Environmental Protection UK - Recent Work

Recent Work

Air Quality Since the Act received its Royal Assent in 1995 the Society, through the Air Quality Committee, has been instrumental in producing supplementary guidance documents to assist local authorities in implementing Local Air Quality Management. Although the Government had produced technical and policy guidance this still left some grey areas because such national guidance inevitably could not deal with every eventuality. Initially the NSCA guidance addressed the processes of assessing air quality problems and the thorny questions surrounding the declaration of Air Quality Management Areas. A second round of guidance looked at the development of Air Quality Action Plans. More recent guidance has addressed the thornier problems of incorporating air quality into the local development control planning regime.

Air quality continues to be a major problem in the UK, despite opinions given from time to time that it is ‘fixed’. Currently the Government’s Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollution (COMEAP) estimates that approximately 24,000 deaths per year are advanced due to the effects of “normal” UK concentrations of air pollution. In hot years such as 2003 this figure may have been even larger.

Noise The organisation has a long standing interest in noise issues - in 1984 publishing 'Noise and Society', prompted by a rise in concern about noise - in particular from traffic, over the preceding 20 years. The NSCA Noise Committee was formed in 1986, in particular in response to increasing concerns about the poor quality of sound insulation in flat conversions - and the committee undertook a survey and reported on the problem. This marked the beginning of increasing involvement in working in the UK and EU on developing practical and policy solutions both in neighbour noise and environmental (transport) noise.

Neighbourhood Noise NSCA first co-ordinated a 'Noise Awareness Day' in 1997 - engaging around 50 local authorities in raising awareness of neighbourhood noise problems. Over time, the need for an initiative to raise awareness of solutions to everyday noise problems and the ways to tackle them means that the campaign, now 'Noise Action Week', is still going strong across the UK - receiving support from housing providers, local authority noise teams, mediation services and schools.

Environmental Noise Transport is a major source of environmental noise - and, like air pollution, has a huge impact on the health of those exposed - second only to air pollution according to the World Health Organisation. EPUK worked closely with European partners lobbying for the reduction of vehicle noise - in particular on ensuring tyre noise was included on the environmental tyre labels to be in introduced in November 2012 - running a Campaign for Better Tyres in the UK 2010 - 2012.

The organisation also worked with industry and government in trying to achieve an up to date methodology for the prediction of wind turbine noise.

Environmental Protection UK continues to have membership amongst local authorities with a substantial contribution from consultants, academics, private individuals and industry. The organisation has seven divisions in England and a division each in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.