The Industrial Facilities Discharge File is an automated database of industrial point source dischargers to surface waters in the United States. The IFD was created specifically to provide the Office of Wetlands, Oceans, and Watersheds with a comprehensive database of industrial point source dischargers.
The major components of the IFD are the Permit Compliance System (PCS), the National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES), the Construction Grants Needs Survey, the Publicly Owned Treatment Works Study, the regulations and standards from EPA/OW Effluent Guidelines Division, EPA's Duluth Laboratory's Complex Effluent Toxicity Information System (CETIS) database, the Organic Chemical Producer's (OCP) database, EPA Enforcement Form 2C data in STORET, the Hazardous
Waste National Priority List (NPL) sites, the Reach File, the In-House System (IHS) Stream Gage File, and input from EPA Region and State applications. General Information about each facility was first extracted from the PCS to form the building block upon which more information was added.
The IFD is organized as a hierarchial information system of three levels: facility, discharge pipe, and contributing indirect discharge. The facility level contains identification information and summarized discharge data. The discharge level includes the components of each individual discharge such as location of pipe, flow, and SIC code activity. Indirect discharge level includes data on industrial flow from industries that discharge to another facility such as a Publicly Owned Treatment Works (POTW), rather than directly to surface water.
References_Cited: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (1992). "Office
of Water-Environmental and Program Information Systems Compendium", Office
of Water, U.S. EPA, Washington, D.C.