Façade sound insulation: the Italian experience

One of the important elements for determining the sound quality of houses is the insulation against external noise. The approach to the façade insulation acoustic requirement adopted in the various countries is very diversified also because closely related to the external noise climate. The main issues related to the façade sound insulation are investigated with particular regard to the choice of descriptors, to the evaluation methods and their reproducibility, to the definition of the limits and their in-situ verification. With respect to the current European policies on the subject of harmonization of all parameters, façades are the hardest to harmonize for what concerns the evaluation method and their reproducibility is the less easy to evaluate. Then the Italian situation is dealt with; using data from laboratory and in-situ measurements, the aspects related to the influence of installation on the obtained performance are analysed. Finally, the Italian current regulations and the classification scheme still at the proposal stage are described by means of real case studies. The Italian standard under publication for the acoustic classification of building units and a new law relate the standard façade classification to the external noise level.