharge mass. Readers comparing Texas (often high facility count) with Alaska or Nevada (often high mass from mining/disposal) need both views; this page is the mass cut, while county facility concentration and the state facility ranking elsewhere cover inventory density.

What this analysis cannot tell us

TRI release totals combine chemicals and pathways with different toxicities into a single pound total; mass is not a health-risk score. Facilities below EPCRA section 313 activity or chemical thresholds are absent even when they emit regulated chemicals. Reporting categories and chemical lists change across years, so longitudinal comparison requires TRI methodology caveats. Superfund counts in the secondary chart are NPL placements only; pre-NPL, deleted, and separately-authorized cleanups are excluded. Facility and water-system columns are contextual inventory counts, not the ranking metric.

Secondary cut from the same source

Top 10 states by EPA Superfund (National Priorities List) site count

Superfund sites

What this shows Superfund site count reflects active National Priorities List placement; it excludes pre-NPL, deleted, and separately-authorized cleanup sites.

Source U.S. Environmental Protection Agency As of 2023

Related data

Sources