Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Mar 16, 2012 9:37 pm Would anybody like to reduce your energy bills, make your house more comfortable and help the environment using a few simple techniques?
As a spin-off from another thread, I’d like to start a discussion on the importance of the orientation of your land, or more specifically, the importance of the orientation of your house on your land. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to gather some simple information that will enable potential house builders to choose their block of land with passive solar design in mind, or if they have already bought their block, to choose a house design that is right for their needs, and includes passive solar design as a factor. From what I’ve learnt, the best orientation for a house in NSW (Sydney, at least) is to have the main living areas facing north, no windows on the western wall and as small-as-possible windows on the east and southern walls. It’s also recommended to have a dark thermal mass on the floors of the northern rooms(for instance, dark tiles on a concrete slab, or maybe polished concrete floors). Basically. . . making your house cooler in summer and warmer in winter. Let's talk!!! I'll list relevant websites and publications here as they're posted (check your local library for books): Books: http://sustainablehouse.com.au/ - Sustainable House website - (2nd Edition of book now available) http://www.fishpond.com.au/Books/Warm-House-Cool-House-Nick-Hollo/9781920705497?cf=3 - Warm House, Cool House by Nick Hollo (Book) Magazines: http://www.sanctuarymagazine.org.au/ - Sanctuary Magazine - Modern Green Homes - Sustainable Design http://renew.org.au/ - Renew Magazine - Technology for a sustainable future http://www.greenmagazine.com.au/ - Green Magazine - Sustainable Architecture & Landscape Design Websites: http://www.yourhome.gov.au/technical/index.html - Your Home Technical Manual - Australian Government http://www.anewhouse.com.au/?cat=62 - Forum member's website 'Opinions on all aspects of building a new house' http://tankulator.ata.org.au/ - Calculate which size water tank suits your house Relevant forum member blogs / threads: http://forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=34585 - Sunshine T's Build http://forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=51099&hilit=a+strawbale+house - Variegated's Build Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 2Mar 17, 2012 7:28 am I'm interested in your comments on dark thermal mass on the floors. Can you or some other helpful person expand on that? I am building with a Colorbond light coloured roof, with anticon upgraded sarking/blanket, and lightish coloured bricks. This will help in summer, but what do I do about winter? We also have the alfresco/large kitchen/living/dining area on the north/northwestern side of the house. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 3Mar 17, 2012 8:22 am One of the best things I have found for any west and east facing windows is to have reflective tint the difference it makes is huge. There are a few other things I have found out about passive solar on my blog here: http://www.anewhouse.com.au/?cat=62 The Harder You Try - the Luckier You Get ! Web site http://www.anewhouse.com.au Informative, Amusing, and Opinionated Blog - Over 600 posts on all aspects of building a new house. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 4Mar 17, 2012 10:30 am daveinthehills and bashworth, thanks for replying!
Hey Dave, this kind of thermal mass works by absorbing heat from direct sunlight during the day (radiant heat transfer), and gradually releasing it after the sun has gone. Most of us already know that dark colours absorb heat a lot more effectively than light colours (you do, hence your light coloured roof ), so to have a dark-coloured floor on the northern side of the house where there are large expanses of glass to let the sun through during winter will heat this side of your house in winter. This is just a simple method which can be expanded upon. We need to make sure that you don't get any direct summer sun into these living areas, as we don't want the floor to be heated during summer, we want it to remain cool (like most tiled/concrete floors do if they aren't hit by direct sunlight.) This would mean having eaves on the back of your house and maybe a solar pergola. (See Bashworth's site for more info on this: http://www.anewhouse.com.au/?p=448) Note that covered alfresco areas outside of these northern areas will block the low northern sun to a certain extent, so should be avoided (wish someone had told me that when we built!!!) Ok. . . anybody please feel free to challenge me or add to this, I'm just learning too! Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 5Mar 17, 2012 10:47 am Hi Bashworth, I think the best thing for a west facing wall is to have no windows at all (which you say on your website ). . . but obviously this isn't a viable option for most people, so it sounds like reflective glass is an excellent option. Can you tell us more about this reflective glass on this thread? Is it a film put on the glass, or maybe a certain way the glass is made? Does it look any different to normal glass? Wow. . . I just took a quick look at your website, and from what I've read so far it's excellent! I suggest that everybody take a good look. Maybe I should stop right now and let you take over this thread. . . you really do have a wealth of info to offer us. . . tell us more! I love your use of foliage as a sun-blocker. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 6Mar 17, 2012 10:59 am great thread topic I read some great stuff in Your Technical Home Manual thingo that a friend sent me. I will look it up and post it here later. Just dropping to say hi and yay for this thread! SunshineT's Build: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=34585 Designs start: 4/12/09 DA: 5/7/11 Demo: 22/12/11 Slab: 24/2/12 Keys: 31/8/12 Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 7Mar 17, 2012 11:04 am Hi T! Thank you and welcome. I know that this thread topic is close to your heart, it's probably a really good place for people to tell us how they have used these principles to make their own homes more energy efficient too. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 8Mar 17, 2012 11:23 am Double Yay for this thread!! We are building at the moment - and attempting to be as 'sustainable' as possible, so we are doing lots for passive solar design. We have large north facing windows - with large eaves to go with them. We have a polished concrete floor and are facing north. Our living areas are all in the north (excluding our master which we just couldn't do without having the ensuite at the front) and our other bedrooms are in the south. I think its important to add that with solar passive, placement of windows is important as you want to make use of cross breezes to help flush the hot air out of your house, and cool the slab in the evening. We have placed our garage on the west wall, and will be insulating this as well. One bedroom has a west wall, and I plan to grow something there to help deflect heat. We are doing this not just to save on energy bills, but are very conscious of what we are doing to our planet, and the only way we could build was if we did it responsibly. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 9Mar 17, 2012 11:35 am Our house has the lounge (with 6-stacker door) facing north. The eaves are just big enough that there is no direct sunlight into the lounge in summer, but there is some direct sun entering in winter. We have skylights in the lounge also. The east wall is garage. The west wall has bedrooms, but there is a big hill on the western side across the road, so there is shade in late afternoon. Build is still in progress, but whenever we've been out there on a hot day, the house itself is cool. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 10Mar 17, 2012 11:53 am That's excellent to hear greenfish and bOson. . . I'll have to take a look at your blog greenfish, do you have a blo bOson? Cross-breeze is a good point greenfish, can you explain how you worked out what to do for your house? Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 12Mar 17, 2012 12:59 pm jodge That's excellent to hear greenfish and bOson. . . I'll have to take a look at your blog greenfish, do you have a blo bOson? Cross-breeze is a good point greenfish, can you explain how you worked out what to do for your house? In what regard jodge? We researched a lot to find out as much as we could on the principles, my husband has always been keen on sustainability and bought the 'sustainable house' book when it was first released. The ATA in particular and their 'your home' manual was fabulous. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 13Mar 17, 2012 1:06 pm Is this the manual you mean? http://www.yourhome.gov.au/technical/index.html We used the above manual like a bible when we were designing our place. (North orientation for living areas, cross ventilation etc.) We also wanted to do polished concrete floors but it got too expensive / difficult with our original builder. We have a new builder now and it just occurred to me that maybe we should look at polished floors again. Which floors are you doing greenfish? SunshineT's Build: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=34585 Designs start: 4/12/09 DA: 5/7/11 Demo: 22/12/11 Slab: 24/2/12 Keys: 31/8/12 Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 14Mar 17, 2012 1:50 pm Yep that's the one T, I bought a hardcover version and enjoyed curling up on the couch with it. Also got lots of inspiration from their magazines, 'Sanctuary' especially. Green house porn that stuff. Love it!! We are doing coloured polished concrete - using flyash as well - in our entry, lounge, kitchen, dining, hallway and rumpus room. We would have done it in the wet areas, but are tilling to save cash. We did go some lovely stones in it too. They only started polishing this week, and didn't get it finished due to all our rain, but I posted a pic on my blog which should give us some idea on how it is going to look. Most likely it will finish up a little darker than how it appears at this stage. If your slab is down already you may want to consider going the burnished concrete instead - but it may be difficult seeing as your frame has already begun. Not sure honestly but you would want to ask your builder ASAP. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 15Mar 17, 2012 3:58 pm greenfish jodge That's excellent to hear greenfish and bOson. . . I'll have to take a look at your blog greenfish, do you have a blo bOson? Cross-breeze is a good point greenfish, can you explain how you worked out what to do for your house? In what regard jodge? We researched a lot to find out as much as we could on the principles, my husband has always been keen on sustainability and bought the 'sustainable house' book when it was first released. The ATA in particular and their 'your home' manual was fabulous. Hi Greenfish, I suppose I'm asking if you can describe the processes you went through when thinking about making the most of cross-breeze. . . Did you use particular types of windows and doors? How did you find out from which direction the breezes were most likely to come? Which walls did you place which windows on to maximise the effects? Did you use bushes or trees in your design? Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 16Mar 17, 2012 4:13 pm We have a block that faces north at the front and it frustrates me endlessly that builders don't offer good options for this. We are planning to build a house that has a courtyard behind the garage to allow light into rear living areas. Our design is also narrow, hopefully letting in more light and having good cross ventilation. We are having high levels of insulation, timber double glazed windows and (hopefully, if the budget stretches) polished concrete. One thing I would say is that a lot of the advice comes out of NSW and seems much more heavily focused on keeping cool in summer than warm in winter. In Melbourne we use our heating nine months of the year and our air conditioning rarely. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 17Mar 17, 2012 4:17 pm Hi kjag, thanks for posting and also for pointing out your point of view as a Victorian. I'd love to see your plans. It would be excellent if you could start up your own thread, then maybe if you're not too far down the track we could all offer some support and suggestions. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 18Mar 17, 2012 5:21 pm Great idea for a thread. I'm keen to read those blog links. Gotta say it's not good that people have to do their own research and then try to tell the industry what they want, oughtn't the industry being teaching us, aren't we paying for their expertise? jodge Note that covered alfresco areas outside of these northern areas will block the low northern sun to a certain extent, so should be avoided (wish someone had told me that when we built!!!) greenfish We have large north facing windows - with large eaves to go with them. We have a polished concrete floor and are facing north. There's formulas online so you can calculate how big you need the eaves for where you are in relation to the equator. Our builder's standard eaves do the job just fine but much less like the newer eaveless style is a problem and much more like alfrescoes is a problem too. The idea to use foliage to block the sun is a great one. We planted deciduous trees on the northern side. Something you can control like a vergola might work better in spring and autumn because otherwise you are dependent on how hot or cold the day is and when the trees lose their leaves and new ones come out, but planting trees is cheaper and looks lovely and works well especially in summer and winter when you need it most. Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 19Mar 17, 2012 5:53 pm To achieve your "6 Star" rating is just a bit more than heating and cooling. There are many factors taken into consideration. The Kw rating of your aircon is not one of them, whilst it may be part of a sustainable "eco friendly" build. "6 Star" takes into account, insulation, ie R value of roof and walls, building colour, house orientation, roof colour, double glazing, window size and placement, eave/verandah size and placement, solar hot water, and much more. Sorry, I forgot the lighting schedule. No more than 5 watts per sq m of living, 4 watts for al fresco etc and 3 watts for the garage. Not as easy as it seems if you want feature lighting. In theory if this cannot be achieved, no building permit!! Having just achieved "7 Star" rating for our new owner build there is a fair bit to it to achieve this. By comparison a friend is building with a "company". He has a dark roof, no double glazing, no solar hot water, minimal insulation, and yet somehow achieves the 6 star rating. Given what we have done really does make me wonder how or who does their ratings for them. Most building companies achieve the lighting rating by using a CFL batten fix in a minimal amount in each room. I forget the actual figure at the moment, but a 7 star is about 15% more energy efficient than a 6 star and even more as you decrease. There is quite a bit of homework to do if you owner build. I think probably even more if you use a builder that "shortcuts" Settlement 1/2/12 New Shed 23/3/12 Slab poured 27/3/12 Frame complete 4/5/12 Roof complete 1/6/12 LOCKUP 29/6/12 Our new build blog http://kareenhillsownerbuild.blogspot.com/ Re: House Orientation - Cool house in summer, warm in winter 20Mar 17, 2012 6:23 pm We did the best we could with the block we had - personally I don't think any sort of film will help our west-facing windows so we're going to get awnings for them. However our 450mm eaves do a surprisingly good job of keeping the sun out of the north facing windows in summer based on what we've seen in our visits to the house while it has still been under construction - we've been there on a regular basis at times ranging from early-to-mid afternoon all the way to early evening over the past few months (the hottest months on the calendar for Melburnians) and based on what we've seen the windows are usually reasonably well shaded in the afternoon. We were honestly expecting to have to organise awnings for our north facing rumpus room window and possibly the lounge (marked as dining) room window as well, but we've been pleasantly surprised by how well they are shaded by the eaves during the hotter parts of the day so we're going to play that by ear. Our house siting is shown below - we think we've done the best we could have in terms of volume builder designs and choosing a block to suit them, so while it's not perfect it is hopefully going to be serviceable: (image to come shortly) Siting: Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ House plan: Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ Some people apparently have nothing better to do than comment on other people's sigs. You’re on the right track, wire brush in a grinder then a zinc rich epoxy primer then a top coat of some sort, like a waterproofing membrane. Raising the concrete would… 1 7020 How good is Simeon?! Always taking time to help others out! Wish we were building in NSW and could work together. Thanks for all that you do! 7 6550 Really tight at the top of the stairs- how to get furniture into those rooms? Study books - does anyone really use them these days? Large storage closet would be more functional. 2 6882 |