What is the environment? Simply put, it is our surroundings. The air we breathe, the water we drink, and the earth we live on are all a part of our environment.

Our surroundings are important, wouldn’t you agree? A healthy environment usually equals healthier people; that is why there are laws called environmental regulations (or rules). The airport has to follow those rules in doing its day-to-day work.

The Department of Aviation (DOA—a part of the City of Atlanta, Hartsfield-Jackson ’s owner) runs the airport. Our Environmental Division makes sure that the whole airport follows the environmental rules.

There are many, many environmental rules that we, and others, at the airport follow. All of the rules are important. Two areas that are especially important are airplane noise and air quality.

AIRPLANE NOISE

If you’ve visited the airport to take a trip to visit relatives or go on a vacation, you know how much fun airplanes can be. What did you notice about them? They are big and fast, aren’t they? But to some people they are also noisy. What is noise? It is any unwanted sound. Sound doesn’t have to reach a certain level before it is termed noise. If you don’t want to hear it, it is noise.

To answer questions about airplane noise and airplane flights, we use a noise and operations monitoring system. We call it NOMS for short. NOMS helps the DOA make sure that airplanes follow special flight procedures. We use special computers to track where airplanes fly. The computers show us the airplanes’ flight tracks. Just what is a flight track? A flight track is the path on the ground of an airplane in flight; it is like a line that traces where the airplane has flown.

If the airplanes do not follow the special flight rules or do something unusual, then we tell the Air Traffic Manager of the control tower. The Air Traffic Manager will pass the information on to air traffic controllers. What is an Air Traffic Controller? It is a person who directs the movement of airplanes on the ground and in the air. They work hard to not only keep the airplanes in the right places, but also to make sure that they don’t get too close to one another.

NOMS also lets us help people learn about where airplanes usually fly; it allows us to locate a person’s property on a map and then tell the person where their property is relative to the places airplanes usually fly. This means that the person can make better decisions about where they want to buy a house, locate a school, or set up a business.

Our use of NOMS includes finding a person’s property on a map and then telling them if the property is in an area that the FAA says has significant airplane noise exposure. The type of noise they want to know about comes from airplanes. If the person knows that aircraft noise annoys them, then they can look for another property with less noise exposure. If we tell a builder about the noise in the area where he or she is going to build homes, then the builder can construct the homes to reduce the noise level inside the home.

The NOMS noise monitors (which are actually fancy microphones) collect aircraft noise. The monitors work 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

AIR QUALITY

Air quality refers to the cleanness of the air that surrounds us. The emissions from cars, power plants, and airplanes affect air quality. What are emissions? They are byproducts of combustion; fumes and smoke from a car engine's tailpipe are an example.

Air quality is an important issue in many large cities like Atlanta. That is because they have a lot of emissions sources. Cars and trucks, power plants, construction equipment, airplanes, and other ground-based airport vehicles are examples of different types of emissions sources. People depend on power plants to deliver the electricity they need to light their homes, run hospitals, and keep their food fresh. They depend on cars and airplanes to get to work, visit relatives, and go on vacation. But clean air is really important to people, too.

Too many emissions from the cars, the power plants, airplanes, and other ground-based airport vehicles can result in poor air quality. What are some of the things we do to reduce emissions at the airport? One thing we do is design airport facilities, like taxiways, to minimize taxiing time. An airplane is taxiing when it is moving on the airport property before or after a takeoff or landing. Taxiing increases the time an engine is running and therefore increases emissions.

In addition to redesigning airport facilities we also voluntarily participate in programs designed to continually lower emissions from airport ground-based sources. For example, we have a program that replaces cars, trucks, and baggage tugs that use gasoline or diesel fuel with those that use either natural gas or electricity. When it comes to heating or cooling the airport, we even consider how much energy that the equipment will use and calculate how many emissions will come from the power plants that supply that energy. Then we try to buy equipment that will use less energy; we do this not only to save money, but also to keep the air cleaner! We are taking a leadership role at the airport and have partnered with airport tenants to join us in programs that can lower air emissions.