Data Sources

Public records behind every report.

VetMyAddress uses public environmental, geographic, and infrastructure records — including EPA PFAS monitoring data — to create a plain-English screening report for any U.S. residential address.

U.S. Census Geocoder

Address matching

Matches a submitted address to geographic identifiers such as coordinates, county, state, ZIP, and census tract when available.

EPA AirNow

Air quality

Provides air quality readings from monitoring stations. Monitor readings are useful local signals, not measurements from inside a specific home.

EPA SDWIS

Drinking water compliance

Provides public water system and drinking-water compliance records. Matching depends on available service-area and public water system data.

FEMA National Flood Hazard Layer

Flood zone screening

Screens the geocoded point against FEMA flood hazard map data where available. It is not a lender flood determination.

FEMA National Risk Index

Natural hazard context

Provides tract-level natural hazard risk, expected annual loss, vulnerability, and resilience context.

EPA ECHO

Regulated facilities

Checks nearby EPA-regulated facilities and compliance records. Facility proximity is a screening signal, not confirmation of exposure.

EPA SEMS / Superfund

Cleanup sites

Checks active Superfund and cleanup-site records, including National Priorities List status where available. PFAS-confirmed NPL sites are flagged separately using the PFAS NPL crosswalk.

EPA UCMR 5

PFAS drinking water

EPA's 5th Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule required public water systems serving 3,300+ people to test for 29 PFAS compounds from 2021–2024. Results are matched to the address via the public water system identifier (PWSID) from SDWIS. Smaller systems were not covered by UCMR 5.

EPA Toxics Release Inventory (TRI)

PFAS industrial sources

Facilities that manufacture, process, or use PFAS above threshold quantities report to EPA's TRI program. VetMyAddress filters TRI to PFAS-reporting facilities (pfas_ind=1) and checks proximity to the address within 5 miles.

DoD PFAS Installation Report

Military PFAS sources

The Department of Defense publishes an annual status report of military installations with confirmed or suspected PFAS contamination from firefighting foam (AFFF). Installations within 5 miles of an address are flagged, with a risk modifier for those within 3 miles.

Mapbox

Address autocomplete

Helps users enter complete U.S. addresses accurately before report generation.

PFAS data — pre-loaded from federal bulk downloads

Unlike live API queries, PFAS data (UCMR 5, TRI, and DoD) is pre-loaded from EPA and DoD bulk datasets directly into our database. This eliminates dependency on external API availability at report time and keeps query latency under 5ms. Data is refreshed when EPA and DoD publish annual updates — typically quarterly for UCMR 5 and annually for the DoD installation report.

Data freshness

Some sources update within hours (AirNow), while others update periodically as agencies publish or revise records. PFAS data reflects the most recent federal bulk download. Each report includes source notes and freshness context so users can understand how current and specific a finding is.