Noise
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Noise Articles
Below is a list of articles that have been published on this topic.
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Noise in the Workplace
Long Term Sense
Listen Up - While You Can
2012-12-19 EHS News: Mark Da Silva reviews the literature to ascertain the elements a hearing conservation programme must contain in order to prevent noise induced hearing loss. Introduction A hearing conservation prog
Modern Measurement Challenges
Modern Measurement Challenges [Sep 2012]. Published in AWE International - Air, Water & Environmental monitoring, analysis and control of industrial process emissions in Europe and the Middle East. AWE International (Air, Water and Environment) is the only A4 glossy magazine that reports to Europe and the Middle East on matters relevant to the environmental analysis industry.
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Setting the Noise Agenda
Setting the Noise Agenda [Sep 2012]. Published in OSA Magazine - . The region’s only A4 glossy, English language journal tying the entire region together for regulations, best practice, training and, most importantly, Personal Protective Equipment for the work force.Reporting to the high-risk industries such as oil and gas, petrochem, construction, mining, utilities...
Giving Sound Advice
Hearing loss is a cross-industry, international problem that anyone exposed to too much noise can suffer with. As one of the most common work related illnesses, the global burden of noise-induced hearing loss has a heavy price to pay, with 16 percent of cases worldwide put down to occupational noise exposure.
What Have You Heard About Noise?
The European Union’s Green Paper on Future Noise Policy estimated that 80 million people throughout Europe suffer from unacceptable noise levels that cause sleep disturbance, annoyance and adverse health effects. The Green Paper further estimated that around 40% of the European population lives in areas where environmental noise causes serious annoyance during the daytime.
Industrial Noise Exposure
Occupational noise exposure has been linked to a variety of negative health effects by various researchers around the world. Occupational noise induced hearing loss (NIHL) is the most prevalent irreversible industrial disease and noise is the biggest compensable occupational hazard in many countries according to a WHO report.
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Noise and Vibration [Nov 2011]
Noise and vibration are among the most common hazards to be found in the workplace. Often underestimated in terms of the permanent and devastating effects they can have on the health and wellbeing of workers, such as permanent deafness and damage to nerves, muscles and joints, both noise and vibration need to be measured, monitored and adequately controlled.
Rising to the Challenge of a 'Buy Quiet' Campaign
A new international initiative to encourage industry to purchase quieter tools and machinery highlights the benefits of using machines that are quiet by design, rather than installing noise control treatments retrospectively. But what can machinery manufacturers do to reduce the noise emissions of their products?
Occupational Noise Measurement
Occupational hearing loss is damage to the inner ear - a form of acoustic trauma - from noise or vibrations due to certain types of jobs or entertainment. Sound is heard as the ear converts vibration from sound waves into impulses in the nerves of the ear.
Listen Up!
A subjective definition of noise could be ‘unwanted sound’. What is noise to one person is just entertainment to another. Ask two persons of different ages what they think about Rap music, for instance.
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Environmental Noise Monitoring
European legislation is calling for ‘noise action plans’. How good are current models based on prediction, and can a new technology provide a fuller reporting method? Richard Barham, a researcher at the National Physical Laboratory’s Acoustic Group, outlines current legislation and how improved measurement can help to meet it.
Noise
My first experience regarding the hazards of noise and noise measurement was in 1960 when starting my initial career as a shipbuilding apprentice. At that time the Shipbuilding and Ship Repairing Regulations, 1960, were being introduced, which supplemented the requirements of the Factories Act and replaced the Shipbuilding and Ship Repair Regulations of 1931.
Noise Monitoring [Dec 2010]
This article explores the background to health and safety at work with respect to hearing, an often under estimated problem, not only because it is not immediately,apparent when we put our hearing at risk – the symptoms can occur years later – but also because of the consequences hearing loss can have upon our lives.
The Selection of Hearing Protection
There are many aspects to noise within the workplace, from conducting a risk assessment to noise control measures, but at some point within the process it is likely that it will be necessary to issue Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) to at least some employees.
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Environmental Noise Pollution
Environmental noise pollution, what causes it, how it affects us, how we measure it and what is being done about it.
Industrial Noise - The Severity of Noise as an Industrial Hazard is Underestimated
Noise is probably the most widespread and underestimated of industrial hazards in the workplace and is a real risk to millions of people every day when they are at work.
A Safe Place to Work - Noise can be harmful, causing short term or acute damage
When thinking of noise do you think of your workplace? If you’re lucky, then hopefully not. But there are people who come across excessive noise every day at work.
Ear Protection
In noisy workplaces hearing must be protected with hearing protectors. Often the results are poor, however, which makes the ear protection a bad investment. The key to successful ear protection is the careful planning and deep understanding of things that can go wrong. Failing to do so means the numbers suffering hearing loss will ?not decrease.
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Monitoring of Industrial Noise
How environmental noise like industrial noise can be determined optimally depends on the situation and the scale in which goals with respect to noise control apply. Only for major industrial plants like manufacturing sites, petrochemical and pharmaceutical operations, construction sites and power stations and oil refineries, it is necessary and cost efficient to perform complex calculations and measuring (monitoring). Such a goal can be the reduction of the average noise emission in a certain area or at a single receiver position. In these cases an integral view of all aspects of environmental noise assists the policy makers in designing more effective policies concerning noise. An example of such a policy is the European guideline for mapping of environmental noise1.
Noise Monitoring - Preventing the sad slip into silence
Colin Chatten relates his early memories to the importance of monitoring noise in order to prevent hearing damage being caused at work.
Sound Practice - Noise Measurements in Health and Safety
Adrian Hirst argues that whilst the measurement of noise can be an involved process, the evolution of modern noise measurement equipment has been a boon for the technophobes as well as the technophiles.
Noise Exposure - Meeting the challenges of employee noise exposure in the oil and gas industry
Noise exposure legislation, designed to protect the hearing of employees and prevent noise nuisance, is becoming tougher and more widespread.
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Noise Measurement - A five point checklist to choosing the right equipment
Noise legislation, designed to protect hearing and prevent noise nuisance, is becoming tougher and more widespread. It’s a response to our increased understanding of the damage that noise can do to hearing, and the negative impact it can have on quality of life in the wider community.
Sounding Off About Noise
The EU Noise Directive and the noise legislation that spread across Europe as a result, impacted companies of every description. According to their respective safety professionals, P&O found that it couldn't drop anchor without providing appropriate hearing protection to deckhands close to the descending chain, and Rolls Royce Turbine Division discovered that overnight it now had fi ve noise hazard areas on a site that previously only had one.
Noise Monitoring [Sept 2009]
Environmental noise modelling describes the process of theoretically estimating noise levels within a region of interest under a specific set of conditions.
Noise Monitoring [Aug 2009]
Noise exposure legislation, designed to protect the hearing of employees and prevent noise nuisance, is becoming tougher and more widespread. It's a response to our increased understanding of the damage that noise can do to hearing and the negative impact it can have on quality of life in the wider community.
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Industrial Noise
The environment we live in is a massive issue and one that’s having a growing impact on all our lives, and everyone’s being encouraged to play their part.
Environmental Noise Monitoring
Living next to the main railway going north from Oslo, Norway, I have some firsthand experience when it comes to environmental noise. There are more than 60,000 train passes outside my window in a year. To many people’s surprise I have little problem with it. The main reasons are that I live in a modern building with triple glass windows and the majority of the trains passing are modern low noise train passing slowly. However, some nights there will be a fast passing diesel locomotive or a squeaky goods train that can wake up the whole neighbourhood.
Noise and Vibration [Jan 2009]
Every day, millions of employees in Europe are exposed to noise at work. In case exposure to noise occurs over several years/decades at levels, for example a road builder is exposed to, this may cause hearing impairment, if protection is not provided or is not used.
Environmental Noise Monitoring
Noise pollution is a problem controlled and managed by numerous pieces of legislation, standards and documents providing guidance. In the UK, each piece of guidance or legislation varies sufficiently to cause a certain degree of conflict, which can lead to confusion and conflict amongst site operators, developers, regulators and the general public.
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Don’t Turn a Deaf Ear
The requirements of the new European Noise Directive on the minimum health and safety requirements regarding the exposure of workers to noise [Directive 2003/10/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 6 February 2003] change the conditions of design and testing for some types of hearing protectors as well as the conditions for selection and use of all types of hearing protectors. Stakeholders responsible for health and safety in companies need to know details on changes which have to be considered within the selection of hearing protectors and their consideration within the risk assessment.
Industrial Noise Measurement
Noise exposure legislation, designed to protect the hearing of employees and prevent noise nuisance, is becoming tougher and more widespread.
Rocking the Leisure Business
A quiet look at the noisiest industry in town. Patrons of loud concerts and bars are there out of choice and exposed to the noise only occasionally but these venues are places of employment for millions of people across Europe who work in the music and entertainment industry, and for whom the question of choice is less clear.
Continuous Noise Monitoring
The increasing awareness of the public of environmental issues such as CO2 emissions, carbon footprints and waste recycling has brought the issue of environmental noise to the fore. Many of the demands of modern society result in the creation of noise sources such as larger airports, additional power stations and higher road traffic levels.
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Physiological Effects of Noise
Noise affects hundreds of workers per year and in this article we shall consider the effects of high noise level exposure and review the various types of noise induced hearing loss that may occur. Finally we will then consider the general crime of noise exposure and health and what the approach to hearing conservation should be.
Noise Measurement
Advice when considering equipment - With the need for both workplace and environmental noise measurements becoming more widespread, it is essential that users have the appropriate tools to carry out these tasks. Noise measurement instruments, and Sound Level Meters in particular, can vary hugely in cost as well as in complexity. It is possible to find instruments, usually via the Internet, priced from as low as £20 and it is also possible to spend well over £5,000 for a sound level meter. Selecting a Sound Level Meter suitable for making noise measurements can often be confusing as well as expensive if the wrong choice is made.
Noise at Work
The ‘Control of Noise at Work’ Regulations came into force in April 2006. Over one year on from the introduction of the regulations, here is a reminder of what they require and the changes they introduced. Plus, here are some tips on when and how to conduct noise measurements in the light of the laws and how to use noise measurement equipment correctly.
Noise Assessment
With increasing pressure to construct on brownfield sites, residential developers are having to consider constructing on sites with inherent noise issues. In order to maximise the development potential of these sites, the existing noise environment must be accurately characterised and the impact of existing and predicted future noise sources assessed. In many instances, these predictions are most effectively undertaken using computerised predictive and mapping techniques.
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Reduce the Effect of Noise
Recent research cited by the HSE estimates that over 2 million people are exposed to potentially harmful levels of noise during work. Nearly 200,000 people are believed to suffer from partial deafness, tinnitus or other hearing complaints due to excessive workplace noise exposure. Civil compensation for noise induced hearing loss (NIHL) rose dramatically after the Noise at Work Regulations 1989 were introduced in 1990. This legislation provided employees with statutory protection from noise in the workplace by setting clear noise exposure limits, which required employers to assess noise levels in the workplace against these limits, deciding whether they complied and then to provide suitable protection to employees where relevant.
Monitoring Environmental Noise Pollution
Noise pollution is a problem controlled and managed by numerous pieces of legislation, standards and documents providing guidance. In the UK, each piece of guidance or legislation varies sufficiently to cause a certain degree of conflict, which can lead to confusion and conflict amongst site operators, developers, regulators and the general public.
Vibration and Noise
Recent regulations include a number of changes, with the Control of Vibration at Work Regulations in force since October 2005 and the Control of Noise at Work Regulations which came into force in April this year there are a number of changes in legislation that employers need to take on board.
Environmental Noise Impact Assessment
Environmental noise has always been with us, from the dramatic results of thunderstorms, to the gentle rustling of leaves by the wind. There are more frequently encountered natural sources too, such as water flowing in streams, various animal calls, and the dawn chorus as birds welcome the rising sun. However, with the advent of the industrial society there has been an explosion in the number of man made sources; ever since man started to use primitive tools, noise has been the unwanted side effect.
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Control of Noise at Work
Regulations, equipment and guidelines on use
Not Quiet Over Noise Pollution
Noise can be annoying, interrupt conversation, disturb sleep and, in extreme conditions, cause damage. The types of noise that are experienced can be classified into some fairly broad categories: occupational noise which is experienced at work, neighbour or neighbourhood noise and environmental (ambient) noise caused by transport and industry.
Cutting Down Noise at Work
Frequent exposure to loud noise can cause permanent, irreversible loss of hearing and tinnitus. Yet in most (if not all) cases this is entirely preventable.
Every day millions of workers all over Europe are exposed to dangerously high levels of noise. Statistics indicate that one in five European workers have to raise their voices to be heard for at least half of the time that they spend at work - suggesting that they are at real risk of noise-induced hearing loss - and that 7% suffer from work-related hearing difficulties.
Come On Feel the Noise!
Granted, most people work in office environments where they are not exposed to the same noise as an operator of welding working next to an aluminium die casting machine. Even fewer of us live near industrial premises, but that doesn’t mean most of us are not exposed to bothering noise. Before we go any further we need to make the simple distinction between sound and noise, and in particular workplace noise and environmental noise.
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Noise- A Pain in the Ears!
Despite the existence of Noise at Work regulations since 1989, the problem of understanding noise remains among some industrial users.
Sound Advice
Often, in the world of health and safety, we concentrate on the obvious hazards within the workplace and forget those aspects that do not immediately present themselves as a risk.
Noise and Vibration [July 2003]
After many delays and false starts, a pair of directives arrive within a few months of each other. Regulations based on the directives must be implemented by member states before July 2005 for Hand - Arm Vibration and February 2006 for Noise. As the new requirements come into force so close together, there is a considerable incentive to spread the workload involved in updating risk management procedures and assessments by taking proactive action now.
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