Noise Pollution
Noise pollution is an unpleasant noise created by people or machines that can be annoying, distracting, intrusive, and/or physically painful.
- Noise pollution comes from sources such as “road traffic, jet planes, garbage trucks, construction equipment, manufacturing processes, leaf blowers, and boom boxes.”
- Sound is measured in decibels (dB). An increase of about 10 dB is approximately double the increase in loudness.
- A person’s hearing can be damaged if exposed to noise levels over 75 dB over a prolonged period of time. The World Health Organization recommends that the sound level indoors should be less than 30 dB.
IMPACTS OF NOISE
o Annoyance: It creates annoyance to the receptors due to sound level fluctuations. The a-periodic sound due to its irregular occurrences causes displeasure to hear and causes annoyance.
o Physiological effects: The physiological features like breathing amplitude, blood pressure, heart-beat rate, pulse rate, blood cholesterol are affected.
o Loss of hearing: Long exposure to high sound levels cause loss of hearing. This is mostly unnoticed but has an adverse impact on hearing function.
o Human performance: The working performance of workers/humans will be affected as it distracts the concentration.