DIPASUPIL, JOHN JOEL A.

ARC – 3203

BUILDING UTILITIES 3
Architectural acoustics (also known as building acoustics) is the science
and engineering of achieving a good sound within a building and is a branch
of acoustical engineering. The first application of modern scientific methods
to architectural acoustics was carried out by Wallace Sabine in the Fogg
Museum lecture room who then applied his new found knowledge to the
design of Symphony Hall, Boston.
Architectural acoustics can be about achieving good speech
intelligibility in a theatre, restaurant or railway station, enhancing the quality
of music in a concert hall or recording studio, or suppressing noise to make
offices and homes more productive and pleasant places to work and live
in.[3] Architectural acoustic design is usually done by acoustic consultants.

The architect deals always with the human senses when designing a
building’s environment.
-Selection of site
-Location of the buildings on the site
-Arrangement of spaces within the building
-Materials and construction elements that shape the finished spaces
Acoustics
Science that deals with the production, control, transmission, reception, and
effects of sound
-Subjective interpretation of sound
–Defines the difference between what is desirable and what is not
–Differentiates what is sound and what is noise; this differentiation does not
consider the specific content of the acoustic signal
–Dictates the quality of communication within a space
ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN GOALS
1. SOUND DISTRIBUTION
–To hear voice and music at all points of the room
2. SOUND ISOLATION
–ToNOT hear unwanted sound between rooms or outside to inside
3. NOISE CONTROL
–To reduce or control sound level within a room

ARCHITECTURAL ACOUSTICS
 Architectural Acoustics is concerned with sound in buildings.
 The function is to simply follow this logic: to enhance desired sounds
and to attenuate noises.
 This branch of architectural acoustics deals with sound in lecture or
concert halls, meeting rooms and classrooms.
−Sound production, by one or more live players, vocalists or lecturers,
whether assisted by loudspeakers or not, is greatly affected by the character
of the room in which it takes place. −The correct choice and placement of
sound-absorbing and sound
-reflecting materials in a room and the level of noise in it are critical to
obtaining an acceptable space.
−Properly placed reflectors can direct the sound to where it will do most
good. Properly placed sound-absorbing materials will prevent reflections
that might cause unpleasant echoes or cause sounds to interfere and cancel
each other out.
−In rooms that are too reverberant, it is difficult to understand speech.
−In rooms that are not reverberant enough, music will sound dead and
lifeless.
 Another concern of architectural acoustics is sometimes called building
acoustics and deals with the reduction of noise transfer between
rooms in buildings
FOUR MAJOR ASPECTS OF ARCHITECTURAL ACOUSTICS
1. Isolating sound between rooms.
2. Managing acoustics within spaces; typically by controlling reverberation.
3. Managing HVAC/Plumbing/Electrical Equipment (MEP) vibration and noise
control.
4. Active audio systems such as white noise generators and noise
cancellation.

What is sound?
At its most basic level, sound is a very small and very rapid fluctuation
in air pressure above and below atmospheric pressure. All sounds – an HVAC
system, a vibrating cell phone on a desk, road traffic – operate using this
principle. The ear is very sensitive to sound sources and the range of pressure
vibration from the weakest to the loudest sound heard is extremely large.
The ear doesn’t experience sound in a linear fashion. Instead, it uses a
logarithmic scale with a measure of energy in decibels (dB). To the ear, a
sound heard at 60dB only needs to decrease to 50dB to experience this sound
as being half as loud. Furthermore, a sound going from 60dB to 40dB (i.e. a
busy street to a quiet library), would be experienced as an even more
dramatic change. The potential for a sound to damage our hearing is
proportional to its intensity, not its loudness as shown in the table below.
Why do we need acoustics?
Acoustics affects everyone on a daily basis – from homeowners, office
workers, students and hospital patients, to professionals working in the
design and construction industries. Therefore, knowing the basics of
architectural acoustics and the meaning of acoustical design and construction
is essential; terms like sound transmission class (STC) and noise reduction
coefficient (NRC) are only the beginning.

Why acoustics matter in homes and buildings

Constructing new buildings – be they homes, schools, office towers or

industrial workplaces – has become an increasingly sophisticated exercise.
We know more today than ever before about the importance of building
structures that are energy-efficient, safe and comfortable for occupants.
Creating these high-performance buildings begins at the planning stage with
design professionals and technical experts who consider all the factors that
go into making spaces perform as they are intended – whether optimizing
productivity for office workers, quiet recovery areas for patients, good
acoustics in learning environments for students, or any number of other
examples to bring the acoustical properties of a space in line with its intended
use.

One of the factors that often gets overlooked at the planning stage is
acoustics, yet the acoustic environment of a building can have a significant
impact on the occupants’ experiences. For example, research has established
that sound can negatively affect health and recovery periods in hospitals.
Design trends that are driving the creation of open workspaces for
collaboration may also have the effect of decreasing privacy and productivity.
Construction practices and products selected to meet sustainability goals
may, at times, inadvertently sacrifice the ability of a space to deliver occupant
comfort by decreasing unwanted noise.

Considering the acoustic needs of a building at the start of the planning

process can help save time and money by reducing the need for renovations
or retrofits once construction is completed. Within this acoustics article
series, we focus on rethinking the role of acoustical design and engineering.
Increasing awareness and understanding of acoustics among industry
professionals, including architects and designers, building owners, as well as
the general population, will only help drive this shift. Occupants of these high-
performance buildings will continue to demand that sound be a key
consideration in new construction.

How is sound measured?

Acoustical engineers use decibels to quantify sound loudness, but when
it comes to acoustics design in buildings, that measure is just one way of
evaluating its performance.

There are two primary metrics used in noise measurement for

evaluating the acoustic performance in a building’s acoustical performance
– acoustical absorption and sound transmission loss.

Acoustical absorption is the ability of a material to absorb rather than

reflect sound (think about the difference between jumping onto a trampoline
vs into a pile of pillows). Sound transmission loss refers to a material’s ability
to reduce sound transfer from one space to another (i.e. blocking noise or
sound between rooms). When you’re trying to find a solution to meet good
architectural acoustics requirements for your next project, it is important to
know the difference between the two.

When referring to sound absorption, you should look for products that
absorb reverberation and echoes in a room. If you want a product that will
stop or block a sound, you’ll need a heavier, denser material. Materials with
high sound absorption are not great for stopping sound transmission. For
example, concrete is great for sound transmission loss, but not great for
sound absorption.

Stone wool ceiling tiles provide high absorption levels, whereas

ROCKWOOL’s wall and roofing products as components of an assembly can
help reduce sound between rooms as well as noise from the exterior
environment. Depending on the application, the acoustical properties of the
building materials you specify and use will play a significant role in overall
soundproofing.

The risks of poor acoustical building design

Depending on the type of structure, the potential complications from poor
acoustical design can vary greatly. Let’s take a look at the range of possible
negative consequences that noise can produce in different built
environments. In healthcare settings, noises can range from irritating to
harmful for patients and caregivers.
For patients:
 Sudden noises can set off startle reflexes, leading to injury, increased
blood pressure and higher respiratory rates
 Prolonged noise can contribute to memory problems, irritation,
impaired pain tolerance and perceptions of isolation
 Reduced noise levels in intensive care units have been found to
promote better sleep and healing
Noise at all hours can lead to sleep deprivation which has been tied to longer
recovery, falls, dementia, higher re-hospitalization and worse medical
outcomes.
For caregivers:
 Healthcare professionals can usually perform important tasks in high-
stress situations, including high levels of noise; however, it may require
greater energy to do so, contributing to fatigue.
 The need to protect patient confidentiality is critical, so speech privacy
– the ability to hold discrete conversations without being heard by
unintended listeners – is essential.
 Speech intelligibility is a very real risk in healthcare environments when
noise is uncontrolled. Patient care teams require the ability to quickly
and accurately understand and respond to auditory signals, be they care
directives, equipment alarms, etc.
In an office or educational environment, the acoustical design can severely
limit productivity and inhibit privacy when not properly considered. Open
design concepts in the workplace are on the rise for quite some time, in part
because they promote greater cooperation and collaboration among
colleagues, decrease response times to requests, and enhance necessary
communication. However, these types of environments may lead to louder
working environments and frequent distractions, as there are fewer surfaces
to absorb the noise from coworker conversations, mechanical systems, and
other background sounds. Similar design trends are occurring in educational
buildings.
The shift to open-concept spaces that allow for more natural light and warmth
by incorporating glass walls, high ceilings and low partitions, can also
contribute to increased distraction and lower productivity. Privacy can be
non-existent in these designs, though in fairness, traditional floor plans with
closed-door offices and classrooms often don’t include an adequate
acoustical design and therefore provide a false sense of privacy. Specific
short-term health problems related to poor acoustics include increased
stress, anxiety, and higher heart and respiration rates, and muscle tension.
The bottom line is that now, more than ever, creating an optimal acoustics
experience in any kind of building is as important as the look, feel and function
of the space to ensure the health and wellbeing of occupants.

Creating a built environment with good acoustics includes controlling

noise pollution.
Exterior sounds can infiltrate a building affecting the acoustic
environment for its occupants. Building system noise and occupant noise can
transmit through the building affecting functionality. The best way to control
this noise pollution is with a “source-path-receiver” model – identifying
strategies at each point of sound transmission that can reduce the impact of
the sound.
This concept for architectural acoustics design may be simple to understand,
but it is often difficult to apply. For example, road traffic noises outside of a
building (the “source” in the above image) are out of the control of architects
and other construction professionals. Likewise, noise pollution would not be
a nuisance in an empty building where there is no “receiver” to hear the
sound. The most effective approach for architects, then, in managing noise
pollution in a building’s acoustic design is controlling the sound path.
ROCKWOOL and Rockfon both provide effective components in your designs
and assemblies which will contribute to controlling sound at the path,
including:
 Control over vibrations – high-density stone wool has proven acoustic
capabilities that allow it to isolate and control vibrations, thus efficiently
absorbing sound and reducing noise
 Installation of barriers, panels, or enclosures – for example: weather
stripping (which stone wool can be used for) and double-paned
windows
 Control in the transmission path – stone wool insulation acts as an
intervention in the path between source and receiver

Resources
https://www.coursehero.com/file/64495672/LECTURE-3pdf/
https://www.rockwool.com/north-america/advice-and-inspiration/blog/fundamentals-
of-architectural-
acoustics/#:~:text=Architectural%20acoustics%20is%20the%20study,sound%20isolation
%20for%20speech%20privacy