House of Lords Science and Technology Committee report: Impact of noise and light pollution on human health

On 9 May 2024, the House of Lords is due to debate the report from the Science and Technology Committee entitled ‘The neglected pollutants: The effects of artificial light and noise on human health’. The report was published on 19 July 2023 and the government responded on 1 December 2023.^[1]

1. What is noise pollution?

The European Environment Agency defines noise pollution as “harmful or unwanted sounds in the environment, which in specific local[e]s, can be measured and averaged over a period of time”.^[2] The most relevant sources of noise include means of transportation, such as aircrafts, trains and motor vehicles; industry, such as wind turbines; and leisure activities.^[3] The World Health Organisation (WHO) has outlined the harmful effects of noise pollution:

Excessive noise seriously harms human health and interferes with people’s daily activities at school, at work, at home and during leisure time. It can disturb sleep; cause adverse cardiovascular, metabolic, psychophysiological and birth outcomes; lead to cognitive and hearing impairment; reduce performance; and provoke annoyance responses and changes in social behaviour.^[4]

2. What is light pollution?

UK government guidance defines light pollution as “light shining where it is not intended or wanted”.^[5] It says light pollution is “a source of annoyance to people, harmful to wildlife and undermines enjoyment of the countryside or the night sky, especially in areas with intrinsically dark landscapes”.

Some environmental organisations, such as the Natural History Museum, define light pollution as all artificial light.^[6]

3.1 What are the current laws and guidelines?

3.1 Noise pollution

The Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005 amended section 79 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 to provide that noise emitted from premises and by “a vehicle, machinery or equipment in a street, or in Scotland, road” is a statutory nuisance.^[7] However, this does not apply to noise from traffic.^[8] Local authorities are required under the legislation to inspect their areas for statutory nuisances and to investigate relevant complaints.^[9]

Government planning guidance on noise states that developers must consider whether the overall adverse effect of the noise exposure relating to the development would be classed as ‘significant’, ‘lowest’ or none.^[10] These are defined as:

• Significant observed adverse effect level. This is the level of noise exposure above which significant adverse effects on health and quality of life occur.
• Lowest observed adverse effect level. This is the level of noise exposure above which adverse effects on health and quality of life can be detected.
• No observed effect level. This is the level of noise exposure below which no effect at all on health or quality of life can be detected.^[11]

The guidance states that effects cannot only be defined in terms of a single value of noise exposure. It says that “in some circumstances adverse effects are defined in terms of a combination of more than one factor such as noise exposure, the number of occurrences of the noise in a given time period, the duration of the noise and the time of day the noise occurs”.

There are also legal noise limits on vehicles under the Road Vehicles (Construction and Use Regulations) 1986 and noise from airports is regulated by various statutory instruments.^[12] There are no legal limits on noise from roads or railways.^[13]

In 2010, the then Labour government published the ‘Noise policy statement for England (NPSE)’ It stated that the government’s “noise policy vision” was to “promote good health and a good quality of life through the effective management of noise within the context of government policy on sustainable development”.^[14] The policy addressed the following types of noise:^[15]

• environmental noise, which includes noise from transportation sources
• neighbour noise, which includes noise from inside and outside people’s homes
• neighbourhood noise, which includes noise arising from within the community such as industrial and entertainment premises, trade and business premises, construction sites and noise in the street

It said the policy statement would mean that noise was properly taken into account “at the appropriate time” and enable noise to be considered alongside other relevant issues rather than in isolation. It also said that in the longer term the government hoped that existing policies could be reviewed and revised so noise management measures could be brought into line with the policy.^[16]

3.2 Light pollution

The Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005 also amended section 79 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 to include “artificial light emitted from premises or any stationary object so as to be prejudicial to health or a nuisance” on the list of statutory nuisances. However, certain premises are excluded from the section on artificial light: airports, harbours, railways, tramways, bus stations, public service vehicle operating centres, goods vehicle operating centres, lighthouses and prisons.^[17]

The planning guidance on light pollution states that when new developments are being designed the following should be considered:

• where the light shines
• when the light shines
• how much light shines
• possible ecological impacts^[18]

4. What did the committee’s report say?

4.1 Evidence and understanding

The House of Lords Science and Technology Committee’s inquiry into the effects of artificial light and noise on human health found that they contribute to a range of adverse health outcomes, including heart disease and premature death.^[19] However, the committee concluded that they are “poorly understood and poorly regulated”.

On noise pollution, the committee argued that while the increased risk to an individual of stroke and heart disease resulting from exposure is low, “the exposure of millions of people results in a significant aggregate health burden”. It said evidence suggested that:

• noise pollution from traffic results in 1mn healthy life years lost in western Europe per year
• in 2018, 130,000 healthy life years were lost in the UK because of noise pollution
• also in 2018, 40% of the British population were exposed to harmful noise levels from road traffic

The committee highlighted a lack of research into the sources and impacts of light pollution. It said more research was needed into measures of exposure to light pollution to quantify the effects on sleep and health. The committee said there should be more research into the effects of both noise and light pollution.

4.2 Departmental responsibility

The committee argued that the current government approach to regulating noise and light pollution was “confused”. It said that while the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) had the lead for regulating noise and light pollution, many of the tools for acting on these lay with other departments such as the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) and the Department for Transport (DfT).^[20] It stated that the DLUHC was not obliged to report complaints about noise and light to Defra. This meant that in the case of noise, where the NPSE applied, there was inconsistent application of policy and the departments needed to “close the feedback loop between policy ownership and policy impact for noise”. On light, it said the government should set a national policy for light pollution and provide local authorities with the resources they needed to take action in line with national targets.

4.3 Recommendations

The committee made a number of recommendations concerning the scientific evidence of health effects and public policy implications.^[21] The scientific evidence of health effects recommendations included:

• Defra should work with the UK Health Security Agency and other organisations to assess the significant, growing evidence of the health effects of noise.
• The UK should seek opportunities to collaborate with similar countries, sharing research data and methodologies.
• An interdisciplinary, independent advisory panel should be established to provide independent advice to the government and a forum for new evidence, particularly on emerging health effects and technologies, to be assessed.
• The government should commission research to establish how light intensity, wavelength, duration, time of exposure, light history and age affect the circadian system.
• Research should be carried out in order to establish the level of risk from glare, flicker, and dazzle, for example in night-time driving.
• Defra should establish a standard methodology for tracking, monitoring and reporting on light pollution.
• The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence should review evidence for the effectiveness of therapies such as light boxes that might promote improved circadian rhythms and therefore physical and mental health.
• The National Institute for Health and Care Research should commission research to establish the mechanisms by which green social prescribing may affect health.

Recommendations on public policy implications included:

• There should be a specific noise reduction target for the regulation of noise pollution.
• The government should use its mapping to identify key cost-effective interventions.
• It is essential that the government commit to extending the mapping beyond 24-hour averaged noise exposure to include metrics of pitch, peak volume and intermittency of exposure.
• Mapping and modelling tools should be used to identify the most cost-effective interventions to reduce the disease burden of noise pollution, including determining where retrofits make sense.
• The government should issue a light policy statement for England which details the government’s policy on minimising light pollution and the roles it expects different departments to play.
• The light policy statement and planning guidance should incorporate up-to-date guidance from the Society of Light and Lighting, the Institution of Lighting Professionals and the Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers on best practice for lighting.
• The government should make clear that exempt facilities are still expected to conform to best-practice lighting guidelines.
• Local authorities should report on complaints about light pollution to DLUHC so that central government can compare local authorities and highlight any issues.
• The government should take steps to ensure that the implications of the technological shifts required for net zero and adapting to climate change for noise and light pollution are understood and addressed early on.
• The status of light and noise pollution as policy areas under the aegis of Defra should be reviewed and interdepartmental co-ordination on these issues strengthened.
• DLUHC should set out what resources local authorities should have to respond adequately to light and noise pollution policies.

5. How did the government respond to the committee’s report?

The government responded to the committee’s report in December 2023.^[22] It set out its response under the headings “research and evidence”, “policy, legislation and co-ordination” and “advice, guidance and resourcing”.

5.1 Research and evidence

Regarding noise, the government said that much of the research and evidence work recommended by the committee was already under way.^[23] It highlighted a new noise mapping tool developed by Defra, which it said would enable national and local government to make decisions “on much improved evidence around the impacts of noise”. It said it had convened the Interdepartmental Group on Costs and Benefits (Noise Subject Group) (IGCB(N)) to assess the most recent health research on the impacts of noise, with a view to determining whether updates to the government’s guidance on assessing the economic impact of noise were necessary.

On light, the government emphasised the benefits of artificial light for safety, security and the night-time economy.^[24] It said there were “technical and data issues” that would need to be resolved before the methodology the committee called for could be developed. It said that unlike for noise, technical solutions to enable artificial light exposure to be mapped were not available.

The government agreed with the committee that the benefits of light and sound to humans was an area for further research. It said the National Institute for Health and Care Research was already taking action in this area, such as by making funds available for research, and research was under way into “social prescribing” of nature-based activities.

The government’s response said it did not agree that a formal expert body on either noise or light was “necessarily the effective approach to drawing in the right expertise” and that “flexibility must be maintained to draw in the most appropriate expertise to individual areas of research, rather than relying on a group of individuals to embody all necessary knowledge across the board”.

5.2 Policy, legislation and co-ordination

In response to the committee’s recommendation for an overall noise reduction target, the government said this was “not feasible without a significant amount of work to understand how targets could be set, standardised, measured and achieved across many different noise sources and authorities”.^[25] It said the government’s aim of promoting low-carbon energy solutions, such as air source heat pumps and onshore wind, was supported by work to identify potential noise issues and their solutions, and this might suggest changes to the current regulations. It also said the government would review the NPSE to determine the extent to which planning authorities were making use of it and use the resulting data to inform the upcoming review of the ‘National planning policy framework’ (NPPF). The government said it would make Defra’s noise modelling system available to all public bodies in order to provide “an accessible source of expertise to all”.

Addressing the committee’s recommendation for a light policy statement for England, the government said that significant gaps in the understanding of the effects of artificial light would need to be addressed before this was possible, and identifying these gaps should be a priority.

The government said that existing formal and informal engagement across government departments meant relevant policies were considered together.^[26] However, it said the UK Health Security Agency would consider creating a dedicated team focusing on light and health.^[27] It disagreed with the committee’s request for a statutory requirement for local authorities to report nuisance complaints to DLUHC, as this “would introduce a new burden on stretched local authorities”.

5.3 Advice, guidance and resourcing

The government agreed with the committee that there was “proliferation and lack of coherence in industry advice and guidance on artificial light”. However, it said there were also “clear avenues of advice and guidance from the government available within specialised work areas”. It highlighted existing sources of guidance and said that “the most significant gaps in readily available guidance can be explored through the wider review of the NPPF and subsequent updates to ‘Planning practice guidance’”.^[28] Finally, the government argued that the committee’s recommendation that DLUHC should set out what resources local authorities should have to respond adequately to light and noise pollution policies would “involve restricting the choices local authorities are able to make over their own staffing and funding priorities”.

---

Cover image by Giammarco Boscaro on Unsplash.