As part of my drive to become energy self-sufficient (and to help others do the same), I get google alerts for a number of terms, and stumbled into this website by Design Pedia from the term “Energy Independence.”

I won’t google alert the term “green” as that is way overused. And having spent part of my engineering career studying the environmental life cycle of products, most “green” applications with respect to energy self-sufficiency might not be “green” at all - but still make sense to do from the stand point of long term sustainability AND economics. For example, those compact florescent bulbs - quite toxic on disposal because of the mercury. Likewise with solar panels. And many other materials that go into creating sustainable energy solutions - they need to be properly disposed of. So, from a life cycle environmental perspective, I’m not sure we really have enough information yet to know enough about the long term ramifications of the more sustainable energy producing options to make claims that one is more “green” than another.

But these designs, literally are “green.” Amongst the many fantastic design concepts, something about these three images were really charming. And just how did the little square house with four sides and white picket fence become the aspirational norm?

Would you like to come over to my hovel for a nice cup of tea?

What if I invite over my neighbor, a former NBA star?

What if the roof was covered with mint and there were sheep up there?

I am working on a corporate retreat center in Northern Nevada that is on a south facing hill. The entire south side of the house is a bank of windows and the original design of the house was passive solar. While the design worked well in the winter to reduce the heating requirements, in the summer, the house’s heating loads were extreme.

We replaced the windows with low-e windows to reduce the solar load, but needed a more aggressive solar blocking strategy in the summer. Putting on an awning to reduce the solar load in the summer was mandatory to make the space habitable without excessive air conditioning. I saw a solar awning design several months ago so had the designer draft a concept of putting solar panel awnings over the south facing windows.

What I like about this design is how she has applied the sun angles for this specific location. In the winter the sun still gets in and in the summer, the awnings prevent exposure AND collect the solar energy. This is a triple whammy - passive heat gain in the winter, shading and energy creation year round.

Solar Awning Design for South Facing Windows