Case Study

Duke Energy – Office Sound Masking System Replacement

Posted on by Rachel
Office Sound Masking Retrofit
20
Jan

Office Renovation & Sound Masking System Replacement

Duke Energy in downtown St. Petersburg was undergoing a major renovation to 3 of its 14 floors, where much of their office staff was located for the financial and back-office operations. The building houses about 1000 office personnel, and each floor already had an existing office white noise system.

During the remodeling process, this existing Sound Masking system was upgraded from the early 2000s Lencore system to a more advanced Lencore iNet system, capable of powering and controlling over 300 independent, disbursed sound masking speakers.

In total, around 300 speakers were replaced during Duke’s office renovation. A properly installed sound masking system will have speaker placed approximately 12.5′ on center, and will be tuned and balanced by skilled technicians using an SPL meter. This helps to avoid “hot spots”, which is when someone would be able to hear the if they were right below a speaker.

A single head-end was used in the MDF (Main Distribution Facility) and wired into vertically stacked IDFs, from which the white noise system was balanced, tuned, and commissioned.

Sound masking speakers are most often concealed by an ACT grid, and the noise from the speakers should “rain down” and almost just sound like AC to people in the space.

Demolition of the space took about a week, as existing J-hooks were re-usable. However, as was the case in many early-2000s low voltage installations, much of the cabling material and fasteners were not up to code. In many cases, speakers were supported from the ACT grid, or even from the fire suppression system.

Benefits of an Upgraded Office White Noise System

Sound masking systems are often very necessary in office spaces that mix both open office areas and private offices. In then open office bullpens, workers are often distracted by background conversations between coworkers and from phone calls. Sound masking speakers help to raise the ambient background noise level in a space, so that a conversation you might’ve previously been able to heat will be “masked” by white noise.

Learn More: How Sound Masking Works

In private offices, often held by those in the C-suite, conversations that are had can contain some sensitive information that shouldn’t be spread. By raising the ambient noise level in and around private offices areas, these conversations can remain confidential.

Rachel