Multi-residential

Affordability and the desire to be closer to work, transport, and other amenities, has seen the demand for apartment and townhouse living rise.

With thermal and acoustic comfort high on the priority of residents, building designers need to accommodate these needs and deal with the challenges created by higher density living.

Using our range of sustainable insulation materials – in walls and ceilings, under floors and roofs, around building services, and in and around the HVAC – we help designers build more comfortable townhouse and apartment environments.

How insulation helps to create better multi-residential environments

The existence of party walls leads to more intrusive noise between apartments or townhouses. As well as noise through adjoining walls, sound from above and below commonly disturbs residents. Insulation helps dampen noise between homes.

Insulation is an essential ingredient of a thermally comfortable residence. It supports a higher energy efficiency rating and thermal performance under the Nationwide House Energy Rating Scheme (NatHERS). In turn, a higher energy efficient rating helps attract buyers, renters, and investors to well-designed multi-residential developments.

With around 24% of Australia’s overall electricity use and 12% of total carbon emissions produced by residential buildings, insulation helps manage a home’s thermal environment. A well-insulated building reduces the need for energy-hungry heating and cooling appliances and cutting power bills.

At Fletcher Insulation we’ll help you specify the optimal insulation solutions for use in your multi-level residential building projects. We provide solutions that contribute to creating:

• a healthier indoor environment for people to live in.
• reduced energy solutions to control costs and environmental impact.
• higher Green-Star ratings and WELL certification.
• safe, fire-resistant construction systems.

Embracing a holistic approach to the health and wellbeing of people living in multi-residential buildings

As our urban areas grow, multi-residential buildings offer a more affordable, sustainable style of housing for many Australians. But these types of buildings create different challenges.

Both airborne and structure-borne noise can disturb residents and diminish their quality of life. Poor sound insulation in party walls, floors, and ceilings can cause stress for residents when noise from neighbouring townhouses or apartments disturbs sleep. For families with children, the noise from children playing can disturb others, creating challenges for parents and tension between neighbours.² Noise from internal building services, such as lifts, air-conditioning, and plumbing, threatens to be a constant source of irritation for residents.

Designing for thermal comfort and good indoor air quality can be challenging for designers, especially for individual apartments in high rise complexes. Orientation, glazing and proximity to the roof are some key factors that come into play. Keeping windows closed for thermal comfort can lead to CO2 concentrations above 1,000 ppm, which has a significant impact on human health and cognition. Thermal comfort can also be a safety issue in high rise buildings. Without it, residents tend to open their windows to regulate the air temperature, creating falls hazards especially for young children.

Whether you’re designing a townhouse complex or a multi-storey apartment building, the challenge for architects is to create comfortable living conditions with cost-effective solutions.

The importance of acoustic comfort

To create the best conditions for people to live in, all homes should be designed for people’s acoustic comfort.

There’s plenty of research proving that environmental noise pollution adversely impacts people’s health and wellbeing. Not only is it annoying, but excessive noise also disturbs people’s sleep, and can lead to cognitive impairment. There’s also good evidence it’s associated with increased blood pressure and heart disease.

Whether the source is external (such as from traffic, construction, and machinery) or internal (air conditioners, plumbing, loud music, and floor impact noise from neighbouring tenancies), noise leads to poor sound quality within the home. This can make it difficult to understand speech or enjoy music, and result in overall discomfort.

In multi-residential properties, a lack of acoustic privacy can lead to conflict between neighbours and impact an individual’s psychological wellbeing.

Fletcher Insulation creates insulation products based on the principal that good design supports the health and wellbeing of all people in our community.

Controlling indoor thermal comfort, air quality and building condensation

For apartment dwellers, temperature is ranked as the second most important of the top four factors indoor environment quality (IEQ) after light. The other two are noise and air quality.

Nevertheless, dwellings have often been described by residents as being ‘too cold in winter’ and ‘too hot in summer’ with the thermal comfort of individual units varying considerably. The energy efficiency provisions in the National Construction Code (NCC) 2022 set out to address this, with an increase in the minimum energy rating for individual units in apartments.

A well-managed indoor environment supports the wellbeing of its occupants. Living in a home that’s thermally comfortable and has a healthy indoor air quality, is essential to support a good quality of life.

It also helps contain energy costs and avoids excessive emissions caused by artificial heating or cooling systems.

The key to Fletcher Insulation’s approach is to devise a project specific solution for designers and developers of multi-residential building projects, aligned with NCC requirements.

We offer a range of insulation solutions that help reduce the reliance on artificial cooling and heating systems and improve indoor air quality in townhouse and apartments. Working with some of the country’s leading building designers, we’ve supplied products for many multi-residential projects.

Protecting people and buildings from fire

Fire-safe homes protect both people and property. For designers of apartments and townhouses, it means selecting building materials that keep people safe.

Best practice passive fire protection strategies work by isolating a fire and protecting residents should a fire break out in an adjoining apartment. They also mitigate both property and equipment damage.

Insulation installed in external and internal walls, floors, ceilings, roofs, and around HVAC applications, is an integral part of fire safety control within any residential building.

As well as National Construction Code compliance, designers, developers and builders must also consider the standards and minimum requirements of insurers. Choosing insulation that fails to meet these specifications could mean higher insurance premiums.

Using Fletcher Insulation’s glasswool products in external cladding and internal partition applications ensures your building complies with AS/NZS 1530.1 for combustibility.

Fletcher Insulation has developed a range of rigorously tested insulation solutions. Made of sustainable, non-combustible or low flammability materials, our products are designed to keep people and buildings safe.

Whatever the specific challenge of your building design, our expert team are on-hand to help you select the best fire-safe solutions for your building project.

For the good of the planet

As climate change continues to make an impact, people are looking for ways to conserve their energy usage and limit their energy costs.

Insulation delivers on energy-efficiency, cutting household costs and emissions. It also creates more comfortable, liveable environments for people in multi-residential buildings.

Fletcher Insulation continues to invest in sustainable manufacturing processes. We are working to reduce the carbon footprint of the built environment by:

• making insulation with zero Ozone Depletion Potential (ODP).
• ensuring our insulation products support healthy indoor air quality – our products contain no harmful levels of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs).
• using recycled materials in our manufacturing process wherever possible. Up to 80% of the glass used in our glasswool insulation is recycled – by transforming a waste product, we avoid further landfill pollution.