Noise Abatement Ordinance
(NAO)

¹ This Or­din­ance is in­ten­ded to pro­tect against harm­ful and dis­turb­ing noise.

² It reg­u­lates:

a.

the lim­it­a­tion of ex­ter­i­or noise emis­sions caused by the op­er­a­tion of new and ex­ist­ing in­stall­a­tions in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 7 of the Act;

b.

the des­ig­na­tion and de­vel­op­ment of build­ing zones in areas ex­posed to noise;

c.

the is­su­ing of plan­ning per­mis­sion for build­ings with rooms sens­it­ive to noise and ly­ing in areas ex­posed to noise;

d.

the sound­proof­ing against ex­ter­i­or and in­teri­or noise of new build­ings with rooms sens­it­ive to noise;

e.

the sound­proof­ing against ex­ter­i­or noise of ex­ist­ing build­ings with rooms sens­it­ive to noise;

f.

the de­term­in­a­tion of the ex­pos­ure to ex­ter­i­or noise and its rat­ing based on ex­pos­ure lim­it val­ues.

³ It does not reg­u­late:

a.

pro­tec­tion against noise ori­gin­at­ing from an in­dus­tri­al site as long as this only af­fects in­dus­tri­al build­ings and dwell­ings with­in the site;

b.

pro­tec­tion against in­fra- and ul­tra­sound.

⁴…²

¹ Sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions are build­ings, trans­port fa­cil­it­ies, build­ing fa­cil­it­ies and oth­er im­mob­ile equip­ment that gen­er­ate ex­ter­i­or noise dur­ing op­er­a­tion. These in­clude in par­tic­u­lar roads, rail­way in­stall­a­tions, aero­dromes, in­dus­tri­al, com­mer­cial and ag­ri­cul­tur­al in­stall­a­tions, fir­ing ranges and per­man­ent mil­it­ary fir­ing ranges and train­ing grounds.

² New sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions also in­clude sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions and build­ings whose use has been com­pletely altered.

³ Emis­sion lim­it­a­tion meas­ures are tech­nic­al, struc­tur­al or func­tion­al modi­fic­a­tions to in­stall­a­tions, or meas­ures to re­dir­ect, re­strict or calm the flow of traffic, or struc­tur­al meas­ures along the emis­sion path. The pur­pose of the meas­ures is to pre­vent or re­duce the gen­er­a­tion or propaga­tion of ex­ter­i­or noise.

⁴ Im­prove­ments are emis­sion lim­it­a­tion meas­ures for ex­ist­ing sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions.

⁵ Ex­pos­ure lim­it val­ues in­clude im­pact thresholds, plan­ning val­ues and alarm val­ues. These are set ac­cord­ing to the noise char­ac­ter­ist­ics, the time of day and the sens­it­iv­ity to noise of the build­ings and areas to be pro­tec­ted.

⁶ Rooms sens­it­ive to noise are:

a.

rooms in dwell­ings with the ex­cep­tion of kit­chens without din­ing fa­cil­it­ies, wash­rooms and stor­e­rooms;

b.

rooms in in­dus­tri­al build­ings that are reg­u­larly oc­cu­pied by per­sons for sus­tained peri­ods of time, with the ex­cep­tion of those for farm an­im­als and those with high levels of in­dus­tri­al noise.

¹ Noise emit­ted from mo­tor­ised vehicles, air­craft, wa­ter craft and rail­ways must be re­duced as far as pos­sible by tech­nic­al and op­er­a­tion­al means, and to the ex­tent that this is eco­nom­ic­ally ac­cept­able.

² Emis­sion lim­it­a­tion meas­ures are gov­erned by the le­gis­la­tion on road traffic, civil avi­ation, in­land nav­ig­a­tion or the rail­ways, provided the vehicle con­cerned is covered by one of these cat­egor­ies of le­gis­la­tion.

³ Emis­sion lim­it­a­tion meas­ures for oth­er vehicles is gov­erned by the pro­vi­sions on mo­bile ap­pli­ances and ma­chines.

¹ The emis­sions of ex­ter­i­or noise from mo­bile ap­pli­ances and ma­chines must be re­duced to the ex­tent that:

a.

this is tech­nic­ally and op­er­a­tion­ally feas­ible and eco­nom­ic­ally ac­cept­able; and that

b.

the well-be­ing of the af­fected pop­u­la­tion is not ser­i­ously im­paired.

² The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall or­der op­er­a­tion­al and struc­tur­al meas­ures, or those for prop­er main­ten­ance.

³ Where it is not pos­sible to avoid ex­pos­ure to highly dis­turb­ing noise due to the op­er­a­tion of mil­it­ary equip­ment, ma­chines and weapons, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall re­lax the re­quire­ments.

⁴ The emis­sions of ap­pli­ances and ma­chines that are used to op­er­ate a sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tion are lim­ited ac­cord­ing to the pro­vi­sions on sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions.

¹ Equip­ment and ma­chines may be placed on the mar­ket only fol­low­ing a con­form­ity as­sess­ment and the ap­pro­pri­ate mark­ing.

² The Fed­er­al De­part­ment of the En­vir­on­ment, Trans­port, En­ergy and Com­mu­nic­a­tions (DE­TEC) shall spe­cify:⁴

a.

the types of equip­ment and ma­chines sub­ject to the con­form­ity as­sess­ment and mark­ing;

b.

the re­quire­ments for pre­vent­ive emis­sion lim­it­a­tion meas­ures and mark­ing, tak­ing in­to ac­count in­ter­na­tion­ally re­cog­nised stand­ards;

c.

the doc­u­ments to be sub­mit­ted for the pur­pose of the con­form­ity as­sess­ment;

d.

the test, meas­ure­ment and cal­cu­la­tion pro­ced­ures;

e.

the sub­sequent con­trols;

f.

the re­cog­ni­tion of for­eign test res­ults and la­belling.

The Fed­er­al Of­fice for the En­vir­on­ment (FOEN) shall is­sue reg­u­la­tions cov­er­ing struc­tur­al and op­er­a­tion­al meas­ures to con­trol noise from build­ing sites.

¹ Noise emis­sions from new sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions shall be lim­ited as dir­ec­ted by the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies in­so­far as:

a.

this is tech­nic­ally and op­er­a­tion­ally feas­ible and eco­nom­ic­ally ac­cept­able; and

b.

the noise ex­pos­ure level res­ult­ing from the in­stall­a­tion alone does not ex­ceed the plan­ning val­ues.

² The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall re­lax the re­quire­ments in cases where com­pli­ance with the plan­ning val­ues would place a dis­pro­por­tion­ate bur­den on the in­stall­a­tion and there is an over­rid­ing pub­lic in­terest, par­tic­u­larly re­gard­ing ques­tions of spa­tial plan­ning. The im­pact thresholds must not, however, be ex­ceeded.⁶

³ In the case of new air-to-wa­ter heat pumps that are primar­ily used for space heat­ing or for heat­ing drink­ing wa­ter and whose noise emis­sions do not ex­ceed the plan­ning val­ues, fur­ther emis­sion lim­it­a­tion meas­ures in ac­cord­ance with para­graph 1 let­ter a shall only be taken if a lim­it­a­tion of emis­sions of at least 3 dB can be achieved with no more than one per cent of the in­vest­ment costs of the sys­tem.⁷

¹ Where a sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tion that already ex­ists when this Or­din­ance comes in­to force is mod­i­fied, the noise emis­sions from the new or mod­i­fied parts of the in­stall­a­tion must be lim­ited as dir­ec­ted by the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies as far as this is tech­nic­ally and op­er­a­tion­ally feas­ible and eco­nom­ic­ally ac­cept­able.⁸

² If the in­stall­a­tion is sig­ni­fic­antly mod­i­fied, the noise emis­sions from the in­stall­a­tion as a whole must be lim­ited at least to the ex­tent that the im­pact thresholds are not ex­ceeded.

³ Con­ver­sions, ex­ten­sions and op­er­a­tion­al changes car­ried out by the per­son re­spons­ible for the in­stall­a­tion con­sti­tute sig­ni­fic­ant modi­fic­a­tions to sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions if it is an­ti­cip­ated that the noise ex­pos­ure level will rise per­cept­ibly as a res­ult either of the in­stall­a­tion it­self or of the in­creased de­mand on ex­ist­ing trans­port fa­cil­it­ies. The re­build­ing of an in­stall­a­tion con­sti­tutes a sig­ni­fic­ant modi­fic­a­tion ir­re­spect­ive of the cir­cum­stances.

⁴ If a new sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tion is mod­i­fied, Art­icle 7 ap­plies.⁹

The op­er­a­tion of new or sig­ni­fic­antly mod­i­fied sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions must not lead to a situ­ation in which:

a.

ow­ing to the in­creased de­mand made on a trans­port fa­cil­ity, the im­pact thresholds are ex­ceeded; or

b.

ow­ing to the in­creased de­mand made on a trans­port fa­cil­ity in need of re­medi­ation, the noise ex­pos­ure level rises per­cept­ibly.

¹ If the re­quire­ments spe­cified in Art­icles 7 para­graph 2 and 8 para­graph 2 or in Art­icle 9 are not ful­filled by new or sig­ni­fic­antly mod­i­fied pub­lic or li­censed sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall re­quire the own­ers of ex­ist­ing build­ings ex­posed to noise to sound­proof the win­dows of rooms sens­it­ive to noise in ac­cord­ance with An­nex 1.

² With the ap­prov­al of the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies, build­ing own­ers may carry out oth­er struc­tur­al sound­proof­ing meas­ures provided these re­duce the noise with­in the rooms to the same ex­tent.

³ Sound­proof­ing meas­ures need not be taken if:

a.

no per­cept­ible re­duc­tion of the noise level in the build­ing is to be ex­pec­ted;

b.

they con­flict with the over­rid­ing in­terest of pre­serving loc­al char­ac­ter or monu­ments;

c.

the build­ing is due to be de­mol­ished with­in three years of put­ting the new or mod­i­fied in­stall­a­tion in­to ser­vice, or the rooms con­cerned will be con­ver­ted to pur­poses not sens­it­ive to noise with­in this peri­od.

¹ The per­son re­spons­ible for the new or sig­ni­fic­antly mod­i­fied in­stall­a­tion bears the costs of lim­it­ing the emis­sion it causes.

² If the build­ing own­er is re­quired to take sound­proof­ing meas­ures ac­cord­ing to Art­icle 10 para­graph 1, the per­son re­spons­ible for the in­stall­a­tion also bears the cus­tom­ary loc­al costs proven to be due for:

a.

en­gin­eer­ing and su­per­vi­sion of works;

b.

sound­proof­ing of the win­dows in ac­cord­ance with An­nex 1 and the res­ult­ing ne­ces­sary ad­apt­a­tions;

c.

the fin­an­cing if the per­son re­spons­ible has failed to con­trib­ute des­pite be­ing re­ques­ted to do so by the build­ing own­er;

d.

any fees due.

³ If the build­ing own­er is re­quired to take sound­proof­ing meas­ures ac­cord­ing to Art­icle 10 para­graph 2, the per­son re­spons­ible for the in­stall­a­tion bears the cus­tom­ary loc­al costs proven to be due in­so­far as these do not ex­ceed those un­der para­graph 2. The build­ing own­er bears the re­main­ing costs.

⁴ Where the need for emis­sion lim­it­a­tion meas­ures or sound­proof­ing meas­ures arises as a res­ult of noise from sev­er­al in­stall­a­tions, the costs are di­vided among the in­stall­a­tions in pro­por­tion to their con­tri­bu­tion to the noise ex­pos­ure level.

⁵ The build­ing own­er bears the costs for main­ten­ance and re­new­al of the sound­proof­ing meas­ures.

The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall in­spect the new or mod­i­fied in­stall­a­tion with­in one year of its be­ing put in­to ser­vice to check wheth­er the emis­sion lim­it­a­tion and sound­proof­ing meas­ures ordered have been taken. In the event of any doubt, they carry out tests to as­sess the ef­fect­ive­ness of the meas­ures.

¹ In the case of sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions that con­trib­ute sig­ni­fic­antly to the im­pact thresholds be­ing ex­ceeded, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall or­der the ne­ces­sary im­prove­ment meas­ures, after hear­ing the per­sons re­spons­ible for the in­stall­a­tions.

² The in­stall­a­tions shall be im­proved to the ex­tent that:

a.

is tech­nic­ally and op­er­a­tion­ally feas­ible and eco­nom­ic­ally ac­cept­able; and

b.

the im­pact thresholds are no longer ex­ceeded.

³ Un­less there are over­rid­ing in­terests, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies give pri­or­ity to meas­ures which pre­vent or re­duce noise gen­er­a­tion in pref­er­ence to those which simply pre­vent or re­duce noise propaga­tion.

⁴ Im­prove­ments need not be car­ried out if:

a.

the im­pact thresholds are ex­ceeded only in build­ing zones that have not yet been de­veloped;

b.

due to the can­ton­al build­ing and plan­ning le­gis­la­tion, plan­ning, design or struc­tur­al meas­ures taken at the site ex­posed to the noise will sat­is­fy the im­pact thresholds be­fore the time lim­it spe­cified in Art­icle 17.

¹ The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall re­lax the re­quire­ments in cases where:

a.

im­prove­ments would res­ult in un­reas­on­able op­er­a­tion­al lim­it­a­tions or costs;

b.

over­rid­ing in­terests, namely those of the pre­ser­va­tion of loc­al char­ac­ter, nature and land­scape pro­tec­tion, traffic and op­er­a­tion­al safety, or na­tion­al se­cur­ity, con­flict with the im­prove­ment ob­ject­ive.

² Un­li­censed private in­stall­a­tions must not, however, ex­ceed the alarm val­ues.

¹ If, as a res­ult of re­lax­ing the re­quire­ments, the alarm val­ues for pub­lic or li­censed sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions can­not be com­plied with, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall re­quire the own­ers of ex­ist­ing build­ings ex­posed to noise to sound­proof the win­dows of rooms sens­it­ive to noise in ac­cord­ance with An­nex 1.

² With the ap­prov­al of the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies, build­ing own­ers may take oth­er sound­proof­ing meas­ures in the build­ing provided these re­duce the noise with­in the rooms to the same ex­tent.

³ Sound­proof­ing meas­ures need not be taken if:

a.

no per­cept­ible re­duc­tion of noise in the build­ing is to be ex­pec­ted;

b.

they con­flict with the over­rid­ing in­terest of pre­serving loc­al char­ac­ter or monu­ments;

c.

the build­ing is due to be de­mol­ished with­in three years of the sound­proof­ing meas­ures be­ing ordered, or the rooms will be con­ver­ted to pur­poses not sens­it­ive to noise with­in this peri­od.

¹ The per­son re­spons­ible for the in­stall­a­tion bears the costs of its im­prove­ment.

² The per­son re­spons­ible for a pub­lic or li­censed in­stall­a­tion also bears the costs of sound­proof­ing meas­ures for ex­ist­ing build­ings un­der Art­icle 11, un­less an ex­emp­tion has been gran­ted un­der Art­icle 20 para­graph 2 of the Act.

³ Where im­prove­ments or sound­proof­ing meas­ures are re­quired as a res­ult of noise from sev­er­al in­stall­a­tions, the costs are di­vided among the in­stall­a­tions in pro­por­tion to their con­tri­bu­tion to the noise ex­pos­ure level.

⁴ The build­ing own­er bears the costs of main­ten­ance and re­new­al of the sound­proof­ing meas­ures.

¹ The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies set the time lim­its for im­ple­ment­ing im­prove­ments and sound­proof­ing meas­ures ac­cord­ing to their ur­gency.

² In as­sess­ing ur­gency, the fol­low­ing factors are de­cis­ive:

a.

the ex­tent to which the im­pact thresholds are ex­ceeded;

b.

the num­ber of per­sons af­fected by the noise;

c.

the cost-be­ne­fit re­la­tion­ship.

³ The im­prove­ments and sound­proof­ing meas­ures must be com­pleted with­in 15 years of this Or­din­ance com­ing in­to force.

⁴ The time lim­it (para. 3) for im­prove­ments and sound­proof­ing meas­ures on roads are ex­ten­ded:

a.

for na­tion­al roads un­til 31 March 2015;

b.

for trunk roads ac­cord­ing to Art­icle 12 of the Fed­er­al Act of 22 March 1985¹⁰ on the Ap­plic­a­tion of the Ear­marked Min­er­al Oil Tax (MinOA), and for oth­er roads un­til 31 March 2018¹¹.

⁵ The time lim­its spe­cified in the Fed­er­al Act of 24 March 2000¹² on Rail­ways Noise Abate­ment ap­ply to the com­ple­tion of im­prove­ments and sound­proof­ing meas­ures on rail­way in­stall­a­tions.¹³

⁶ The im­prove­ments and sound­proof­ing meas­ures must be com­pleted:

a.

at mil­it­ary aero­dromes by 31 Ju­ly 2020;

b.

at civil aero­dromes that are used by heavy air­craft by 31 May 2016;

c.

at civil shoot­ing ranges that re­quire com­puls­ory im­prove­ments as a res­ult of the Amend­ment of 23 Au­gust 2006¹⁴ of An­nex 7: by 1 Novem­ber 2016;

d.

at mil­it­ary fir­ing ranges and train­ing grounds: by 31 Ju­ly 2025.¹⁵

With­in one year of com­ple­tion, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall in­spect the im­prove­ments and sound­proof­ing meas­ures to check com­pli­ance with the meas­ures ordered. In case of doubt, they carry out tests to as­sess the ef­fect­ive­ness of the meas­ures.

¹ The FOEN¹⁸ shall en­quire reg­u­larly of the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies as to the status of the im­prove­ments and the noise pro­tec­tion meas­ures, in par­tic­u­lar con­cern­ing roads, rail­way in­stall­a­tions, aero­dromes, shoot­ing ranges and mil­it­ary shoot­ing ranges and train­ing areas.

² For roads, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies must provide the fol­low­ing doc­u­ments in par­tic­u­lar by 31 March each year:

a.

a sum­mary of:

1.

the roads or sec­tions of road re­quir­ing im­prove­ments,

2.

the time frame with­in which these roads and sec­tions of road will be im­proved,

3.

the total costs of these im­prove­ments and noise pro­tec­tion meas­ures, and

4.

the num­ber of per­sons ex­posed to noise levels above the im­pact thresholds and alarm val­ues;

b.

a re­port on:

1.

the im­prove­ments made to roads and sec­tions of road, and the sound­proof­ing meas­ures im­ple­men­ted in the pre­vi­ous year, and

2.

the ef­fect­ive­ness and the costs of these im­prove­ments and noise pro­tec­tion meas­ures.

³ For na­tion­al roads, it shall ob­tain the in­form­a­tion un­der Para­graph 2 from the Fed­er­al Roads Of­fice. For trunk roads and oth­er roads it shall ob­tain this in­form­a­tion from the can­tons. The in­form­a­tion must be sub­mit­ted in ac­cord­ance with the re­quire­ments of the FOEN.

⁴ The FOEN shall as­sess the in­form­a­tion in par­tic­u­lar in re­la­tion to the pro­gress made with im­prove­ments and the costs and ef­fect­ive­ness of the meas­ures. It shall in­form the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies of the res­ults and pub­lishes them.

¹ The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant sub­sidies for im­prove­ments and sound­proof­ing meas­ures on ex­ist­ing in­fra­struc­ture for:²⁰

a.

trunk roads ac­cord­ing to Art­icle 12 MinOA²¹;

b.

oth­er roads.

² The sub­sidies gran­ted un­der para­graph 1 let­ter a form part of the glob­al pay­ments ac­cord­ing to Art­icle 13 MinOA. The pay­ments un­der para­graph 1 let­ter b are gran­ted glob­ally for the road sec­tions defined with the can­tons in pro­gramme agree­ments.

³ ...²²

¹ The can­ton sub­mits the ap­plic­a­tion for sub­sidies for im­prove­ments and sound­proof­ing meas­ures for roads ac­cord­ing to Art­icle 21 para­graph 1 let­ter b to the FOEN.

² The ap­plic­a­tion must in par­tic­u­lar con­tain in­form­a­tion on:

a.

the roads or road sec­tions to be im­proved dur­ing the peri­od covered by the pro­gramme agree­ment;

b.

the im­prove­ments and sound­proof­ing meas­ures planned and their cost;

c.

the ef­fi­ciency of the meas­ures.

¹ The FOEN con­cludes the pro­gramme agree­ment with the can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies re­spons­ible.

² The pro­gramme agree­ment cov­ers in par­tic­u­lar:

a.

the roads or road sec­tions to be im­proved;

b.

the amount paid by the Con­fed­er­a­tion;

c.

the con­trol pro­ced­ures.

³ The pro­gramme agree­ment ap­plies for four years; in jus­ti­fied cases a longer or short­er peri­od may be agreed.²³

⁴ The FOEN is­sues dir­ect­ives on the pro­ced­ure fol­lowed for pro­gramme agree­ments and on the in­form­a­tion and doc­u­ment­a­tion re­lat­ing to the sub­jects of the pro­gramme agree­ment.

¹ The amount of the sub­sidy for im­prove­ments is de­term­ined by:

a.

the num­ber of people who are pro­tec­ted by these meas­ures; and

b.

the re­duc­tion in noise pol­lu­tion.

² For sound­proof­ing meas­ures on ex­ist­ing build­ings, CHF 400 is al­loc­ated per sound­proof win­dow or oth­er equally ef­fect­ive struc­tur­al noise pro­tec­tion meas­ure.

³ The amount of the sub­sidy is ne­go­ti­ated between the Con­fed­er­a­tion and the can­ton.

Re­pealed

Glob­al sub­sidies are paid out in in­stal­ments.

¹ The can­ton shall re­port an­nu­ally to the com­pet­ent Fed­er­al Of­fice on the use of the sub­sidies.

² The FOEN shall veri­fy by ran­dom sample:

a.

im­ple­ment­a­tion of in­di­vidu­al meas­ures in ac­cord­ance with the pro­gramme goals;

b.

use of the pay­ments made.

¹ The FOEN shall with­hold all or part of the in­stal­ment pay­ments dur­ing the pro­gramme if the can­ton:

a.

fails to ful­fil its re­port­ing duty (Art. 26 para. 1);

b.

fails to meet its ob­lig­a­tions to a sub­stan­tial ex­tent through its own fault.

² If on con­clu­sion of the pro­gramme it emerges that the can­ton has failed to meet its ob­lig­a­tions, the com­pet­ent Fed­er­al Of­fice shall re­quire the can­ton to rec­ti­fy the situ­ation; it shall set the Can­ton an ap­pro­pri­ate dead­line for do­ing so.

³ If in­stall­a­tions for which sub­sidies have been made are used for a pur­pose oth­er than that in­ten­ded, the FOEN may re­quire the can­ton to cease or make good the mis­use with­in a reas­on­able peri­od.

⁴ If the de­fects are not rec­ti­fied or the mis­use does not stop or is not remedied, the sub­sidies may be re­claimed in ac­cord­ance with Art­icles 28 and 29 of the Sub­sidies Act of 5 Oc­to­ber 1990²⁴.

Re­pealed

¹ New build­ing zones for build­ings with rooms sens­it­ive to noise and new no-build zones with high­er noise abate­ment re­quire­ments shall be des­ig­nated only in areas in which noise ex­pos­ure does not ex­ceed the plan­ning val­ues or in which these val­ues can be com­plied with by plan­ning, design or struc­tur­al meas­ures.

²…²⁵

Build­ing zones for build­ings with rooms sens­it­ive to noise that have not yet been de­veloped when the Act comes in­to force may only be de­veloped to the ex­tent that the plan­ning val­ues are com­plied with or can be com­plied with by a change in the type of use, or by plan­ning, design or struc­tur­al meas­ures. The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies may grant ex­cep­tions for small sec­tions of build­ing zones.

¹ If the im­pact thresholds are ex­ceeded, new build­ings and sig­ni­fic­ant modi­fic­a­tions to build­ings with rooms sens­it­ive to noise may only be au­thor­ised if the val­ues can be com­plied with:

a.

by loc­at­ing the rooms sens­it­ive to noise on the side of the build­ing away from the source of the noise; or

b.

by struc­tur­al or design meas­ures which shield the build­ing against noise.²⁷

² If the im­pact thresholds can­not be com­plied with by meas­ures un­der para­graph 1, plan­ning per­mis­sion may be gran­ted only if there is an over­rid­ing in­terest in con­struct­ing the build­ing and the can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies agree.

³ The landown­ers bear the costs of the meas­ures.

¹ In the case of air­ports that are used by large air­craft, the plan­ning val­ues and im­pact thresholds un­der An­nex 5 num­ber 222 are com­plied with at night if:

a.

no flight op­er­a­tions are planned between 24 and 06 hours;

b.

rooms sens­it­ive to noise are pro­tec­ted against ex­ter­i­or and in­teri­or noise as a min­im­um in ac­cord­ance with the in­creased re­quire­ments for sound­proof­ing un­der SIA Stand­ard 181 of 1 June 2006²⁹ of the Swiss So­ci­ety of En­gin­eers and Ar­chi­tects; and

c.

the bed­rooms:

1.

have a win­dow that closes auto­mat­ic­ally between 22 and 24 hours and can be opened auto­mat­ic­ally at oth­er times, and

2.

are de­signed to guar­an­tee an ap­pro­pri­ate in­door cli­mate.

² When des­ig­nat­ing or de­vel­op­ing build­ing zones, the com­pet­ent au­thor­ity shall en­sure that the re­quire­ments set out in para­graph 1 let­ters b and c are made bind­ing on prop­erty own­ers.

³ The FOEN may is­sue re­com­mend­a­tions on the en­force­ment of para­graph 1 let­ter c. In do­ing so, it shall take ac­count of the rel­ev­ant tech­nic­al stand­ards.

¹ The pro­ject own­er of a new build­ing shall en­sure that the sound­proof­ing of the ex­tern­al build­ing ele­ments and par­ti­tions of rooms sens­it­ive to noise, and of the stairs and build­ing fa­cil­it­ies com­plies with re­cog­nised codes of build­ing prac­tice. These are in par­tic­u­lar, for noise from civil aero­dromes that are used by heavy air­craft, the stricter re­quire­ments, and for noise from oth­er sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions, the min­im­um re­quire­ments, of SIA Stand­ard No 181 of the Swiss So­ci­ety of En­gin­eers and Ar­chi­tects.³⁰

² If the im­pact thresholds are ex­ceeded but the re­quire­ments of Art­icle 31 para­graph 2 for grant­ing plan­ning per­mis­sion are ful­filled, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall im­pose stricter re­quire­ments for the sound­proof­ing of the ex­tern­al build­ing ele­ments ap­pro­pri­ately.

³ The re­quire­ments also ap­ply to the ex­tern­al build­ing ele­ments, par­ti­tions, stair­ways and build­ing fa­cil­it­ies that are con­ver­ted, re­placed or newly in­stalled. On re­quest, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies grant re­lief if com­pli­ance with the re­quire­ments would in­volve un­reas­on­able cost.

¹ Ex­tern­al build­ing ele­ments form the ex­tern­al bound­ary of a room (e.g. win­dows, ex­tern­al doors, ex­tern­al walls, roofs).

² Par­ti­tions (e.g. in­tern­al walls, ceil­ings, doors) serve to sep­ar­ate in­di­vidu­al units, such as dwell­ings, with­in the build­ing.

³ Build­ing fa­cil­it­ies are fixed in­stall­a­tions such as heat­ing, vent­il­a­tion, sup­ply and dis­pos­al sys­tems, lifts and wash­ing ma­chines.

¹ The pro­ject own­er must spe­cify in the ap­plic­a­tion:

a.

the ex­ter­i­or noise pol­lu­tion in the event that the im­pact thresholds are ex­ceeded;

b.

the use to which the rooms are put;

c.

the ex­tern­al build­ing ele­ments and par­ti­tions of rooms sens­it­ive to noise.

² For build­ing pro­jects in areas in which the im­pact thresholds are ex­ceeded, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies may de­mand de­tails of the sound­proof­ing of the ex­tern­al build­ing ele­ments.

After build­ing works are com­pleted, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall make ran­dom checks to veri­fy wheth­er the sound­proof­ing meas­ures com­ply with the re­quire­ments. In the event of any doubt, they must carry out a more de­tailed in­spec­tion.

¹ The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall in­vest­ig­ate the ex­pos­ure to ex­ter­i­or noise due to sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions, or or­der its in­vest­ig­a­tion if they have grounds to be­lieve that the rel­ev­ant ex­pos­ure lim­it val­ues are be­ing ex­ceeded or that this is to be ex­pec­ted.

² They shall take ac­count of in­creases and re­duc­tions in noise ex­pos­ure levels that are to be ex­pec­ted due to:

a.

the con­struc­tion, al­ter­a­tion or im­prove­ment of sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions, in par­tic­u­lar if the pro­jects in ques­tion have already been ap­proved or made avail­able for pub­lic in­spec­tion at the time of the in­vest­ig­a­tion; and

b.

the con­struc­tion, al­ter­a­tion or de­moli­tion of oth­er struc­tures if the pro­jects have been made avail­able for pub­lic in­spec­tion at the time of the in­vest­ig­a­tion.

³ …³³

¹ In the case of roads, rail­way in­stall­a­tions, aero­dromes and mil­it­ary fir­ing ranges and train­ing grounds, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall re­cord in spe­cif­ic re­gisters (noise pol­lu­tion re­gisters) the noise ex­pos­ure levels meas­ured in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 36.³⁵

² The noise pol­lu­tion re­gisters spe­cify:

a.

the noise pol­lu­tion meas­ured;

b.

the cal­cu­la­tion pro­ced­ure used;

c.

the in­put data for the cal­cu­la­tion;

d.

the clas­si­fic­a­tion of the areas ex­posed to noise in the land use plan;

e.

the sens­it­iv­ity levels ap­plic­able;

f.

the in­stall­a­tions and their own­ers;

g.

the num­ber of per­sons who are af­fected by noise ex­pos­ure levels above the ap­plic­able ex­pos­ure lim­it val­ues.

³ The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies are re­spons­ible for the su­per­vi­sion and re­vi­sion of the re­gisters.

⁴ On re­quest, they sub­mit the noise pol­lu­tion re­gisters to the FOEN. The Of­fice may is­sue re­com­mend­a­tions on the stand­ard­ised re­cord­ing and present­a­tion of the data.

⁵ The Fed­er­al Of­fice for Civil Avi­ation is re­spons­ible for meas­ure­ment of noise ex­pos­ure levels pro­duced by Basel Mul­house Air­port on Swiss ter­rit­ory.

⁶ Any per­son may have ac­cess to the noise pol­lu­tion re­gister provided that con­fid­en­ti­al­ity with re­spect to man­u­fac­tur­ing and busi­ness secrets is en­sured, and no con­flict with oth­er in­terests that over­ride ex­ists.

¹ The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies state the per­mit­ted noise ex­pos­ure level in their de­cision on the con­struc­tion, al­ter­a­tion or im­prove­ment of an in­stall­a­tion.

² If it is es­tab­lished or an­ti­cip­ated that the noise ex­pos­ure levels due to an in­stall­a­tion will de­vi­ate sig­ni­fic­antly and per­man­ently from those quoted in the de­cision, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall take the ne­ces­sary meas­ures.

³ The FOEN may is­sue re­com­mend­a­tions on the stand­ard­ised re­cord­ing and present­a­tion of the noise ex­pos­ure levels in these de­cisions.

¹ Noise ex­pos­ure levels are de­term­ined in the form of a rat­ing sound level, Lr, or a max­im­um sound level, Lmax, on the basis of cal­cu­la­tions or meas­ure­ments.³⁷

² Noise ex­pos­ure levels due to air­craft shall prin­cip­ally be de­term­ined by cal­cu­la­tion. The cal­cu­la­tions are car­ried out us­ing re­cog­nised state-of-the-art meth­ods. The FOEN shall re­com­mend suit­able cal­cu­la­tion pro­ced­ures.³⁸

³ The re­quire­ments for cal­cu­la­tion pro­ced­ures and meas­ur­ing in­stru­ments are giv­en in An­nex 2.³⁹

¹ For build­ings, noise ex­pos­ure levels shall be de­term­ined at the centre of open win­dows in rooms sens­it­ive to noise. Noise ex­pos­ure levels due to air­craft may also be de­term­ined in the vi­cin­ity of the build­ing.⁴⁰

² In the non-de­veloped sec­tor of zones with high­er noise abate­ment re­quire­ments, noise ex­pos­ure levels shall be meas­ured 1.5 m above the ground.

³ In build­ing zones that have not yet been de­veloped, noise ex­pos­ure levels shall be meas­ured at points where the build­ing and plan­ning le­gis­la­tion al­lows the build­ing of rooms sens­it­ive to noise.

¹ The en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall rate the ex­pos­ure to ex­ter­i­or noise due to sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions on the basis of the ex­pos­ure lim­it val­ues spe­cified in An­nexes 3 ff.

² The ex­pos­ure lim­it value, it is also con­sidered ex­ceeded if it is less than the sum of the levels of ex­pos­ure to sim­il­ar types of noise gen­er­ated by sev­er­al in­stall­a­tions. This does not ap­ply to the plan­ning val­ues for new sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions (Art. 7 para. 1).

³ In the ab­sence of ex­pos­ure lim­it val­ues, the en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies shall rate the noise ex­pos­ure levels in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 15 of the Act. They shall also take ac­count of Art­icles 19 and 23 of the Act.

¹ The ex­pos­ure lim­it val­ues ap­ply to build­ings with rooms sens­it­ive to noise.

² They also ap­ply:

a.

in yet un­developed build­ing zones in areas where the con­struc­tion of build­ings with rooms sens­it­ive to noise is al­lowed un­der the build­ing and plan­ning le­gis­la­tion;

b.

in the non-de­veloped areas of zones with high­er noise abate­ment re­quire­ments.

³ For areas and build­ings in which, as a rule, people are present either only dur­ing the day or only at night, no ex­pos­ure lim­it val­ues ap­ply at night or dur­ing the day.

¹ For rooms in in­dus­tri­al build­ings (Art. 2 para. 6 let. b) ly­ing in areas of sens­it­iv­ity levels I, II or III, the plan­ning and im­pact thresholds shall be in­creased by 5 dB(A).

² Para­graph 1 does not ap­ply to rooms in schools, in­sti­tu­tions and homes. It ap­plies to ho­tels and gues­t­houses only if these can be ad­equately vent­il­ated when the win­dows are closed.

¹ In land use zones ac­cord­ing to Art­icles 14 ff. of the Spa­tial Plan­ning Act of 22 June 1979⁴¹, the fol­low­ing sens­it­iv­ity levels ap­ply:

a.

sens­it­iv­ity level I in zones with high­er noise abate­ment re­quire­ments, not­ably in leis­ure zones;

b.

sens­it­iv­ity level II in zones in which op­er­a­tions that emit noise are not per­mit­ted, not­ably in res­id­en­tial zones and zones for pub­lic build­ings and in­stall­a­tions;

c.

sens­it­iv­ity level III in zones in which op­er­a­tions emit­ting a cer­tain level of noise are per­mit­ted, not­ably in res­id­en­tial and in­dus­tri­al zones (mixed zones) and ag­ri­cul­tur­al zones;

d.

sens­it­iv­ity level IV in zones in which op­er­a­tions emit­ting a high level of noise are per­mit­ted, not­ably in in­dus­tri­al zones.

² Parts of land use zones rated as sens­it­iv­ity levels I or II may be as­signed the next high­er level if they are already ex­posed to noise.

¹ The can­tons shall en­sure that sens­it­iv­ity levels are as­signed to the land use zones in the build­ing reg­u­la­tions or land use plans of the com­munes.

² The sens­it­iv­ity levels are as­signed at the time of des­ig­na­tion or modi­fic­a­tion of the land use zones, or at the time of modi­fic­a­tion of the build­ing reg­u­la­tions.⁴²

³ Pri­or to as­sign­ment, the can­tons shall de­term­ine the sens­it­iv­ity levels on a case by case basis in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 43.

⁴ …⁴³

¹ The can­tons shall en­force this Or­din­ance un­less it del­eg­ates en­force­ment to the Con­fed­er­a­tion.

² If the fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies ap­ply oth­er fed­er­al laws or in­ter­na­tion­al treat­ies or de­cisions that re­late to the sub­ject mat­ter of this Or­din­ance, they shall also en­force this Or­din­ance. The co­oper­a­tion of the FOEN and the can­tons is gov­erned by Art­icle 41 para­graphs 2 and 4 of the Act; stat­utory du­ties of secrecy are re­served.

³ The fol­low­ing au­thor­it­ies are re­spons­ible for en­for­cing the pro­vi­sions gov­ern­ing emis­sion lim­it­a­tion meas­ures (Art. 4, 7–9 and 12), im­prove­ments (Art. 13, 14, 16–18 and 20) and the de­term­in­a­tion and con­trol of noise ex­pos­ure levels (Art. 36, 37, 37a and 40):

a.

for rail­way in­stall­a­tions:

1.

DE­TEC, where the pro­vi­sions re­late to ma­jor rail­way pro­jects un­der the An­nex to the Rail­ways Act of 20 Decem­ber 1957⁴⁶ and are im­ple­men­ted by means of a plan­ning ap­prov­al pro­ced­ure,

2.

in oth­er cases, the Fed­er­al Of­fice of Trans­port;

b.

for civil aero­dromes:

1.

DE­TEC, where the pro­vi­sions re­late to build­ings and in­stall­a­tions un­der Art­icle 37 of the Air Nav­ig­a­tion Act of 21 Decem­ber 1948⁴⁷ that are used for op­er­a­tion of an aero­drome and are im­ple­men­ted by means of a plan­ning ap­prov­al pro­ced­ure,

2.

in oth­er cases, the Fed­er­al Of­fice of Civil Avi­ation;

c.

for na­tion­al roads:

1.

DE­TEC, where the pro­vi­sions are im­ple­men­ted by means of a plan­ning ap­prov­al pro­ced­ure,

2.

in oth­er cases the Fed­er­al Roads Of­fice;

d.

for na­tion­al de­fence in­stall­a­tions: the Fed­er­al De­part­ment of De­fence, Civil Pro­tec­tion and Sport;

e.

for elec­tric­al in­stall­a­tions:

1.

the Swiss Fed­er­al Of­fice of En­ergy in cases where the Fed­er­al In­spect­or­ate for Heavy Cur­rent In­stall­a­tions (ESTI) has been un­able to deal with ob­jec­tions from or re­solve dis­putes with the Fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies con­cerned, in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 16 para­graph 2 let­ter b of the Elec­tri­city Act of 24 June 1902⁴⁸,

2.

in oth­er cases the ESTI;

f.

for cable rail­way in­stall­a­tions ac­cord­ing to Art­icle 2 of the Cable Rail­ways Act of 23 June 2006⁴⁹: the Fed­er­al Of­fice of Trans­port⁵⁰.

⁴ In cases where the re­spons­ib­il­ity for or­der­ing emis­sion lim­it­a­tion meas­ures and im­prove­ments lies with the fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies, but that for noise pro­tec­tion lies with the can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies, the two au­thor­it­ies shall co­ordin­ate the ne­ces­sary meas­ures.

⁵ For na­tion­al roads, DE­TEC is also re­spons­ible for en­for­cing the pro­vi­sions gov­ern­ing sound­proof­ing meas­ures (Art. 10 and 15). It co­ordin­ates the en­force­ment of these pro­vi­sions with the sound­proof­ing meas­ures that are ar­ranged by the can­tons.⁵¹

The FOEN shall con­duct a na­tion­al sur­vey of noise pol­lu­tion. It shall pub­lish a geo-ref­er­enced present­a­tion of the noise pol­lu­tion in par­tic­u­lar for road, rail­way and air­craft noise and for noise from mil­it­ary fir­ing ranges and train­ing grounds. It shall up­dates this present­a­tion at least every five years.

The FOEN shall provide spe­cific­a­tions for the min­im­al geodata mod­els and present­a­tion mod­els for of­fi­cial geodata un­der this Or­din­ance, for which it is des­ig­nated as the fed­er­al spe­cial­ist au­thor­ity in An­nex 1 to the Geoin­form­a­tion Or­din­ance of 21 May 2008⁵⁴.

¹ Sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions are deemed to be new sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions if the de­cision au­thor­ising the start of build­ing work has not yet taken full leg­al ef­fect when this Or­din­ance comes in­to force.

² For sta­tion­ary in­stall­a­tions that are to be mod­i­fied, Art­icles 8-12 ap­ply only if the de­cision au­thor­ising the modi­fic­a­tion has not yet taken full leg­al ef­fect when this Or­din­ance comes in­to force.

³ Build­ings are deemed to be new build­ings if plan­ning per­mis­sion has not yet taken full leg­al ef­fect when this Or­din­ance comes in­to force.

⁴ For build­ings that must be mod­i­fied, Art­icles 31 and 32 para­graph 3 ap­ply only if plan­ning per­mis­sion has not yet taken full leg­al ef­fect when this Or­din­ance comes in­to force.

This Or­din­ance comes in­to force on 1 April 1987.