WHO Guidelines 2018
The World Health Organisation (WHO) Europe has published the WHO Environmental Noise Guidelines for the European Region (2018) as a regional update and to provide an important replacement of the 1999 Guidelines. The main purpose of the 2018 guidelines is to provide updated recommendations for protecting human health from exposure to environmental noise from transportation, wind turbine and leisure sources, based on recent research.
WBM is attending an Institute of Acoustics conference in January 2019 to keep up to date and be involved in the discussions about the implications of this important WHO document.
In the meantime, our summary of the WHO 2018 guidelines is available here: WBM WHO 2018 Summary Nov 2018
A full version of the 181-page document is available here:
http://www.euro.who.int/en/publications/abstracts/environmental-noise-guidelines-for-the-european-region-2018
A shorter, 8-page Executive Summary of the 2018 guidelines is available here:
http://www.euro.who.int/en/health-topics/environment-and-health/noise/publications/2018/environmental-noise-guidelines-for-the-european-region-executive-summary-2018
BREEAM 2018
BREEAM New Construction has been updated from 2014 to 2018 for the UK. The issues relevant to acoustics are Hea 05 Acoustic Performance and Pol 05 Reduction of Noise Pollution.
Hea 05 Acoustic Performance ensures that the new building is capable of providing an appropriate acoustic environment for users. Up to 4 credits are available for residential institutions and up to 3 credits are available for other building types. The credits are awarded when a building meets the appropriate acoustic performance standards and testing requirements for sound insulation, indoor ambient noise level and room acoustics.
For Pol 05 Reduction of Noise Pollution, 1 credit is available for avoiding or reducing the impact of external noise arising from fixed installations from the new development on nearby noise sensitive buildings.
WBM can provide assistance on BREEAM assessments for Hea 05 and Pol 05 for the 2018 or earlier versions of the document.
