Nottinghamshire County Council Chooses Sound Level Meter Kits

When Nottinghamshire County Council needed to upgrade its 20-year-old noise monitoring equipment, it made sense to choose two of the latest high performance sound level meter kits from Casella’s (UK) well proven 63x series.

Nottinghamshire County Council is the Mineral & Waste Authority so receives minerals and waste applications from external bodies including quarries (minerals) and waste processing/recycling sites. It also administers applications for its own developments such as roads and schools.

David Collins, Project Engineer, Landscape & Reclamation and Environment & Resources comments: “The ability to implement noise measurements is an essential requirement of my role at the Council. Our department delivers a range of acoustic services such as assessing noise levels at the site of a submitted planning application and preparing acoustic reports like Noise Impact Assessments or Baseline Noise Surveys. We also provide general guidance on noise issues.”

He continues: “One of our outdated sound level meters was a Casella model so we knew they were a trusted brand that also offered cost benefits. Reliability is essential as we carry out unattended noise measurements. The CEL-633 meets all our key requirements as it can be used to take long and short term environmental measurements and 1/3 octave band analysis plus calibration can be evidenced to ensure any noise data is accurate and will stand up to scrutiny.”

As well as the sound level meter, the Council purchased additional equipment due to the requirement to undertake unattended outdoor measurements including an environmental case, outdoor mic protection, batteries and charger.

Nottinghamshire County Council received detailed training in the use of the CEL-633 from Casella. The company even sent a demonstration model so staff could familiarise themselves with the kit ahead of the half day course. David adds: “The training was very helpful in helping us understand the capabilities and benefits of the software which enables us to quickly download, analyse, save and export data.

Since being purchased, the Casella sound level meter kits have already been used for a baseline noise survey on a £16million ring road improvement scheme by Nottingham City Council. The project entailed setting up the equipment at 16 properties along a five mile stretch of the ring road for a period of 24 hours at a time. Further short term monitoring was implemented at a further five properties.

They have also helped with noise assessment of land owned by the Council for potential residential development. Measurements were taken at various positions around the site which is currently agricultural land to determine the noise exposure categories in accordance with the superseded guidance in Planning Policy Guidance 24 (PPG24) as requested by the Local District Authority Planners.

Baseline noise surveys have been conducted at three schools in Nottinghamshire on behalf of the Council’s property team. Data was used to inform noise impact assessments for the sites.

David concludes: “The CEL-633 is very simple to operate in comparison to older sound level meters and we are particularly impressed with the easy to use menus, settings and analysis software. Casella is a reputable supplier of well proven noise monitoring equipment and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend them to other Councils across the UK.”