Verein Deutscher Ingenieure

Effects and assessment of odours; determination of annoyance parameters by questioning; repeated brief questioning of neighbour panellists
 N VDI 3883 BLATT 2

Annotation

Scope and Limitations of the Various Methods of Detecting Odour Annoyance

There are three main methodical approaches for measuring odour annoyance (cf. also [7]):

a) collecting data on complaints about odour annoy¬ ance (complaints statistics; CR = Community Re¬ action)

b) systematically questioning on a Single occasion ("once-only") a sample of residents in a defined investigation area by questionnaire, to measure the degree of annoyance (Guidehne VDI 3883 Part 1) [8]

c) systematically questioning a panel of local residents on repeated occasions to measure the frequency of momentary degrees of annoyance (this Guideline).

Collecting complaints data has the following disad-' vantages :

— A complaint is an ungraded yes/no answer. Complaints are only made in case of massive odour impact.

— People differ widely in their readiness to make a complaint. A large proportion of the population never makes a complaint, while some people make frequent complaints even for trivial cause.

— Complaints behaviour depends greatly on how accessible the local authorities are, on the belief that the complaint will have some effect, on reports in the media, and on the activities of action groups.

Complaints behaviour is thus not representative of the odour annoyance experienced by the population. In general, complaints are good indicators of a sudden event, such as an operating fault in a plant. In addition to negative complaints, also neutral reports are received, aimed solely at helping to remove the causes.