Energy efficient Landscape

design
• A well-designed landscape will:
– Cut your summer and winter energy costs dramatically.
– Protect your home from winter wind and summer sun
– Reduce consumption of water, pesticides and fuel for landscaping and lawn maintenance
– Help control noise and air pollution.
• Weather
– ‘A state or condition of the atmosphere (temperature, pressure, wind, rainfall, etc) at a given
place and at a given instant of time’.
• Climate
– ‘The generalized weather or summation of weather conditions over a given region during
comparatively longer period (usually, a season or a year or even a decade)’
– Factors affecting climate
• Latitude
• Altitude (elevation)
• Precipitation
• Soil type
• Nearness to large water bodies
• Topography
• Vegetation
– Scales of climate
• Microclimate
• Meso climate (10 & 100 km across )
• Macro climate
• Microclimate
– The climate immediately surrounding your home
• If your home is located on a sunny southern slope, it may have a warm microclimate, even if you live in a cool region
• Even though you live in a hot-humid region, your home may be situated in a comfortable microclimate because of abundant shade and dry breeze.
• Nearby bodies of water may increase your site’s humidity or decrease its air temperature.
• Various methods
– Shading
– Windbreaks
– Water conservation
– Arbors
– Absorbent and Reflective Materials
 Solar Insolation
• Amount of solar radiation
received on a surface is dependent
– the altitude of the sun due to the
season
– the position of the sun due to the
time of day
– the inclination of the receiving
surface.

• Assumptions for purposes of

simplifying the calculation of the
sun ’ s position in relationship to a
building
– the sun rotates around the Earth
– the Earth is flat.
Radiation spectrum and seasons
Equinox and solstice
Path of the sun on solstices and equinox
• Used to read the solar
azimuth and altitude
Stereographic sun path diagrams
throughout the day and year
for a given position on the
earth.
• Azimuth Lines -
– run around the edge of the
diagram.
• Altitude Lines -
– represented as concentric
circular dotted lines that
run from the center of the
diagram out.
• Date Lines 
– start on the eastern side of
the graph and run to the
western side - represent
the path of the sun on one
particular day of the year.
– first day of January to June
are shown as solid lines
– July to December are
shown as dotted lines.
• Hour Lines/ Analemma 
– shown as figure-eight-type
lines that intersect the date
lines - represent the
position of the sun at a
specific hour of the day,
throughout the yea
– The intersection points
between date and hour
lines give the position of
 Basic Orientation

– East:
• Receive direct morning sun but will be shaded in the afternoon
by the shadow of the building itself.
– West:
• Shaded in the morning but fully exposed to the hot afternoon
sun.
– South:
• Most critical to passive solar design because it receives the most
sunlight throughout the day but never as intensely as the east or
west sides.
– North:
• Almost always in shade.
Shading
– trees can reduce surrounding air temperatures as much as 9° F (5°C).
– Using shade effectively requires you to know the size, shape, and location of the moving
shadow that your shading device casts
– Trees are available in the appropriate sizes, densities, and shapes for almost any shade
application.
– To block solar heat in the summer but let much of it in during the winter, use deciduous
trees.
– To provide continuous shade or to block heavy winds, use dense evergreen trees or
shrubs
– Deciduous trees with high, spreading crowns (i.e., leaves and branches) can be planted
to the south of your home to provide maximum summertime roof shading.
– Trees with crowns lower to the ground are more appropriate to the west, where shade
is needed from lower afternoon sun angles.
– Trees should not be planted on the southern sides of solar-heated homes in cold
climates, because the branches of these deciduous trees will block some winter sun.
– Plant trees far enough away from the home so that when they mature, their root
systems do not damage the foundation and branches do not damage the roof.
– A 6-foot to 8-foot (1.8-meter to 2.4-meter) deciduous tree planted near your home will
begin shading windows the first year. Depending on the species and the home, the tree
will shade the roof in 5 to 10 years.
Windbreaks
• To use a windbreak effectively, you need to know what landscape strategies will work best in your regional climate and
your microclimate.
• A windbreak reduces heating costs by lowering the wind chill near your home.
• Wind chill is the temperature it "feels like" outside and is based on the rate of heat loss from exposed skin caused by
wind and cold.
• As the wind increases, the body is cooled at a faster rate and the skin temperature drops.
• A windbreak will reduce wind speed for a distance of as much as 30 times the windbreak's height. But for maximum
protection, plant your windbreak at a distance from your home of two to five times the mature height of the trees.
• The best windbreaks block wind close to the ground by using trees and shrubs that have low crowns.
• Dense evergreen trees and shrubs planted to the north and northwest of the home are the most common type of
windbreak.
• Trees, bushes, and shrubs are often planted together to block or impede wind from ground level to the treetops.
• If snow tends to drift in your area, plant low shrubs on the windward side of your windbreak. The shrubs will trap snow
before it blows next to your home. Snow fences can also help trap snow.
• Evergreen trees combined with a wall, fence, or earth berm (natural or man-made walls or raised areas of soil) can
deflect or lift the wind over the home.
– Be careful not to plant evergreens too close to your home's south side if you want to collect passive solar heat from the winter sun.
 Water conservation
WATERING
– determine how much water your plants actually need and evapo-transpiration.
– Evapotranspiration (Et) is the amount of water that is evaporated from the soil and transpired through the plant's leaves.
– This amount of water needs to be replaced through watering.
– If you know your area's Et rate, you can plan the amount of water to be replaced through irrigation. Your particular
microclimate will also affect evapotranspiration in different areas of your yard.
– It's best to water or irrigate your plants in the early morning when evaporation rates are low. This also provides plants
with water before mid-day when the evaporation rate is the highest.
XERISCAPING
– Xeriscaping is a systematic method of promoting water conservation in landscaped areas.
– landscaping designed specifically for areas that are susceptible to drought, or for properties where water conservation is
practiced.
– xeros meaning "dry," the term means literally "dry landscape." 
– Seven basic xeriscaping principles:
• Planning and design
–  Provides direction and guidance, mapping your water and energy conservation strategies, both of which will be dependent upon your regional climate and
microclimate.
• Selecting and zoning plants appropriately
– Bases your plant selections and locations on those that will flourish in your regional climate and microclimate.  Always group plants with similar water needs
together.
• Limiting turf areas
– Reduces the use of bluegrass turf, which usually requires a lot of supplemental watering. Consider substituting a turf grass that uses less water than bluegrass.
• Improving the soil 
– Enables soil to better absorb water and to encourage deeper roots.
• Irrigating efficiently 
– Encourages using the irrigation method that waters plants in each area most efficiently.
• Using mulches
– Keeps plant roots cool, minimizes evaporation, prevents soil from crusting, and reduces weed growth.
• Maintaining the landscape
– Keeps plants healthy through weeding, pruning, fertilizing, and controlling pests.
 Arbors
• Arbors along the sides of the house, attached or detached, will similarly reduce temperatures as the air movement can pass
through the arbor and be cooled by evaporation at the plant’s leaves.
• The shade created by the arbor is also beneficial.
• The arbor is a traditional cooling method used worldwide.
Absorbent and Reflective Materials
• Groundcover and/or turf also has a cooling effect from evapotranspiration (the loss of water from the soil by evaporation and by
the transpiration of the plants growing therein).
• The temperature above a groundcover will be 10 to 15 degrees cooler than above a heat absorbent material such as asphalt or a
reflective material such as light colored gravel or rock.
• A heat absorbent material like asphalt will also continue to radiate heat after the sun has set.
• It is best to either minimize the use of heat absorbent and reflective materials near a house and/or shade them from any direct
sun.