About EPA Digitization Centers

EPA records digitization centers enable EPA to avoid significant costs spent storing and manually managing paper records, while making it easier for employees and the public to find EPA information.​

In May 2024, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) celebrated the grand opening of the National Digitization Center (NDC) East. This state-of-the-art facility enables EPA to digitize and eventually dispose of temporary and permanent paper records. EPA is one of the first agencies to open a digitization center to meet the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the National Archives and Records Administration’s (NARA) policies (M-23-07), requiring executive agencies to manage all permanent and temporary records in an electronic format, and to transfer records to NARA electronically. ​

EPA has over 26 miles of paper records spread across its facilities and the Federal Records Center storage sites. The agency anticipates avoiding significant costs that currently go to leasing Federal and commercial space to store paper records, as well as costs associated with the manual and labor-intensive process of retrieving information from paper records.​

“Think about what this could mean in terms of physical space, our ability to realize rent savings because we're able to use less space because we don't have to have storage. We can digitize those records, which could lead to millions of dollars in savings,” said Kimberly Patrick, Principal Deputy Assistant Administrator for EPA’s Office of Mission Support. “The opening of National Digitization Center, it means the world, when you think about it, because what we're here to do is to protect human health and environment, right? The proliferation of paper does not help that process.”​

EPA developed a custom tool (Paper Asset Tracking Tool PATT) to capture required metadata and track the location and status of each record throughout the digitization process. This ensures no information is lost in transit or during digitization. The agency is also investing in sophisticated technology. One of the scanners in the digitization center, the IBML Fusion 8300, was the first of its kind installed in the U.S.​

“I reflect on the records we have, and the data we have, it’s only as good as it's able to be accessed. So, we're not only optimizing the digitization of records, but we're also optimizing the discovery of information that can be used to make informed decisions going forward,” said Vaughn Noga, EPA’s Chief Information Officer and Deputy Assistant Administrator for Information Technology and Information Management. “The driving force was the OMB and NARA memorandum driving federal government to be better stewards, not just of how we manage paper records, but how we're going to a more digitized approach for managing our assets. The plan is that we've got to support the agency now, but we've got to be looking forward. Our path to being fully digitized is modernizing workflows and moving totally away from paper.”