By Jack Dini ——Bio and Archives--November 11, 2019
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Noise gets low billing as an environmental hazard. Bianca Bosker notes, “There is no Michael Pollan of sound. When The New Yorker recently proposed noise pollution as the next public health crisis, the internet scoffed. Noise is treated less as a health risk than an aesthetic nuisance, a cause for people who, in between rounds of golf and art openings, fuss over the leaf blowers outside their vacation homes. Complaining about noise elicits eye rolls. Nothing will get you labeled a crank faster.” 1
In 1960, there were no boom boxes, no boom cars, no leaf blowers, no jet skis, nor car alarms and hardly any snowmobiles. 2
The stereo sound systems we have in our cars today are much louder than the sound system the Beatles used for their concerts in the sixties.
Today millions of Americans suffer from noise pollution which can result in hearing loss and a very important point is that hearing loss is irreversible. Once hearing is lost it's lost forever. 3
Scientists have known for decades that noise, even seemingly innocuous volume of car traffic, is bad for us. “Calling noise a nuisance is like calling smog an inconvenience,” former US Surgeon General William Stewart said in 1978. In the years since, numerous studies have only underscored his assertion that noise “must be considered a hazard to the health of people everywhere.” Say you're trying to fall asleep. You may think you've tuned out the grumble of trucks downshifting outside, but your body has not. Your adrenal glands are pumping stress hormones, your blood pressure and heart rate are rising, your digestion is slowing down. Your brain pressure continues to process sounds while you snooze, and your blood pressure spikes in response to clatter as low as 33 decibels, slightly louder than a purring cat. 1
Experts say your body does not adapt to noise. Large scale studies show that if the din keeps up, over days, months, years—noise exposure increases your risk of high blood pressure, coronary heart disease, and heart attacks, as well as strokes, diabetes, dementia, and depression. Children suffer not only physically but also behaviorally and cognitively.
In the extreme, sound becomes a weapon. Since at least the 1960, scientists have investigated sound's potential to subdue hostage takers, protestors, and enemy troops, against whom on expert proposed using low frequency sound, because it apparently induces disorientation, vomiting fits, bowel spasms, uncontrollable defecation.
Study after study has reached the hardly earth-shattering conclusion that we largely prefer the sounds of nature to those of machines. A 2008 research project that played subjects 75 recordings ranging from a cat's meow to skidding tires, found the five most agreeable sounds to be running water, bubbling water, flowing water, a small waterfall, and a baby laughing. 1
The National Park Service's Natural Sound and Night Skies Division, which sends researchers to measure the acoustics of the American outdoors, estimates that noise pollution doubles or triples every 30 years.
Sound intensity is measured in decibels (dB); the unit A-weighted db (dBA)
is used to indicate how humans hear a given sound It's important to note that the decibel scale is a logarithmic scale, and that a doubling of loudness is represented by an increase of 10 decibels. 2
Ron Chepesuik reports, “Zero Db is considered the point at which a person begins to her sound. A soft whisper at 3 feet equals 30 dBA, a busy freeway at 50 feet is around 80 dBA and a chain saw can reach 110 dBA or more at operating distance. Brief exposure to sound levels exceeding 120 dBA without hearing protection may even cause physical pain. 3
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This table provides a more detailed breakdown on noise from various sources
| Device/Situation | dBA |
|---|---|
| Grand Canyon at night | 10 |
| Quiet room | 28 to 33 |
| Computer | 37 to 45 |
| Normal conversation | 40 |
| Dishwasher | 54 to 85 |
| Push reel mower | 63 to 72 |
| Telephone | 66 to 75 |
| Gasoline powered push lawn mower | 87 to 92 |
| Average motorcycle | 90 |
| Leaf blower | 95 to 105 |
| Chain saw | 110 |
| Average snowmobile | 120 |
| Average firecrackers | 140 |
| Average rock concert | 140 |
Noise is also fiendishly difficult to legislate, though for nearly as long as humans have lived together, we have seen fit to try. Presently, noise from wind turbines is a topic of concern.
Some complaints have been made that wind turbines can cause too much noise for residents living within a mile of the blades. So just how noisy are these turbines?
The closest that a wind turbine is typically placed to a home is 300 meters or more. At that distance, a turbine will have a sound pressure level of 43 dBA. To put that in context, the average air conditioner can reach 50 dBA of noise, and most refrigerators run at around 40 dBA. 4
Yet individuals living in proximity to turbines experienced higher levels of annoyance but could not state with certainty whether the annoyance was attributable to turbine noise or other factors such as attitudes toward the visual appearance of the turbines or financial reward. 5
In other words, people who dislike the look of turbines or who are not financially vested in the project may be more annoyed and higher levels of annoyance could cause people to notice the noise.
A World Health Organization report underscores the failure of current regulations of dB to manage health impacts from industrial wind installations worldwide. Another conclusion is that the wind industry has been given a regulatory path to profits with an unfathomable license to hurt in the form of sleep deprivation (and associated disease) for a very long time. 6
For years, a host of professionals and interested parties have asked World Health Organization in include wind turbine noise in its Guidelines. For the first time, WHO has announced guidelines for wind turbine noise. 7
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Jack Dini is author of Challenging Environmental Mythology. He has also written for American Council on Science and Health, Environment & Climate News, and Hawaii Reporter.