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Responsible site planning
is based on a buildings response to its environment and the dominant influence
is usually the sun. This
is very old practice and should be a cornerstone of national energy policy.
The ancient Greeks had a renewable fuel economy based on wood. By 6 B.C., goats
had eaten virtually all the trees in Greece. The government put a tax on wood
fuel to conserve and extend its use. The Greeks also realized that buildings
were a major consumer of energy. The first formal site-sensitive planning I
have found, which takes solar influence into consideration was a housing development
built in 5 B.C. in Olynthus. The Greek playwright Aeschylus said this was normal
for greeks and a sign of modern and civilized society, as opposed to buildings
built by primitives and barbarians who, "though they had eyes to see, they saw
to no avail; they had ears, but understood not. Without purpose, they wrought
all things in confusion, lacking knowledge of buildings." Aeschylus was not
alone. In 1 B.C., Vitruvius, chief architect of the roman empire said, "We must
begin by taking note of the climate in which buildings are to be built if our
designs for them are to be correct". "One type building seems appropriate for
Egypt, another for Spain, one still different for Rome, and so on with lands
and countries of varying characteristics." 2000 years later we re-discover what
we should have been doing all along.
Of course, we have to know
where the sun is in order to determine its effect on structures. That is another
discussion but telling time with the sun is an offshoot of architectural solar
response and there are interesting ways of employing sundials in design.
An excellent
sundial site is http://perso.orange.fr/blateyron/sundials/shadowspro/gb/index.html.
It was recently translated from French and has a very good
sundial design program call SHADOWS available for free download.
SHADOWS let's you plot points and print data for dials of
any size and orientation.
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