Resources for State, Local, and Tribal Authorities
Introduction
This page offers some resources to State, Local, and Tribal Authorities (SLTs) who are either interested in onboarding with CAERS or are considering joining and would like to provide feedback as CAERS functionality continues to be developed. The use of CAERS is not mandatory for SLTs.
Joining the Product Design Team
Our Product Design Team (PDT) is composed of staff from EPA and SLT air programs. We meet every two weeks to:
- Discuss SLT and federal program requirements towards CAERS development (via discussions or through R&D projects)
- Obtain periodic updates on CAERS development
- Provide feedback towards CAERS improvements and new functionality
We are always interested in having new SLTs become members of our CAER Product Design Team (PDT). By joining the PDT you are not committing to using CAERS. However, your feedback on PDT calls will help improve CAERS, and it may become a good fit for you in the future. If you are interested in joining the PDT, please reach out to one of the PDT co-chairs:
Julia Gamas
U.S. EPA Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards
gamas.julia@epa.gov
919-541-7915
Sierra Allen
Maine Department of Environmental Protection
sierra.allen@maine.gov
207-815-7684
Tammy Manning
North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality
tammy.manning@ncdenr.gov
919-707-8717
You may also reach out to Kurt Rakouskas from ECOS with questions: krakouskas@ecos.or, 202-266-4935.
Obtaining a CAERS Test Account
If you are considering onboarding with CAERS but are not sure yet, or not ready to do so, you may get a test account to help you understand how your SLTs data will look in CAERS, and what kinds of edits, additions, and corrections you may want to apply to your data before they are pulled into CAERS. By learning how CAERS will handle your data, you may get a good sense of how CAERS works now, and the types of customizations you would need (for example, SLT-specific QA checks, SLT-specific emission factors you'd want to add to the compendium, etc.). To request more information about obtaining a test account, reach out to Julia Gamas (gamas.julia@epa.gov).
Onboarding with CAERS
While SLTs can onboard at any time if they would like to adopt CAERS as is, we know many SLTs will likely need some customizations. CAERS has been created so that SLT modules can be added, rather than hard coding any new SLT requirements.
The following document may help you view your current SLT reporting system, method, and/or tools within the overall CAERS scheme:
The following document lays out the general steps to take to onboard with CAERS:
The following document describes CAERS data governance:
Funding
Exchange Network Grants to assist SLTs in their adoption of CAERS are available every year and are due early Spring. For example, an SLT may need funding to: build out their data retrieval using the CAERS API, create a workflow to transform their current data intake templates for their users to be able to upload data into CAERS, require additional staff time to work with EPA to adopt CAERS. SLTs may benefit from work done by previous SLTs grant recipients.
Current CAERS Users
- Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (AZDEQ)
- Department of Energy & Environment Government of the District of Columbia (DOEE)
- Georgia Department of Natural Resources (GADNR)
- Idaho Department of Environmental Quality (IDDEQ)
- Maine Department of Environmental Protection (MEDEP)
- Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MSDEQ)
- Pima County (AZ) Department of Environmental Quality (PCDEQ)
- Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management (RIDEM)
Additional Resources for SLT CAERS Users
- CAERS API resources and documentation for automatic data retrieval from CAERS
- Emissions Inventory System (EIS) Gateway for NEI reporting
- Source Classification Codes (SCC) to search appropriate process codes
- WebFIRE to search emission factors
- Substance Registry Services (SRS) to search pollutants/chemicals