Process emissions for vinyl pipe industry

The vinyl pipe industry consumed approximately 1.9 million metric tons of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) in 1994. This resulted in 2.1 million metric tons of extruded pipe in the same time interval. If one uses an emission factor contained in the 1978 USEPA contractors report, this industry would result in 117,000 metric tons of emissions. This factor was acknowledged to be too high, however; no data was available to indicate a more realistic factor. The current work involves a study commissioned by the Vinyl Institute and UNI-BELL to establish a more realistic factor using accepted EPA protocols as well as newly developed laboratory techniques. The results of this work has yielded an emission factor that is 1000 times lower than that appearing in the 1978 report. Laboratory procedures have also been shown to accurately reflect the results obtained from the plant monitoring study.