The legal basis for environmental noise protection in Slovenia consists of:
- Environment protection act. This act represents a broad frame of protecting the environment against pollution. It defines base principles for environmental protection, mitigation measures, change in the environment, and the collection and liaison of information concerning the state of the environment or other concerns about its protection.
- Regulation on the evaluation and regulation of environmental noise. This decree is an adoption of the European directive 2002/49/EC to the Slovenian legal framework. It presents a set of unified benchmarks for the assessment of environmental noise pollution (noise indicators) and defines assessment methods for noise mapping. The managing and assessment of noise has three core goals as subject to the directive:
- Preparing data concerning the noise exposure and its effects on the population and the environment and forwarding it to the European Commission
- Informing the public on noise exposure
- Preparing, accepting and implementating of action plans for environmental noise
The access to information concerning noise pollution has to be available at the state and local level at all phases, the Directive also demands that the Ministry responsible for the environment informs the European Commission on strategic noise maps and action plans. The decree shares the Directive’s definitions of computational assessment methods, strategic map contents, assuring information access, and the scope and means to enact environmental noise action plans.
- Decree on the levels of noise in the environment. This decree is compliant to the aforementioned Directive and Commission recommendation 2003/613/EC concerning audited temporary computational methods to assess industrial noise, airport noise, rail and road noise. It also covers temporary methods to evaluate noise indicators and calculation adjustments that have to be made with these methods. It is crucial that the only relevant for strategic noise mapping are computational methods . The guideline for assessing noise indicators (Lden in Lnight ) for road traffic is XPS 31-133, railway traffic is subject to the RMR guideline, while assessment for industrial noise is guided by standard ISO 9613. The decree defines a method of determining areas protected against noise, that is based on land use in spatial planning acts of the respective municipality. Certain protected areas are mentioned in the decree itself, accompanied by case specific limit values for noise indicators.
- Rules on the first evaluation and operational monitoring of noise sources and the conditions for its implementation. These rules set the methodology for measuring and assessing noise, the contents of reports concerning noise, and the format of reporting to the Ministry. A key aspect of these rules is that only authorised counterparties can perform environmental noise assessments.
- Rules on noise protection in buildings. These rules set the demands for sound protection in buildings used as residences or workplaces. The constituent guideline TSG-1-005 Protection from noise in building defines limit values of noise indicators in residential and commercial premises. The rules are key in crafting mitigation measures in areas where the available measures to reduce noise at the source or its spreading are insufficient, which necessitates the improvement of conditions in the noise sensitive premises.