Locations of Major U.S. Federally Licensed Firearms Manufacturers and Their EPA Compliance Records

This data set presents major federally listed firearms manufacturers with EPA ECHO Records (2021) available for facilities that also appeared in ATF FFL reports on firearms manufacturing and exports (2000-2019). By combining EPA ECHO Records with FFL manufacturing reports, it is possible to further study the environmental impact of firearms manufacturing by location in the United States. The initial data sets were gathered from two main sources, and then combined. >> ATF Annual Firearms Manufacturing and Export Reports from 2000-2019 were aggregated across year. >> EPA ECHO Reports from October 2021 were identified using facility searches for top manufacturers. EPA ECHO Results were then appended with RDS keys and manufacturing totals from the ATF reports. 30 of the top firearms manufacturing locations, representing over 65 percent (n=79,411,915) of total firearms released into commerce (2000-2019, n=122,888,821), were identified in the EPA ECHO database. Both the largest and smallest producers in this abbreviated list were Smith & Wesson, sited in Springfield, Massachusetts, and Houlton, Maine. 11 of the facilities were located within 3 miles of populations that are majority People of Color, and listed 1.27 million pounds of toxic releases to the EPA Toxics Release Inventory. Geographic data sets that work to join together disparate records on manufacturing and compliance can improve our understanding of the costs of manufacturing that are non-monetary in nature, as well as the human and ecosystem costs that are unevenly distributed. Evaluation alongside other contemporary and historical records may yield more insight. For example, two Kimber manufacturing facilities, also spotlighted in the recent text Gunfight by Ryan Busse, were constructed in historically red lined areas, as defined by the federal Home Owners Lending Corporation (HOLC). The population nearby these manufacturing sites are 48 and 78 percent People of Color.