Proposals to reduce the maximum noise limit of heavy trucks have been rejected by a plenary session in the European Parliament.
Although MEPs in the EU Parliament’s Environment Committee approved a proposal in December that would see most newly registered heavy road-going trucks restricted over an eight-year period to a maximum of 79dB(A) with off-roaders limited to 80dB(A) - a 1dB(A) reduction on today’s levels - a subsequent plenary vote in early February left the current limits for such vehicles unchanged.
The reduction proposal was conceived to help protect EU citizens from the health effects of persistent exposure to high levels of traffic sound, which the Environment Committee says can exhaust physical reserves, disrupt proper functioning of organs and lead to the development of cardiovascular and other diseases.
European vehicle manufacturers’ association ACEA welcomed the recent vote. An ACEA spokesman told MT.co.uk that Europe already had “some of the most stringent limit values in the world” on vehicle noise, adding that it would already be “extremely difficult, if not impossible” to meet those limits, particularly with heavy trucks.
Truck noise has already been radically reduced in recent years, he added. “It takes ten modern trucks to make the same amount of noise as one from the 1970s,” he said.
