03-26-12 NPS used falsified acoustic data to deceive Public an Peer review of dEIS

On March 21, Dr. Clark, of Cornell, was informed of the falsified data and retracted his support of the dEIS data and stated he “does not believe that these activities have a biologically significant impact on wildlife…”

Why? Ask yourselves, do these sound equal?

A 4-STROKE 70 HORSEPOWER JET SKI  versus a  2-STROKE, 20 HORSEPOWER, oyster boat?

Noise measurements at 4 feet above water line and 2 feet behind a 70 HP boat engine, to those at 50 feet from a 20 HP boat engine?

A Federal Highway Heavy Construction Diesel Forklift at 78 dBA, to the Oyster Farm’s Small Front End Loader at 64-65 dBA?

A 4-foot tall Federal Highway Heavy Construction Jack-Hammer at 85 dBA,  to an  18-inch hand held drill producing 70 dBA used by the oyster farm?

A Federal Highway Heavy Construction Rivet Buster at 79 dBA, to a 12v electric motor oyster tumbler at 50 dBA?

Noise factors overstated by a factor of 12 to 825 times in dEIS

What does this mean?

It would take TWELVE (12) boats like the DBOC oyster boat, all operating in the same location to generate the 71 dBA stated in the dEIS. (see page 30, Table H-1, footnote “b” in the linked document).

What difference does 10 decibels make?  “An increase of 3 dB is a doubling of the “strength” of the sound, and an increase of 10 dB means that the sound is 10 times as loud; i.e., 70 dB is 10 times as loud as 60 dB.”  http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/eng99/eng99325.htm

Here are some typical sounds, and their levels.

Sounds dB SPL
Rocket Launching                                  180
Jet Engine                                                  140
Air Raid Siren 1 Meter                          130
Jet takeoff (200 ft)                                 120
Discotheque                                              110
Firecrackers                                              100
Heavy Truck (15 Meter)                         90
Alarm Clock (1 Meter)                             80
Noisy Restaurant                                       70
Conversational Speech                            60
Light Traffic (50 Meter)                           50
Quiet Office                                                    40
Library, Soft Whisper (5 Meter)           30
Broadcasting Studio, Rustling Leaves 20
Hearing Threshold                                         0

For the full text of Dr. Goodman’s review of the NPS & Atkins review of soundscape deception, click the link below:

NPS DEIS and ATKINS review soundscape deception.9.2MB

Posted by Jane Gyorgy on March 26, 2012

https://oysterzone.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/03-26-12-nps-used-falsified-acoustic-data-to-deceive-public-an-peer-review-of-deis/