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The Outside-In House, desert edition
Abstract
The prolific use of non-renewable energy must be significantly deterred in order to maintain stability of the earth. The desert outside-in house allows human thermal comfort to be maintained in a building environment without the use of mechanical air conditioning. Energy consumption is substantially reduced through implementation of natural environmental thermal control principles.
In addition to accomplishing the typical objective outcomes of good architecture, the outside-in house substantially reduces the amount of non-renewable energy used in residences. The reduced consumption of underground fossil fuel resources will then ultimately make the world a better place to live.
Description
The outside-in house is a residential design concept for living comfortably and conveniently in a securely defined space that develops outside thermal comfort conditions within the traditional interior residential setting. The outside-in house is also a producer of energy - both enthusiastic energy for the occupants and residual extra electrical energy for the community.
In essence, the outside-in house is a fun, comforting, energizing, net-zero energy-in, guilt-free desert home for living, learning, working and playing while reducing the energy demand on the earth. The outside-in house must improve, or at least not detract from the quality of the earth, the earth's atmosphere, and the inhabitants of the earth.
Design Process
The design of the outside-in house requires an approach somewhat different from traditional architecture design in that there is a much greater focus and attention given to the site design and integration of landscape design into daily living - both outside and inside.
Designing the outside-in house actually starts with site selection and then modifying the site architecturally to take advantage of the natural outdoor human thermal comfort features that preexist on the site. The outside-in house shelter component is then developed and integrated into the existing features from the site. The integrated project of site plus shelter is considered the outside-in house.
The outside-in house project design process includes an evaluation of climatic and human thermal comfort variables that affect environmental comfort. Through a subjective and qualitative evaluation of the human thermal comfort modifiers, such as shading, natural ventilation, and thermal mass storage, strategies are developed to create year-round, energy-efficient, comfortable living conditions.
Creative use of traditional passive climatic architectural responses, such as wind scoops, deep shading, and thermal mass energy storage are commonly reintroduced as architectural features in the outside-in house.
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