Wondering why some sustainability advice doesn’t seem to work where you live?

Discover why your climate zone is the foundation for every design and specification decision in a sustainable home.

Learn how to find your climate zone, what it means for your design priorities, and how to use it as a filter when you’re weighing up advice from your team.

Listen to the episode now.

Hello! This is Episode 404, and Way #4 in the ‘44 Ways to Create Your Sustainable Home’ series here on the podcast. It’s also the last episode of Section One, which takes you through Designing for Climate and Site.

Over the past three episodes (Episode 401, Episode 402 and Episode 403), we’ve covered orientation, natural ventilation from breezes and protection from harsher winds, and how to design a home to naturally heat and cool itself through passive solar design principles.

This Episode will help tie all of that together and give it a specific context for your project.

None of the strategies I’ve discussed so far apply identically everywhere. What works best in a hot and humid tropical climate is different from what works in a cool, elevated climate. 

And so, the best way to understand which strategies apply most powerfully to where you are building or renovating is to know your climate zone.

A climate zone is a classification that groups geographic areas by their predominant climate characteristics. Temperature range, humidity levels, solar radiation, rainfall patterns, wind exposure, these all vary across a country and across the globe. Climate zones give designers, engineers, and assessors a common reference point for understanding those conditions and designing accordingly.

The reason climate zones matter so much for sustainable home design is this: the strategies that make a home comfortable, efficient, and durable are not universal across all locations. They are highly climate-specific.

Applying the wrong strategy for your climate can result in a home that is more expensive to run, more uncomfortable to live in, and more prone to building performance issues. Knowing your climate zone is the foundational step that allows you to filter the enormous volume of sustainability information and advice available to you, and identify what actually applies to your specific situation.

In Australia, there are eight main climate zones and 69 climate sub-zones, classified through the NatHERS system, which is the National House Energy Rating Scheme. These are the zones used in building codes and energy assessments across the country.

In the United States and in many international building codes, the ASHRAE climate zone classification is used, which runs from Zone 1 in the hottest, most humid climates through to Zone 7 and 8 in the coldest. The European Union, the United Kingdom, Canada, and other countries have their own equivalent classification systems. The concept is universal; the specific system varies by jurisdiction.

Knowing your climate zone gives you a practical tool for evaluating the advice and information you receive throughout your project. It really can simplify what will work, and not work, for your project.

In this Episode, we cover:

• What a climate zone is, and why it matters so much for sustainable home design
• The five broad climate types (hot and humid, hot and dry, temperate, cool and cold, warm and humid) and how each one shapes design priorities
• How to find your climate zone in Australia (NatHERS) and internationally (ASHRAE and equivalents)
• How to use your climate zone as a filter for the sustainability advice and recommendations you receive
• The questions to ask your designer, energy assessor and builder so your climate zone informs the key design and specification decisions
• Why pairing climate-zone knowledge with the previous three Ways gives you the strongest foundation for a sustainable project

Plus a whole lot more.

LISTEN TO THE EPISODE NOW.

RESOURCES

NatHERS Climate Zones (Australia) >>> https://www.nathers.gov.au/nathers-accredited-software/nathers-climate-zones-and-weather-files 

ASHRAE Weather Data Centre (National information) >>> https://www.ashrae.org/technical-resources/bookstore/weather-data-center 

Your Home (Australian Government resource) >>> https://www.yourhome.gov.au/ 

’44 Ways to Create a Sustainable Home’ e-guide >>> https://undercoverarchitect.com/ways 

Access the support and guidance you need to be confident and empowered when renovating and building your family home inside my signature online program, HOME METHOD >>> https://undercoverarchitect.com/courses/the-home-method/

Learn more about how to interview and select the right builder with the Choose Your  Builder mini-course >>> https://undercoverarchitect.com/courses/choose-your-builder