Background

In Europe, legal requirements concerning acoustic performance of buildings differ widely in performance descriptors and limit values. The diversity (indicators, steps between classes, grade of quietness achieved, etc.) found in the nine existing national schemes and proposals in three more countries is an obstacle for exchange of experience, development and trade. The harmonization of such descriptors and performance levels of sound insulation classes is important to make progress and would be well received by industry, government and research sectors. The Action will stimulate innovation, support sustainability through simplified research and development objectives, reduce trade barriers between Member States and facilitate marketing. Coordination of research activity, knowledge transfer, psychoacoustic evaluation, collection of data of typical and high performance acoustic solutions is necessary to make progress. Keywords: Dwellings, sound insulation, descriptors, legislation, sound classification, social surveys, design guidelines.

Main objectives

- Propose harmonized descriptors for airborne and impact sound insulation.
- Propose a European acoustic classification scheme for dwellings.

Secondary objectives

- Include low frequency range adequately
- Prepare a uniform questionnaire on annoyance by neighbour noise
- Provide a correlation between sound insulation and annoyance
- Establish a catalogue of sound insulation data for construction solutions found in the different participating countries
- Produce an on-line compendium on good workmanship practice

Participating countries:

AT, BE, HR, DK, EE, FI, MK, FR, DE, GR, HU, IS, IT, LT, NL, NO, PL, PT, RO, RS, SK, SI, ES, SE, CH, UK

Working groups

WG1: Harmonized sound insulation descriptors and classification schemes in Europe

Topics: Common descriptors, classification schemes, legislation, enforcement, harmonization, rating and prediction methods (ISO and EN standards) for all member states in the fields of airborne and impact sound insulation of dwellings.

WG2: Subjective evaluation of sound insulation

- Laboratory tests and harmonized field surveys
Leaders: info@simmons.se; valtteri.hongisto@ttl.fi; monika.rychtarikova@bwk.kuleuven.be
Topics: Collection and interpretation of research data in the participating countries about the social surveys and psychoacoustic evaluation of neighbour noise: annoyance, impact on health, quality of life, correlation with acoustic comfort.

WG3: Design and acoustic performance of building constructions for multi-storey housing

Leaders: se.smith@napier.ac.uk; patrizio.fausti@unife.it; bart.ingelaere@bbri.be
Topics: Collection and discussion of construction details and sound insulation data. Prepare a European database with traditional and innovative „robust“ solutions for sound insulation of new dwellings and for improvement of existing dwellings.

Main achievements

WG1:

- Update data base with sound insulation descriptors used in all participating countries. Evaluate scientifically the suitability of different performance descriptors.
- Make recommendations for descriptors to be applied in future building regulations and discuss how to involve national building authorities in a change process.

WG2:

- Collect, analyze and compare questionnaires and results from social surveys and experience from laboratory listening tests. Two AHGs have been set up for this work. – Prepare a status document with a summary of studies and proposals for research.

WG3:

- Collect information from all countries to mosaic project “Existing and New Build Dwelling Stock Profiles” about housing types and sound insulation. – Prepare a paper with proposals for how sound insulation data and construction details as well as typical construction errors may be presented in a database.

Cost Action TU0901 – European Cooperation in the field of Scientific and Technical Research