Awareness Getting Louder
Surveys have provided strong evidence that there’s a growing
popular frustration with unwanted noise. According to the environmental noise
pollution group NoiseOFF, a 2001 census survey found that in the United States
11.8 million households said street or traffic noise was bothersome, and an
additional 4.5 million said it was so bad they wanted to move.
New York City
provides another important example of this raised awareness. When the city
established a special 311 citizen service hotline under Mayor Michael
Bloomberg, the number one complaint concerned noise. This finding helped prompt
the mayor to issue legislation overhauling the city’s noise code to make it
stricter.
Awareness of noise pollution is by no means confined to United States.
A 2005 study2 by Spanish researchers
found that urban households are willing to pay four Euros per decibel per year
for noise reduction. Recently, in Scotland, regulations were recently
introduced that require builders to incorporate soundproofing into new
buildings.
In recent years new citizen action groups have formed to
raise awareness of noise pollution and to urge legislative action. One example
is the above-mentioned NoiseOFF, founded in 2004, which provides tool kits for
managing noise. The group contends that noise pollution has become much worse
in American society since the 1970s, and it urges citizens to encourage elected
officials to restore funding to the Office of Noise Abatement and Control,
which was created by the EPA to oversee the impact of noise on the general
public, but which has lost much of its funding.
Home Sweet Quiet Home
Despite some progress and action at local levels to control
noise, the truth is that noise laws and ordinances vary widely among
municipalities, and in some cities they don’t even exist. For now, residents
need to rely on what local protections are available, or rely on their own devices.
If you are a homeowner, you can be proactive in reducing
unwanted noise. Experiment with furnishings and carpeting, all of which can
absorb and reduce noise. There are also new building materials available that
can take soundproofing to a new level for do-it-yourselfers—the most important
thing to realize about soundproofing is that an effective strategy requires a
combination of tactics.
Below are some practical tips that can help you soundproof
your home without breaking the bank.
Tip One: Look Beyond
the Ratings
The Sound Transmission Class is the industry standard used
to gauge the effectiveness of isolating noise between rooms. Although
widely-recognized, the standard, established in 1961, calculates noise
transmission in an outdated fashion and fails to provide an accurate gauge of
low-frequency noise, such as from home entertainment systems. Where possible,
look for noiseproofing products that offer technical data based on real-world
applications, as well.
Tip Two: Insulate and
Dampen Wherever Possible
Adding insulation to walls is easy and cost-effective, and
it will absorb some sound, though it is not useful for low-frequency noise.
Take advantage, therefore, of the numerous options available to dampen noise,
as well—damping dissipates energy, i.e., vibration (sound) as it travels
through a structure. Modern viscoelastic materials, for example, are easy to
apply and when constrained between two layers of drywall they dissipate noise
by converting the energy of sound vibrations into small amounts of heat and can
eliminate a much wider range of sound frequencies, including low bass noise.
And don’t forget your ceilings and floors either. Carpeting
will certainly muffle floor noise but it won’t stop floors from squeaking,
which happens over time when subflooring and joists on a floor begin to rub
together. A joist tape can be employed to eliminate the noise caused by this
natural settling and reduces noise from foot traffic.
Tip Three: Watch Your
Flank
Always be on the look out for ways to eliminate Flanking
Noise—noise that travels by any path other than directly through the wall or
ceiling. Sound can flank over, under, or around a wall, via cracks and joins,
and can even go through electrical sockets and plumbing. Wherever possible,
plug these places using a flexible caulking or a dedicated noiseproofing
product like an acoustical sealant.
Soundproofing your home should not longer be considered a
luxury upgrade, but rather a step towards improving your quality of life. An
entire soundproofing system is possible to achieve, cost-effectively and
easily.
References
1. S. Rosen and P. Olin,
Hearing
Loss and Coronary Heart Disease, Archives of Otolaryngology, 82:236 (1965)
2. Jesús Barreiro, Mercedes Sánchez, Montserrat
Viladrich-Grau (2005), “How much are people willing to pay for silence? A
contingent valuation study,”
Applied
Economics, 37 (11)