Author(s)

H. Tang & M. Al-Sudairawi

Abstract

Noise is now playing an ever increasing role in our lives now. The trend to build more factories, to use more ground vehicles, and to increase aircrafts etc. has created an acceptance of noise. Thus, noise pollution becomes another category of environmental pollution, which threats human health and well-being. Every year, millions of people are exposed to hazardous noise. Many of them suffer impairment of hearing, and become victims of increasing accidents due to noise effects. Therefore, to conduct noise assessment for any new development and to reduce exposure to high noise levels have become a routine request. Based on increasing energy demand, a new thermal power station will be built in Kuwait. The noise pollution problem from this project has caused great attention in the local communities. We initiated a study to address the local concerns. This paper details the study, which includes monitoring program design, instruments, and assessment results. A simple empirical model was derived for noise level predications. Keywords: noise, assessment, pollution, impact. 1 Introduction Noise is part of our life and is playing an ever increasing role in our life. The trend of using new technologies, new transportation devices, new machines, new sound devices, new constructions etc. has gradually created an acceptance of noise as a natural by-product of progress. Noise is normally defined as unwanted sound and therefore noise characteristics are essentially sound characteristics. It has caused attention that different types of noise may adversely affect the environment of the neighbourhood and impact human life [1-3]. The human ear can detect sound ranging from 2 x 10-5 N/m2 (pascals) (the threshold of hearing)

Keywords

noise, assessment, pollution, impact.