Designing a Passively Solar Heated Home

Our neighbors and good friends Matt and Tonya designed and built their own non-traditional home shortly after we purchased our traditional mid-sixties ranch home. Matt and Tonya, through their example, taught me a number of important concepts regarding passive solar heating and choosing a home site in general, and I will list them here:

Choose a building site with hardwood trees to your south. These trees will shade your home in the hot summer months and allow full sun in the cold winter.
Choose a building site on the south side of a road, not the north side! In the winter, when your leaves are gone, you will still have your privacy. And, you can thin out trees away from your home to the south to allow a nice cooling breeze in the summer. On your north side, you can install dense plantings of evergreens to provide both privacy and to block the cold winter winds.
For passive solar heating, you simply need large energy-efficient windows facing south. Let the sun do the rest. My friend Matt states that even on days with near zero (degrees Fahrenheit) temperatures, the solar heat generated via his large south-facing windows will entirely heat his fairly large home. Note that they still use wood heat during the cloudy days and evenings.
Insulate your home well! Matt insulated his home with the high R-value expanding foam. He was fortunate to have a father-in-law next door that possessed the equipment and experience to help him do this at cost.
If you are resourceful, you can pick up thermally insulated windows at highly discounted prices. Matt and Tonya obtained their windows from newspaper ads and other sales and then designed their home around the windows.

Photos of Matt and Tonya's Passively Heated Solar Home

Windows From Inside	Windows From Outside

Wind-Blocking Evergreens and Privacy on North Side

More Resources on Passive Solar Design

Visit the U.S. Department of Energy webpages devoted to passive solar heating design.

See this Wikipedia page on Passive Solar Desing for more information too.