This National Metal Finishing Environmental R&D Plan is a milestone for several reasons. It is one of the first environmental R&D plans for any sector in the country. It took a great deal of effort and persistence over nearly three years by industry, other stakeholders, and EPA staff to put it together. It needs both public and private sector participation to carry out the recommendations for R&D.

We commend the R&D Plan sub-group that drafted this document; the Research and Technology Work Group that reviewed drafts and developed criteria for rating projects; and the Metal Finishing Subcommittee for providing guidance and endorsement for the Plan.

We also wish to share this Plan with other CSI sectors so that they may consider developing similar environmental R&D plans for their sectors.

Finally, the Research and Technology Work Group has already undertaken two demonstration projects prior to the completion of the Plan, since there was imminent need for the information they would provide. Indeed, both demonstration areas rated very high in the priority project ratings.

Now the challenge is to seek funding and identify who will carry out the other priority R&D projects. This may be difficult with recent budget cut-backs, but the job has been made immensely easier by the existence of this Plan which represents a consensus on what research should be the focus of our efforts.

Funding to implement this Plan can come from many sources and occur in many ways. For example, academic researchers and researchers in national laboratories frequently ask EPA and others what the research priorities are in a particular area so they can utilize their existing funding and seek additional funding to target on the research projects that will make the greatest contribution. This Plan will vastly increase their ability to do that for R&D related to metal finishing.

In addition, DOD, DOE, NIST, NSF, and other Federal agencies besides EPA conduct R&D related to metal finishing. The clients of metal finishers--e.g., the automotive, electronic, and aerospace industries--and the suppliers to metal finishers of chemicals, process equipment, and analytical devices also do R&D related to metal finishing. Another purpose of this Plan, therefore, is to serve as a basis for coordinating these public- and private-sector funder efforts so that they address the priority R&D areas and are additive, not duplicative.

The Plan was largely outlined and coordinated by Teresa Harten (EPA National Risk Management Research Laboratory), who also participated in the management of workshops and other meetings and commissioned surveys of Federal and industry pollution prevention R&D related to metal finishing operations. Substantive contributors to the Plan included: Mark Arienti (Maine Metal Products Association), Eric Brooman (Concurrent Technologies Corporation), Diane Cameron/Ryan Clark (Natural Resources Defense Council), Michael Cournoyer (Los Alamos National Laboratory), Mark Ingle (EPA Office of Water), Brian Manty (Concurrent Technologies Corporation), and Paul Shapiro (CSI Coordinator, EPA Office of Research and Development, and Co-Lead Staff for the Metal Finishing Subcommittee).

Ken Saulter (Industrial Techology Institute, NIST Manufacturing Technology Center) developed the table relating the R&D goals to the metal finishing sector strategic goals and made other substantive inputs. Paul Shapiro analyzed the rating results and produced the final drafts of the Plan. Twenty-seven experts from all stakeholder groups participated in the R&D project rating process. The Plan was reviewed at various stages by the Research and Technology Work Group and at critical points by the Metal Finishing Subcommittee.

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Brian Manty

Concurrent Technologies Corporation

(AESF)

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Tim Oppelt

EPA National Risk Management Research Laboratory

Co-Chairs

Research and Technology Work Group

CSI Metal Finishing Subcommittee