Noise Pollution and Infant Health

Noise, or unwanted sound, is ubiquitous in urban environments. I introduce a new approach to measuring noise at scale using seismometers and compile the largest publicly available database of ambient noise. Using a research design leveraging idiosyncratic variation in electric passenger rail noise exposure, I estimate the impact of noise pollution on infant health. In utero noise pollution exposure harms health at birth. A 2 decibel increase in average noise levels during pregnancy—a small but perceptible increase—lowers an overall index measure of infant health by 4 percent of a standard deviation, equivalent to one-third of the Black-White gap in the index. This effect is driven by nighttime noise, suggesting disruptions to maternal sleep as a main mechanism. Overnight rail services, which account for only about 5 percent of overall ridership, generate an average externality of $18 per trip. In per passenger-mile terms, overnight rail noise externalities are comparable to rush hour traffic congestion externalities from private vehicles. Using seismic data and machine learning, I produce a novel map of noise for the contiguous United States and use this map to assess noise exposure and costs nationally. Eighty percent of urban residents are exposed to potentially harmful levels of nighttime noise. I estimate that the annual cost of noise pollution due to harms to health at birth is $9.8 billion. Urban, Black, and Hispanic Americans disproportionately bear these costs.

Biography

Simon Greenhill is a PhD candidate in Agricultural and Resource Economics at UC Berkeley. His research focuses on the measurement and regulation of environmental externalities, including water pollution, climate change, and noise pollution. Simon's research has been published in Science, and he was a lead author of the Economics chapter of the Fifth National Climate Assessment. He holds undergraduate degrees in economics and Arabic from UC Berkeley and worked as a pre-doctoral fellow in the Climate Impact Lab prior to graduate school.