Posted on 08/02/2021 5:29:41 PM PDT by Jonty30
Just a point of curiosity. I've been reading up on how buildings can be designed to draw heat from the ground and have it sent upwards, which keeps the ground floor cooler.
So, I'm just wondering how often southern homes make use of this design and why it isn't used more?
Build it in Texas.
They are not that expensive at the initial build, but the expense in utilities is prohibitive. A friend who has a home roughly 50% larger, but with vaulting pays in excess of 4 times as much in electricity costs and we are both totally electric. He regrets his choices.
Thanks.
I imagine that does help, a LOT, with the heating.
Luckily, we don’t get too cold, for too long, down here in TX.
Well, except for when we have statewide, unprecedented FREEZES! 🥶
Exactly. People get use to things. Personally, I can’t stand heat. I cry like a liberal at a college protest when it gets above 80. But I can sit out in my yard and read a book when it is 20 below in the winter time. I am completely off grid so I don’t have the luxury of unlimited energy (hahaha, Californians don’t either) so you just get use to things like we did for thousands of generations.
Don’t give the libs any ideas. They won’t be happy until we’re living in huts and carrying water jugs on our heads. I refuse to stand before cameras with flies in my eyes, showing the world how woke we are.🪰
I’m guessing it’s because they use sweet tea to cool off instead.
High humidity and high water tables. Cellars and storm shelters usually end up being water logged here in Oklahoma, too.
Lots of white privledge in post 119.
Because the 19th Century ended 120 years ago.
I think there is room to incorporate old stuff with the new. It costs nothing to use covection currents to cool off a house. It could save you a few bucks by not having your AC have to work so hard.
When the breeze came off the river, they had their houses arranged so the breeze would channel through these narrow walkways generating a cooling breeze.
However, once the levees were built there was no flooding and also no more breeze. So the design was no longer useful.
Yes, you get it cold in the fridge, but, don’t use the ice to dilute the tea. Taste better at full strength.
I live in southern Florida now, but, we use to live in Georgia. House had AC, but, we sold it to buy a sailboat. REALLY wanted AC while still in Georgia, but, didn’t get it. Now where we are is windy, cool in (most) evenings, and, have several DC fans to keep the air moving. If it gets too hot, we go to the beach.
If I understand the question, we have a library in the system I worked for that used the ground for heating and cooling.
I am not sure how well it worked as I wasn’t in that department.
They used to. They had big porches. They also lined up hallways and windows so that airflow could be directed completely through a house’s open windows. They called it crossdraft.
They used to. They had big porches. They also lined up hallways and windows so that airflow could be directed completely through a house’s open windows. They called it crossdraft.
People also paid more attention to positioning to take advantage of prevailing winds and planted trees for shade.
The simple answer is cost. Its a lot cheaper to build homes to more economic design plans and then just rely on air conditioning to cool them.
Things like really high ceilings which used to be used before air conditioning take up a lot of extra space. Also, while they save money on air conditioning in the summer, it costs more to heat them in the winter.
You forgot the big shade trees planted on the south and west sides of the house.
Just so.
My DC high school was built in 1890 with heavy masonry walls, high ceilings with very tall double hung windows. When the temperature rose, we used window poles to lower the top pane to help exhaust the heat collected at ceiling level. All in all comfortable but for a few days in DCs hot and humid climate. Had zero mechanical ventilation. Lighting was at at much lower level than modern schools with hallways dim by today’s standards...very little heat gain from incandescent lights...
Yes, as I read this headline I was thinking of Montpelier, James Madison's estate, halfway between Charlottesville and Culpeper in central Virginia. Those doors on either side of the main entry door are actually three separate pairs of shutter panels, if I recall correctly, with several similar floor-to ceiling shuttered windows in the back of that central lobby, so that breezes can flow through as they are needed, whether low or high. This was a feature of many Georgian buildings; you can see them in original buildings in places like Philadelphia and Williamsburg.
Having so many panels meant the air flow could be adjusted in a variety of ways. Those interior shutter panels can also be angled to aid the ventilation of the rooms on either side. The bottom panels can also remain closed to keep children and dogs in, like many farm houses. Some interior rooms would have had transom windows over the entry doors.
One of the front rooms upstairs is where Madison wrote most of the Constitution. It looks out over rolling green hills descending. They used sheep to mow the main expanse of the lawns, with laborers clipping or scything the edges.
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