Noise Pollution

Noise pollution is one of the leading problems to many things in New Zealand. In this research, I am going to research about what is noise pollution, who/what causes it, how does this affect people’s quality of living, the current laws on noise pollution and how to prevent noise pollution from various websites based on noise pollution.

What is noise pollution? Who/what causes it? How does this affect people’s quality of living?

Based on what-is-what.com, the definition of noise pollution is an open debate as there are no clear borders of which sounds are considered noise pollution. But from the other resources, I’ve found that noise pollution is a type of energy pollution made up of unwanted sounds. It is displeasing and disrupts the balance of human and animal life. Noise pollution is caused mainly from transports such as cars and air planes, or factories and even noisy people or animals.

Noise pollution has affected people’s quality of living as this could lead to problems such as annoyance, stress, hyper tension and tinnitus. These problems could greatly affect one’s health as stress and hyper tension are the leading causes to health problems. Noise pollution could also lead to hearing loss. From ehow.com, a research done in 2000 by the United States air force base in Okinawa, Japan. Results showed that due to the continual sounding of air craft, residents had increased level of hearing loss.

Despite the fact that noise pollution could lead to physical health problems such as higher mortality rate as there are lower birth weight. I think that noise pollution affects mental health more as this also leads to higher rates of disobedience in young school children.

What are the current laws on noise pollution?

There are also no definite laws on noise pollution as laws on noise pollution vary between cities. But according to what-is-what.com, little is currently being done to reduce noise pollution. The reason for this was probably because that people are not aware of their legal right to be quiet or they do not know how to register a complaint.

Although little is being done to reduce noise pollution, people still put efforts into reducing this. Based on environmental-protection.org from United Kingdom, Antisocial behaviour act 2003 enables local authorities to tackle night time noise between hours of 11pm to 7am. There are also laws on banning loud speakers between times of 9pm and 8am.

Neighbour noises are considered a more serious problem. Councils are given power to issue an anti-social behaviour order to anyone causing “harassment, alarm or distress” which includes noise due to the crime and disorder act 1998. The penalties of disobeying this order can leas to prison sentence of up to five years.

From these laws, I have realized that most people are not aware pf their legal right to be quiet as the laws are mostly about keeping quiet between certain hours. If the laws are broken, the punishments were usually quiet harsh as people could be fined up to £1000 or even being given a prison sentence up to five years in United Kingdom.

How do you prevent noise pollution?

Noise pollution can be reduced simply by building noise barriers or planting trees. But people also need to turn down their stereos when driving. Earphones could also be obtained or windows could be rolled up if they insist on listening to loud music. Another way to reduce noise pollution is to replace noisy mufflers. Quieter engines could also be used for jets and planes along with their flight paths and the time of the runaway use being altered.

Redesign of industrial equipment, road surface texture and tyres is also a great help as these are used frequently by many people through out the world. Although these adjustments could be helpful towards reduce noise pollution. The best way is to stand up for yourself and call the police when your neighbour exceed acceptable noise limits or go up to them and complain about it because people don’t usually notice what they have done wrong until someone tells them.

Conclusion

Noise pollution has large impacts on people through out the world nowadays. Many things such as plant more trees or redesigning of machines could be done to reduce this. But I personally think the best way to reduce pollution is to stand up for yourself and register a complaint whenever you think that your neighbour is exceeding the noise limits, and try not to produce too much noise whenever you can. When noise pollution is reduced, many health problems such as stress and hearing loss would be also be reduced. Therefore, people would live a happier and healthier life.