Assignment (Doc) | Sustainable Home Design

Sustainable Home Design 1
SUSTAINABLE HOME DESIGN
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Sustainable Home Design 2
Introduction
Sustainable home can be defined as a home that has the least possible negative impact on
the environment in terms of energy efficiency, environmental toxins, use of materials and
resources in the most responsible and efficient manner as possible while at the same time
impacting positively both physically and psychologically on its inhabitants (Low, Gleeson,
Green & Radovic 2016).
It entails orientation and positioning off your sustainable home, topological design
consideration, planning regulations, structural configurations and concepts, structural timber
design, foundation design, and architectural and structural drawings.
The housing industry takes care of around 7% to 10% of Australian GDP and it’s one of
the major indicators of economic health and growth (Tapsuwan, Mathot, Walker, & Barnett
2018). This home project provides an excellent learning experience and can be used as a
powerful tool to improve community awareness. The government has put in initiatives to help
encourage green domestic building stock by providing incentives and encouraging more
investment in sustainable homes.
Trends- Domestic Buildings
The emerging trends in the domestic building recently have been in the line of demands of a
single dwelling, medium-density, and high-density housing. This has affected the average house
sizes, lifestyle and market trends have also put pressure on urban land, energy, and water
resource. The regulator of the industry is as well as doing new policy concerning water
conservation and recycling, energy rating measures are now mandatory. The affordability of such
homes is being monitored and controlled so as to make many people be able to own homes.

Sustainable Home Design 3
Infrastructure helps make available the physical structures needed to provide the services
and goods to where they are needed. Infrastructural development in most areas is used as a
measure of the level of development and acts as one of the indicators of development.
Sustainable infrastructural design is there not an option but a mandatory requirement for any
construction design work.
Selecting suitable land
When designing for a sustainable home, the land selection is a vital process and a number of
factors should be put into consideration while doing this. First, the orientation of the land and
access is critical while doing the design. The orientation of the land and access points for both
entry and exit should be taken care of for the design to be per the standard of sustainable design.
Second, Land size, frontal width, geometry, elevation, and landscape should also be considered.
This is important so as to avoid violating of set building and urban planning regulations.
Neighborhood character and security should be considered as this will shape the kind of
fencing style to be used, kind of lighting employed and even the use of live fences are dedicated
to the neighborhood culture and security
Scenery and lines of sight are also important to help on the way of landscaping. As well
engineering considerations should be made for the right involvement of other services and street
lighting.
In addition to the above-mentioned factors, other things that should be kept in mind while
doing sustainable infrastructure design and land selection are the local authority regulations as
outlined in the Australian Building Codes. The plot slop should average about 8% from the front

Sustainable Home Design 4
of the plot boundary to the rear boundary. An easement is also included in the rear fence as it is
important for surface water drainage.
The service connection should be located at the right-hand corner of the plot when looking
form, the access road. As well it will be important to check the soil condition with the best
recommended at the soil of class-M.
Passive Design
By maintaining a comfortable temperature range for auxiliary cooling or heating the
design takes advantage of the climatic conditions. Passive design is constituted in several ways.
First, the design should create thermal comfort within the interior of the space occupied by
people. This is made possible by positioning windows, doors, and other fenestrations in such a
way that they correlate well with the exterior weather conditions.
The smart use of land should be a priority as well as the orientation of the building to
help achieve heat control. Materials used should be selected that control heat gain as well the
interior should be designed to encourage airflow. On top of these, shading and shielding should
be well applied to minimize heating and cooling needed and thus encouraging the use of solar
energy.
Climatic Zones in Australia
The climatic zones can be subdivided into several zones but majorly it can be subdivided
into seven zones. But using zone 7 as our major zone that is Monash city with a cool
temperature, the sun seasonal movement can be monitored and its angle of the incident be used
in the design. This is important as it guides in the orientation of the doors and windows.