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Assessment of the human
health component of the Dublin Airport EIS
Introduction
I was asked to prepare a short review of the human health component
EIS submitted with the planning application for the proposed second
runway in Dublin airport.
Material considered
The EIS contains little material on the human health impact of the proposed
development. The non-technical summary simply says that the human health
impact of air pollution end noise emissions will be minimal.
There is more detail in one section of the main report - Section 18,
pages 337 to 346. The methodology used is described as follows :-
"In preparing this assessment information available in the medical
literature as well as noise and air assessments and contours prepared
as part of the environmental impact assessment have been reviewed."
This review is divided into two parts :-
1 The first covers issues of noise, This contains sections on noise
induced hearing loss; interference with speech communication; sleep
disturbance; cardiovascular and physiological effects; mental health
effects and effects on performance; effects of noise on residential
behaviour and annoyance. The summary concludes that the impact of environmental
noise related to the proposed runway on human health is assessed to
be negligible.
2 The second covers air quality. This records various recent measurements
of air quality at the site and concludes that for each pollutant considered,
that is Nitrogen dioxide, hydrocarbons, PM-10, sulphur dioxide and carbon
monoxide, the impact on human health of the operations of the new runway
will be negligible.
Critique
I have two major concerns about this section. First in my opinion, the
methodology used is inadequate. I do not believe that what seems to
be a small scale desk study is remotely adequate for assessing the health
impacts of a development of the scale proposed. I believe that formal
health impact assessment (HIA) process is necessary for this application.
I will describe what I mean by this later.
Even taking the document presented on its own terms I remain concerned.
First, most of the references given do not seem to be included in the
list of references in Section 20. This is unusual, and should be remedied.
In the circumstances I have made some assumptions about which papers
they refer to. Also the literature referenced is frequently out of date,
and they have not mentioned some exceptionally important recent work.
Finally the discussion of the possible impact of the exposures under
consideration on the population around Dublin airport is cursory.
Air quality
The review of air quality is inadequate. There is no reference at all
to any literature on the human health impacts of air quality. Knowledge
of the health effects of air pollution has increased greatly over the
last decade, and none of this is reflected in the material presented.
This should be completely redone, and in particular the health effects
of emissions from traffic using the airport should be included.
Noise
I would agree that this is likely to be the main source of human health
effects from the operations of the airport.
Noise induced hearing loss
The issue of noise induced hearing loss is of great importance for airport
staff, although it was not properly addressed in this EIS, but it is
not of much relevance for local communities.
Other noise related health effects
I shall discuss their coverage of other noise related health effects
together.
They discuss the impact on schools by referring to one study, that of
Evans (2002). I cannot find this reference, but there is a paper by
Hygge, Evans and Bullinger (A prospective study of some effects of aircraft
noise on cognitive performance in schoolchildren. Psychol Sci. 2002;13:469-74)
which I take to be the one they refer to.
There is far more literature on this issue which they do not seem to
have engaged with at all. In an hours work with an indexing service
I identified twenty papers on this exact topic, as well as about sixty
other papers relevant to the health effects of airport noise.
One which I consider of some importance is a recent paper by Haines
et al (Int J Epidemiol. 2001 Aug;30(4):839-45.) 'A follow-up study of
effects of chronic aircraft noise exposure on child stress responses
and cognition'. This is based on a study of children in schools near
Heathrow. It is worth quoting their conclusions in full :-
"At follow-up chronic aircraft noise exposure was associated with
higher levels of annoyance and perceived stress, poorer reading comprehension
and sustained attention, measured by standardized scales after adjustment
for age, social deprivation and main language spoken. ... The reading
and annoyance effects do not habituate over a one-year period and do
not provide strong evidence of adaptation."
Paraphrasing this into less technical language Haines et al. showed
that airport noise reduced the quality of life, and the educational
achievement of exposed children, and that these effects persisted over
time.
Another study from the same group (Haines MM et al, The West London
Schools Study: the effects of chronic aircraft noise exposure on child
health. Psychol Med. 2001 Nov;31(8):1385-96.) showed that airport noise
selectively impaired children's performance on the most difficult tasks
presented.
An exceptionally important article, which I would have expected the
authors to consider is a paper by Franssen EA et al. published early
in 2004. (Aircraft noise around a large international airport and its
impact on general health and medication use. Occup Environ Med. 2004;61(5):405-13.).
This important study showed significant and diverse low level effects
on human health in the communities living near Schiphol airport in the
Netherlands.
A very recent Italian study, published after the EIS was submitted,
(Hardoy MC, et al. Exposure to aircraft noise and risk of psychiatric
disorders: the Elmas survey Aircraft noise and psychiatric disorders.
Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol. 2005;40:24-6.) found that people
living close to a (small) airport in Sicily had a higher frequency of
long-lasting syndromal anxiety states (Generalized Anxiety Disorder
and Anxiety Disorder NOS). This supports the hypothesis that chronic
exposure to noise can have significant health effects on humans.
They also discuss sleep disturbance, again without seeming to be aware
of more recent work. Their discussion of the impact of this change in
airport use on the Dublin population is particularly abbreviated. I
reference only a recent paper by Fidell S et al (Social survey of community
response to a step change in aircraft noise exposure. J Acoust Soc Am.
2002;111:200-9.) which showed a marked increase in annoyance with airport
noise following the opening of a new runway at Vancouver International
Airport.
For cardiovascular disease, I would make the same complaints. There
is no reference to recent literature and the discussion of impacts in
Dublin is too short.
There is no discussion at all of possible impacts of noise on mental
health or on annoyance and residential behaviour in Dublin, and the
literature reviewed is out of date.
Conclusions (1)
In summary the assessment presented is inadequate on its own terms,
that is as a desk based literature review of the health impact of airport
noise on humans with reference to Dublin airport. It fails because the
literature review is out of date and inadequate, and because there is
very little attempt made to link the evidence in the literature to the
details of the proposed development and the community around it.
Health impact assessment
I would argue that for a development of this scale that a full health
impact assessment (HIA) will be required. There is little experience
with HIA in planning circles in Ireland, so it may be useful to briefly
describe this process. At its simplest HIA is a way of looking at the
health consequences of a policy and planning decisions. It is a structured
set of methods for considering, and assessing, the actual or likely
impact on human health of an existing or planned development.
Typical HIA's follow a staged process once the decision to conduct a
HIA has been taken. The first stage is a scoping exercise, to decide,
in consultation with the stakeholders (the developers the airport, the
local authority, the local community and others), what the HIA should
cover and what methods should be used.
The primary objective, in planning terms, is to maximise the benefits
of the development, while minimising the costs. There is legitimate
and reasonable concern that the operation of a second runway at the
airport will cause harm to local people.
The time to address these concerns, is at the planning stage, when decisions
can be taken to reduce or eliminate potential health effects from the
operation of the airport. Such changes are likely to cost considerably
less than if they have to be added on to an operating facility. In other
words, the same arguments which justify a careful EIS, also justify
a careful HIA, preferably conducted concurrently with the EIS.
Large scale HIA's usually involve elements of survey work with the local
communities, as well as desk exercises. Indeed much of our knowledge
about the health impact of airports comes from HIAs.
Conclusions 2
As presented the assessment of human health impact in the EIS does not
appear to be adequate to support planning decisions. There are many
obvious gaps, and the methods used are not appropriate for the questions
asked.
At a minimum this exercise needs to be redone, but it is my opinion,
given the scale of the proposed development, and the diversity of likely
health impacts, that a formal HIA procedure should be commenced.
Dr. Anthony Staines,
Senior Lecturer in Epidemiology,
University College Dublin,
Earlsfort Terrace,
Dublin 2.
E-mail
:- anthony.staines@ucd.ie
Mobile :- 086 606 9713
Office :- 01 716 7345
Fax :- 01 716 7407
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