ERI Home IRR Home Last updated 8/10/04
This document covers environmental aspects associated with the service infrastructure needed to support the operation of automobiles, including fuel retailing and vehicle repair. It is one component of the full picture of the impact that our reliance on the automobile has on the environment Other major components include automobile manufacture, highway construction and maintenance, the fuel supply chain, tailpipe emissions and the fate of end-of-life vehicles.
For several decades following the advent of the automotive age, the document could have been titled "Automobile Service Stations". But now a consumer is more likely to fuel up at a convenience store with gasoline pumps rather than at a facility whose main line of business is automobile repair. Nevertheless, the impacts associated with automotive services form a distinct package, since their overall magnitude moves in lockstep with the number of miles driven, and it makes sense to consider them as a unit.
The operations of the automotive services sector are dispersed among hundreds of thousands of individual establishments, no one of which could be considered a major source of impact in a broad sense. However, its operations occur much closer, in physical proximity, to the public than is the case with most industrial sectors.
Many environmental assistance organizations have devoted a considerable amount of effort to preparing resource materials for this sector. The challenge lies in transmitting the message to such a widespread audience, and in ensuring its reception.
Environmental impacts and risks
Effects of existing and future regulations on impacts
The repair side of what we are calling the automotive services sector is a highly decentralized business. Facilities are located where the customers are, and the customers are uniformly distributed throughout the population as a whole. There are franchises, some of them large and nationwide, for certain specialties (mufflers and transmissions are well-known examples), but even these are more like collections of quasi-independent facilities with similar signage, decor, and framed policies on the wall than like plants under the general management of a typical corporation in a manufacturing sector. (Franchises associated with large department stores are an exception to this rule, but remain in the minority.) The 1997 Economic Census lists 164,360 establishments involved in one form or another of automotive repair and maintenance. (A detailed breakdown is available from the U. S. Census Bureau web page covering this category.
The retail gasoline side is similarly dispersed, and the sale of fuel is often just one category of product among many. The relevant 1997 Economic Census web page lists 126,889 establishments under NAICS category 447 ("Gasoline Stations"), of which 81,684 are in subcategory 44711 ("Gasoline stations with convenience stores"), and a lesser number, 44,719, are in subcategory 44719 "(Other gasoline stations")
*** Effect of leaking underground storage tank liability issues on service stations and industry consolidation.
Automobile service facilities are classified under several different NAICS and SIC codes. A summary is given in the table below. Additional details are accessible from the U.S. Census Bureau web page from which the table was derived.
| 1997 NAICS |
1997 NAICS U.S. Description | 1987 SIC |
1987 U.S. SIC Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8111 | Automotive Repair and Maintenance | ||
| 81111 | Automotive Mechanical and Electrical Repair and Maintenance | ||
| 811111 | General Automotive Repair | 7538 | General Automotive Repair Shops |
| 811112 | Automotive Exhaust System Repair | 7533 | Automotive Exhaust System Repair Shops |
| 811113 | Automotive Transmission Repair | 7537 | Automotive Transmission Repair Shops |
| 811118 | Other Automotive Mechanical and Electrical Repair and Maintenance | 7539 | Automotive Repair Shops, NEC |
| 81112 | Automotive Body, Paint, Interior, and Glass Repair | ||
| 811121 | Automotive Body, Paint, and Interior Repair and Maintenance | 7532 | Top, Body, and Upholstery Repair Shops and Paint Shops |
| 811122 | Automotive Glass Replacement Shops | 7536 | Automotive Glass Replacement Shops |
| *7549 | Automotive Services, Except Repair and Carwashes (automotive window tinting) | ||
| 81119 | Other Automotive Repair and Maintenance | ||
| 811191 | Automotive Oil Change and Lubrication Shops | *7549 | Automotive Services, Except Repair and Carwashes (lubricating service, automotive) |
| 811192 | Car Washes | 7542 | Carwashes |
| 811198 | All Other Automotive Repair and Maintenance | *7534 | Tire Retreading and Repair Shops (repair) |
| *7549 | Automotive Services, Except Repair and Carwashes (except automotive window tinting, lubricating, and towing) |
The NAICS and SIC categories track fairly closely, with the exception of a few specialties. The one exception of particular interest for this analysis is the separate category provided in the NAICS system for oil change and lubrication shops. Such shops are grouped into a more general classification in the SIC system. Because the most recent available air emissions data are based on the SIC system, it is not at this point possible to derive a figure for oil and lube shops specifically. Future data, when available on a NAICS basis, should make it possible to track this subcategory.
Gasoline service stations are classified by NAICS and SIC as follows:
| 1997 NAICS |
1997 NAICS U.S. Description | 1987 SIC |
1987 U.S. SIC Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| 447 | Gasoline Stations | ||
| 4471 | Gasoline Stations | ||
| 44711 | Gasoline Stations with Convenience Stores | *5541 | Gasoline Service Station (gasoline station with convenience store) |
| *5411 | Grocery Stores (convenience store with gas) | ||
| 44719 | Other Gasoline Stations | *5541 | Gasoline Service Station (gasoline station without convenience store) |
Neither system is completely satisfactory for our purposes here, since establishments which sell gasoline, but which which classify themselves primarily as grocery stores, will be grouped with other grocery stores, and such quantities of interest as VOC emissions from fueling operations specifically will be difficult to derive.
There are a number of organizations representing various specialties. Examples follow, selected to provide a sense for the breadth of specialties represented. A longer list is available on the trade associations page of a website called ShopTrac, "the home page for the auto repair professional".
There are also several organizations dealing with parts remanufacture, and parts recovery from end-of-life vehicles, including
Although end-of-life issues are, for the most part, outside the scope of this analysis, recycling activities are relevant to evaluating impacts of the repair sector, since re-use or remanufacture of serviceable parts recovered from end-of-life vehicles can mitigate the impacts that would otherwise occur if aftermarket parts had to be manufactured from scratch.
Air emissions data for certain key criteria pollutants (ozone precursors) are available from the National Emission Trends (NET) database (1999), and hazardous air pollutant emissions data are available from the National Toxics Inventory (NTI) database (1996 is the most recent year for which final data are available). For the SIC codes of interest here, the total emissions for volatile organic compounds (VOC), nitrogen oxides (NOx) and hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) are as follows (in tons per year):
| SIC | Subsector | VOC | NOx | HAP |
| 7532 | Top, Body, and Upholstery Repair Shops and Paint Shops | 2,510 | 29 | 102,909 |
| 7533 | Automotive Exhaust System Repair Shops | 0 | 12 | |
| 7534 | Tire Retreading and Repair Shops | 162 | 6 | 65 |
| 7536 | Automotive Glass Replacement Shops | 7 | 0 | 4 |
| 7537 | Automotive Transmission Repair Shops | |||
| 7538 | General Automotive Repair Shops | 363 | ||
| 7539 | Automotive Repair Shops, Not Elsewhere Classified | 4 | ||
| 7542 | Carwashes | 7 | 1 | 1 |
| 7549 | Automotive Services, Except Repair and Carwashes | 22 | 0 | 2 |
| Total, all automobile repair subsectors | 2,708 | 36 | 103,360 | |
| 5541 | Gasoline Service Stations | 10,523 | 96 | 21,973 |
| Total, all automobile operation subsectors | 13,231 | 132 | 125,333 |
The VOC emissions from service stations represent the biggest air quality impact of all contributors to atmospheric emission from automobile operation. However, its VOC emission level is an order of magnitude below the levels coming from other phases of the fuel supply chain, such as from petroleum refining (SIC 2911, at 161,207 tons per year), and petroleum bulk stations & terminals (SIC 5171, at 72,591 tons per year).
The HAP levels from paint shops are substantial, putting that source in the top dozen categories listed in the NTI (about on a par with gasoline distribution, and with the pulp and paper sector).
The fact that the HAP emissions listed from the same SIC codes exceed the VOC emissions by one or two orders of magnitude deserves some comment. Not all HAPs are VOCs: the latter are defined according to their smog-forming potential, and organic compounds which do not readily enter into the free radical reactions in the atmosphere that result in ozone production do not fall under the definition of "VOC" (volatile and organic though they may be). A list of compounds considered by EPA to be VOC-exempt can be found in the Code of Federal Regulations, at 40 CFR 51.100(s) . That said, the specific compounds on the list do not appear to account for the discrepancy. Apart from methane and ethane, there are few simple hydrocarbons on the list. The exempt compounds tend to be halogenated or partially oxygenated compounds, more in the nature of cleaning solvents than fuels.
*** [Check on what is behind this discrepancy. Exemption of small businesses from VOC reporting rules in some states? Or what?]
Most industrial facilities are physically located at some remove from the general public. To some extent in repair facilities, and to a very great extent in fueling facilities, the public is in as intimate contact with fugitive emissions from automotive service operations as workers on the shop floor are to emissions from industrial processes. The quantitative impacts summarized in the previous section, which for all facilities in the automotive service except paint shops are relatively low compared with emissions from the more significant of the industrial sectors, should be weighted accordingly. Gasoline fumes are, quite literally, "in the face" of the public, rather than being a fenceline issue.
** Regulation in the automotive services sector embodies a tension between the need to regulate a widespread activity involving closer contact with the general public than most manufacturing sectors, and the desire to relieve small businesses of the burden of regulation.
** Gasoline sellers in many locations are required to install VOC abatement devices. An example of typical requirements can be found in a detailed resource provided by the Ohio EPA. In that case, emission control requirements were phased in in two stages, with stage I applying to the transfer of gasoline from delivery truck to storage tank, and stage II applying to the transfer from the storage tank to individual vehicles.
** Some states have exempted gasoline service stations from air permitting requirements (see proposed rule changes in Minnesota, for example)
** A common regulatory term that covers retail gasoline suppliers is "gasoline dispensing facilities" (GDFs).
** Numerous state and local environmental assistance providers have prepared pollution prevention and compliance assistance information for auto repair and auto body shops. Among small business sectors, the auto services sector seems to have received as much attention as any other. An extensive list of resources available from various states can be found on the CCAR-Greenlink© website.
** Service stations also serve a regulatory function. Emissions inspection programs.
One of the Compliance Assistance Centers sponsored by EPA's Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA), CCAR-Greenlink©, is devoted to auto repair, at http://www.ccar-greenlink.org/
The Pollution Prevention Resource Exchange (P2Rx) provides a Topic Hub on Auto Repair at http://www.westp2net.org/hub/subsection.cfm?hub=4&subsec=1&nav=1
The North Carolina Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Division of Pollution Prevention and Environmental Assistance (DPPEA), operates the "P2Pays" website, with one of the most extensive collection of pollution prevention documents available on line. A wide variety of resource materials on auto repair is available from their information page at http://wrrc.p2pays.org/industry/autorepair.htm