The Department for Education’s acoustic performance standards for schools are given in Building Bulletin 93 (BB93), published December 2014. This supersedes the 2003 BB93 edition, and the document ‘Acoustic Performance Standards for the Priority School Building Programme (PSBP)’, 2013. You can also find the baseline designs acoustics strategy on GOV.UK.
1.1 ‘Building Bulletin 93: Acoustic Design of Schools - Performance Standards’ ‘Building Bulletin 93: Acoustic Design of Schools - Performance Standards’ (BB93), 2014 is intended for designers and building control bodies. It gives the performance targets for compliance with Requirement E4 of the Building Regulations on School Acoustics that:
Each room or other space in a school building shall be designed and constructed in such a way that it has the acoustic conditions and the insulation against disturbance by noise appropriate to its intended use.
All school buildings are subject to detailed design checks and on-site inspections by building control bodies. BB93 also gives guidance on how to meet the acoustic requirement of the School Premises Regulations and the Independent School Standards that:
The acoustic conditions and sound insulation of each room or other space must be suitable, having regard to the nature of the activities which normally take place therein.
Supporting guidance on how to achieve the performance standards in BB93 will be published in 2015 by the Institute of Acoustics (IoA) and the Association of Noise Consultants (ANC) in ‘Acoustics of Schools: a Design Guide’.
1.2 Public consultation in 2014 The Department for Education conducted a public consultation on the revised BB93 in early 2014 and published the government response in December 2014.