The inventory was first proposed in a 1985 New York Times op-ed piece written by David Sarokin and Warren Muir , researchers for an environmental group , INFORM . Congress established TRI under the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act of 1986 ( EPCRA ) , and later expanded it in the Pollution Prevention Act of 1990 . The law grew out of concern surrounding Union Carbide 's releases of toxic gases in the 1984 Bhopal disaster and a smaller 1985 release in Institute , West Virginia
Bhopal disaster
Bhopal disaster
Toxics Release Inventory