Customer Reviews

The Passive Solar House: Using Solar Design to Heat and Cool Your Home (Real Goods Independent Living Book)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

A timely book considering the likely escalation in price and growing scarcity of fossil fuels over the next few years/decades. If most new houses were built according to the principles in this book, then at least the building industry would be doing its bit to help alleviate rapid climate change. James Kachadorian has been building passive solar homes on a commercial basis since the mid 1970's, having been inspired by the 1973 oil crisis.

The book acts on two levels, acting as an inspiration for all who are interested in the concepts, and at the same time leading the more technical reader through all the principles and calculations necessary to make a good job of designing a solar house. The calculations will enable you to ensure correct sizing and orientation of windows, thus avoiding the common error of overglazing. With the inclusion of local climate data, the author shows you how to calculate the necessary capacity for any back-up heating, enabling you to avoid a costly oversized heating system and overheating of the living spaces.

Half a chapter is given to the design of a Solar Slab foundation, a concept the author patented in 1975, but has now released for general use. The idea is that internal air heated by the sun during the day is circulated through channels in the slab, thereby heating the masonry. The heat is released as the living space cools in the evening.

Also included are sections on appropriate insulation, venting and fresh air systems. The basic house design is standard American, based on six inch timber stud wall construction, but the basic principles can easily be applied to the masonry buildings favoured in the UK. Special sun-spaces are also considered, as are interior design considerations to help make the solar concepts more effective.

The many pages of very useful regional climate data apply only to the USA. If you want to make good use of the book, and do the calculations, you will have to find the appropriate data for your part of the UK. That said, the remainder of the book is the best I have seen on the practicalities of designing a solar home.

An excellent book for the beginner in passive solar home design with a cookbook approach and worksheets to calculate the solar performance of you building design. Usefull tables needed for calculations are included but only for a limited number of localities. Based upon a sound, albiet more than 20 year old, approach to passive solar design. An easy to understand process for the design of a truely passive home with methods to determine the need for and cost of supplemental heat in many areas of the country. Principles throughout the book may be applied to other designs. A detailed explanation and instructions on building the "solar slab". Well worth the price of admission!

A "how to do it" approach to building your own passive solar house. To be fair not truly passive solar as a backup heating system is essential. Some books give overviews of passive solar designs, while others go into generalised details of calculations. This is not a high brow technical book aimed at technical people. This book gives one design, the solar slab, that is proven, and the calculations to design the essentials. An example house is used throughout the book. The attractions of the design - a Trombe wall laid flat and the house built on it - is that it costs no more to construct that any other house, and can look like any traditional design. This is a true bonus in England, where in many regions the planners frequently reject designs not blending in with the surrounding very old traditional houses.

The book is well laid out and easy to read and can be interpreted by most people with common sense. Even the foundations are displayed in cut away drawing form in precise detail. The tables are for the USA, but can be easily substituted by the equivalent UK tables. From my viewpoint, it would nice if the UK tables were incorporated though. Further detail on the control functionality of the backup heating and fans would be beneficial.

If anyone is considering building a passive solar house, and does not have a bottomless pit of money, this book is essential reading.

This book is simple, clear and straight forward. James Kachadorian talks the reader through the design process and calculations, allowing them to apply his solar slab design to any of their own house plans.

It is aimed not at the academic nor those with heating engineering experience, but at those wanting to acquire a working knowledge of the principles and calculations involved with designing their own home. Instead of dealing with vague generalities, a simple but robust method of calculating solar heat gained and lost is worked through, although (like tax calculations) some may find this level of maths challenging.

Weakness: For the UK market, the build style is standard US early 90's; the tables refer only to the US.

Strengths: The techniques are transparent enough that it is easy to update and adapt to UK data; the houses suggested are very close to traditional designs.

Warning: Not appropriate for people wanting to build 'weird' or peculiar looking houses.

A good book for the beginner. Otherwise fairly light weight. Repetitive. Why did he give up the business? Others have used his under floor storage system using stones, rather that his patented slab. Not worth the money.

Easy to read and understand. James takes building materials you are going to use any way but in a unique way. This is the way we all should build.