Mount Desert Island Hospital is located in Bar Harbor, a coastal town in an idyllic setting with low ambient noise levels. Some residents who lived near the hospital were complaining of excessive nighttime mechanical noise from the hospital. Hospital staff and consulting engineers speculated that the source of the noise complaints was the air-cooled chiller, located on a low roof, and began to seek out noise reduction solutions.

Acentech was called in to measure exterior mechanical noise levels, find the source of the noise, and make recommendations for noise mitigation. We listened to and measured the noise levels from three pieces of equipment: 1) the chiller, 2) an operating room fan, and 3) a restroom exhaust fan. We determined that the restroom fan was the source of the noise complaints and recommended replacing it with a larger fan that would run at a slower speed, thus producing less noise. The hospital replaced the fan and the noise complaints stopped.