Environmental Noise Directive (END)

Article 9 provided that the strategic noise maps and the action plans which were drawn up were to be made available and disseminated to the public concerned. The information was requested to be "clear, comprehensible and accessible". The public was to be given the possibility to participate in the elaboration of the noise reduction action plans. Apparently, the underlying idea of this provision - and of the whole Directive - was that the published noise levels would raise concern among the population and generate pressure on the public authorities to adopt noise-reducing measures. This is, however, made difficult, as Directive 2002/49/EC does not state anywhere what kind of noise level creates annoyance, disturbance or health problems for citizens. In particular, the guidance values of the WHO were not referred to anywhere, so that the public lacked any parameters against which they could assess whether they are exposed to too much noise.

According to Article 11 European Commission had to publish a Report of 2011 on the implementation of Directive 2002/49/EC (further in the text – Report), which was to assess the need for further EU actions on environmental noise. The provision explicitly mentioned that long-term and medium-term goals for the reduction of the number of persons who were harmfully affected by environmental noise and the protection of quiet areas in open country should be considered. Furthermore, the report was to review the acoustic environmental quality in EU.

The Report did not discuss the acoustic environmental quality within EU at all and also did not raise questions about medium-term and long-term goals for the reduction of the number of people who were exposed to too high levels of noise. It mentioned that overall some 65 million people were exposed to noise levels above 50 dB(A) during the night and about 105 million people to noise levels above 55 dB(A) during day-time.       However, it was very careful to avoid mentioning that these levels were considered to be too high by the WHO. The Report did not comment on the fact that these figures were dramatically higher than the figures mentioned in the Green Paper which was referred to above.

As regards the fixing of noise levels, the Report was outspoken:

The Report did not explain with one word why limit values for pollutants were fixed by EU as regards water (Directive 2008/105/EC), air (Directive 2008/50/EC) and soil (Directive 86/278/EEC), but could not be fixed for acoustic pollution. It rather indicated that EU would concentrate on measures relating to sources of environmental noise.