Anthropogenic noise pollution from traffic, industry, and shipping affects the welfare of wildlife whose communication, navigation, and predator detection depends on acoustic environments.
Acoustic pollution welfare harms are insidious because they are invisible: birds near busy roads cannot hear their own song clearly enough for mate assessment; whales must shout to communicate at distances that would naturally be effortless; fish schools cannot coordinate correctly in noisy environments. Each of these represents a welfare cost imposed by human infrastructure on animals that evolved in naturally quiet environments. Noise reduction through traffic management, speed limits, shipping lane modifications, and industrial noise controls offers measurable welfare improvement for many species.