Five Easy Ways to Drive Green

By CINDY HUMISTON WEED | Milton Independent Writer

It's all around us but we hardly notice it: noise pollution.

The other morning, well before the sun had risen, I became aware of the loud hum, like an electric motor, in the distance. I've heard it may times before - and it has even caused me to close my window during many a hot, muggy summer evenings – and I deduce that it comes from a neighborhood dairy farm's milking pump. As I lay there waiting for daybreak, I began to ponder that if the noise was annoying me this much it could conceivably be bothersome, or downright unhealthy, for the cows in the barn.

Research corroborates my suspicions: noise can be a serious detriment to living beings. According to www.nonoise.org and the National Park Service, 1994, “sources of noise that have the potential to effect wildlife include aircraft overflights, recreational activities such as snowmobiling and motorboating, automobile traffic, and heavy machinery and equipment.”

Noise can do more. Noise related hearing loss affects 28 million people in the United States and the trend is occurring at younger and younger ages, according to the League for the Hard of Hearing website. According to the website http://stress.about.com, noise can also can cause stress; aggression (Donnerstein and Wilson, 1976); physiological changes in sleep, blood pressure and digestion; elevate blood pressure; impaired cognitive functioning; cause a state of chronic stress; and damage a developing fetus. William H. Stewart, former U.S. Surgeon General, said, “Calling noise a nuisance is like calling smog an inconvenience. Noise must be considered a hazard to the health of people everywhere.” Noise is a big problem.

The unit used to measure environmental sound intensity is the decibel (dBA), according to the League for the Hard of Hearing. “Zero decibels is approximately the softest sound the healthy human ear can hear. The scale increases logarithmically; that is, the level of perceived loudness doubles every 10 decibels. Experts agree that continued exposure to noise above 85 dBA, over time, will eventually harm hearing. In general, the louder the sound, the less time required before hearing will be affected.” The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) recommends that hearing protection be worn in the workplace when loudness levels and exposure time exceed the allowable standards, such as operating a power saw at 110 dBA. They suggest that continued exposure to noise over 85 dBA (about the level of city traffic, a whistling kettle, a vacuum cleaner) will eventually harm hearing and that the exposure time allowed is cut in half for every 5 decibel increase. Live music concerts can be measured at 110-120 dBA, snowmobiles at about 99 dBA, and stock car races at 130 dBA (and yes, I wear earplugs; I wear them to vacuum). Interestingly, even noise at levels well below 85 dBA has been found to negatively impact the health and quality of life in a community (the steady hum of an electrical motor in the distance?), according to the League for the Hard of Hearing's website. The Environmental Protection Agency identified an indoor day-night average sound level of 45 dBA in order to get a good night's sleep – about the same as a quiet residential area.

Noise-induced hearing loss is permanent, typically occurs gradually and without pain and is cumulative across a life span. Often, by the time a person realizes that there is hearing loss –damage to the delicate hair cells of the inner ear - it is too late. Warning signs that need attention: “ringing or buzzing (tinnitus) in the ears immediately after exposure to noise, a slight muffling of sounds after exposure making it difficult to understand people when you leave a noisy area, and/or difficulty understanding speech; you can hear all the words but you can't understand all of them”, according to League for the Hard of Hearing website.

I experienced the former– a serious ringing of the ears – once a few decades ago and I'll never forget it. I was performing on stage at a wedding and a joker came along and put a cherry bomb into a ceramic toilet that he set up on stage. We were totally unaware of what was about to happen, too close to the action, and the blast was unbelievably piercing. After the borderline painful ringing in my ears subsided, I was temporarily deafened - but permanently angered - by the exceptionally foolish stunt that probably damaged my delicate ear hairs and my hearing forever.

Noise pollution is preventable and must be minimized for everyone's health. Silence is still golden.