Strategic Noise Mapping in Athens International Airport: A Tool for Balanced Approach & Health Effects Evaluation

Athens International Airport (A.I.A) is the first major transportation infrastructure in Greece with the participation of the private sector, a pioneer international Public-Private Partnership. Environmental protection is a priority, and AIA, is committed to protect the environment and preventing or lessening negative impacts, through a comprehensive Environmental Policy and Procedures. Within this framework, AIA has already carried out the study for Strategic Noise Map (SNM) and the Noise Action Plan (NAP) for the Aircraft Noise. According to the European Directive 49/2002 the study should be repeated every 5 years. This research article focuses on the comparative study for the latest SNMs 2017 & 2019 (ECAC Doc.29) and for 2019 (executed by the new methodology CNOSSOS-GR), for the respective traffic data 2016 & 2018, and presents the results of the acoustic model in order to create the Strategic Noise Maps for L den & L night indicators. With a view to implementing the legislation, an analysis of aircraft mix for every year (except helicopters, military and other specific flights) was carried out in accordance with the categorisation provided for in the relevant recommendation of the Committee of 6 August 2003 and the European Commission adopted Directive 2015/996. The potential health effects were further analyzed using the World Health Organization (WHO’s) Disability Adjusted Life Year’s (DALY’s) metrics for aircraft noise in relation to the exposure of the population based on the results of alternative comparative Strategic Noise Maps. The aim of the study is to show how the combination of both the implementation of the European Directive 2002/49 and 2015/996 and the DALY approach is an analysis tool for the evaluation of the acoustic environment. As we can observe in the results, the overall findings are significantly lower in the case of SNM 2019 (executed by the new methodology CNOSSOS-GR) than in the others.