Development of noise modeling software for the evaluation and management of noise pollution in Malaysia

Abstract

Through the last decade, noise has emerged as one of the main environmental issues in Malaysia as a result of the rapid development in industrial, construction and transportation sectors. The Malaysian communities are becoming more sensitive to noise in their surroundings, and this is shown from the increase in complaints due to noise in residential areas and in noisy working conditions. Noise Assessment Software (NAS) has been develop by a team of researcher in the Department of Mechanical and Material Engineering, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia to assists the management, engineers and supervisors in industries to manage and minimize the impact of industrial noise to human. Another feature offered by NAS is analysis and evaluation of noise exposure to worker. If the amount of noise dose to workers can be established at the early stage, the management and supervision team can plan a better schedule and for the workers to minimize the impact of noise pollution to them. This indirectly can reduce the number of accidents due to human fatigue, increase productivity and prevent noise-induced hearing loss to the workers. The impact of industrial noise to the surrounding community can be assessed via computer stimulation module, which is available in NAS, in order to ensure noise generated by the industrial project is within the permissible level at the perimeter. This software has been utilized extensively to study the impact of industrial noise to human, namely for “Environment Impact Assessment (EIA)” report for power generation plants, process plants, highways, railways and many more