PRTRs benefit Governments by enabling Governments to:
- Review the compliance of local facilities with their permit conditions;
- Track the release of hazardous chemical substances and pollution trends over time;
- Examine progress in reducing emissions;
- Monitor compliance and national progress with international commitments;
- Set priorities for reducing or even eliminating the most potentially damaging releases;
- Identify priority industrial sectors for eco-innovation;
- Use PRTR results as one input for assessing risks to human health and the environment;
- and to help achieve pollution prevention, lessening the burden of control regulations, which require a large bureaucracy to monitor and enforce.
PRTRs also reduce costs to Government and industry by providing a coordinated reporting system.