The following is a quick summary of many ZED technologies that we have comprehensively integrated into our unique holistic architecture-and-design systems engineering, for 27 years. This short overview is intended to “wet your scientific appetite” and motivate you to invest the time required to read on, and better understand the energy-problem-solving potential of our proven ZED solutions.

It has taken us decades to accumulate, develop and refine this valuable ZED knowledge. Much of it is “counterintuitive” to people who are unfamiliar with energy science. We attempt to summarize our successful design patterns in a concise form that is easy for intelligent people (who know how to read in depth) to understand and appreciate.

ZED wishes to fully acknowledge the significant research and public domain contributions published by the world-renowned University of Central Florida, Florida Solar Energy Center. Since 1975, they have provided valuable input that is an integral part of ZED. We have always considered their basic foundation, and added our experiences and creative innovations on top of the best design and construction practices offered by the many energy experts we have encountered over the years. FSEC now has about 60 researchers, many working on a $5 million NASA hydrogen program grant.

When I developed my 5,000 sq.ft. Zero Energy Home in 1979, I was a Senior Research Scientist at a large energy research lab with 700 research scientists – many with leading-edge expertise in thermal mechanics, and the essential skills that I needed to perfect ZED in a minimum amount of elapsed time.

As a second-generation energy research scientist, I have always solicited and appreciated input from multitudes with widely varying intuitive, anecdotal, irrational, and scientific opinions. ZED has listened closely to the considerable constructive criticism we have received, and made decades of iterative refinements along the way. What we offer here is our proven assimilation of the “best and brightest” thinking we have discovered, tested, and improved upon along on our journey toward resolving the ever-increasing great American energy crisis.

ZED cannot be digested in a 60 second sound bite by non-learning TV addicts with a short attention span. In writing this material, we obviously hope and assume that YOU will take the time required to merge our experience with your own critical decision making processes, and become healthy, wealthy and wise from the time you invest exploring ZED possibilities, and our practical solutions developed over the decades. (smile) The longer you study a challenging problem with an open mind, the more chance you’ll have of working out all of the subtle issues you encounter over time.

Albert Einstein said that if we cannot explain something to a six-year-old child we really do not understand it at all. His enlightened statement is very stimulating. We will do the best we can to help you become aware of what is now a formal set of ZED principles and practices – How and Why. If you care about energy conservation or living an abundant life in harmony with nature, then please take the time required to read and absorb this valuable information.

This quick outline does NOT explain everything you need to know to make it all happen. We are merely providing a snapshot of a 50,000-foot-high view of some of the categories of expertise required to solve our nation’s current complex energy problems. There is a lot of physics and math behind what has become “intuitive” ZED to us in hindsight.

We will elaborate on the history, science, systems engineering, tradeoffs, economics, esthetics, logistics, materials, products, practical construction techniques, and community planning issues on later web pages, and in our books, plans, specifications, Construction Checklists, and on our sister website: Natural Energy Applied Research (with photo presentations, graphics, and tutorials). We are adding new detailed specifics every week right now.

We also offer classes and turnkey project consulting for architects, designers, developers, builders, tradesmen, executives, investors, teacher / professors, students, hands-on interns, politicians, and potential Zero Energy Home buyers. Our 25 years of practical ZED demonstrations have shown that the remaining issues in front of us are educational and political, more than technical.

Get More Information in Larry Hartweg's 800 page book on
"Zero Energy Design"

A Nutshell Summary Of Things To Avoid in a Zero Energy Home

Never Do In Any Climate – No compromise, IF you want a low-cost Zero Energy Home

Never Use Roof Angled Glass (Skylights) – They create a Solar Furnace in the summer. In the winter, warm air rises and heat is rapidly lost through the cold conductive glass. Roof angled glass is always bad everywhere in every season. Even on sunny winter days, roof angled glass provides LESS solar gain than vertical south facing glass (in the northern hemisphere).

Never Use A Fireplace or A Clothes Dryer In Air-Conditioned Living Quarters – They suck out your expensive clean conditioned air, which must be replaced by unconditioned dirty air. ZED locates the laundry room in the un-air-conditioned thermal buffer zone. Folding and ironing can be done in air conditioned rooms.

Never Design A Complex Exterior with a high ratio of surface area to interior space – Excessive surface area causes unnecessary undesirable heat transfer summer and winter. A simple rectangle costs less, performs better, and has less surface area and less turbulent airflow. Simple architectural features can be added to a rectangle to improve street appeal.

Never Use 2 x 4 Wooden Exterior Walls On 16” Centers – 2 x 6’s on 24” centers use less wood, cost less, and allow more insulation. Use simplified 2-stud corner details, wall intersections, etc. Other non-wood alternatives have many advantages over wood framing. There are many modern good reasons to not use wood to frame a home.

Never Ignore Pests, Toxins and Allergens – Dust, dust mites, termites, ants, rodents, spiders, mold, mildew, pollen and microorganisms – Design to prevent – Avoid pesticides, etc. that are environmental hazards and toxic to humans and pets.

Never Use Log Home Exterior Walls – Wood has much less insulating effect per inch than other superior less-expensive materials, and logs waste a large quantity of a dwindling natural resource. Killing trees is bad for the environment and increases Global Warming.

Never Design A Long Distance Between Hot Water Source and Faucet – Wastes time, water, and energy to heat the replacement water. Use plumbing clusters (and possible re circulation just before hot water usage).

Never Design A Frequently-Used Single Exterior Door - ZED often uses a 2-door “airlock” in the thermal buffer zone. One door is shut before the next is opened, reducing the large volume of air infiltration on windy days.

Never Use Much Glass on a single-shell portion of the house – It is like a thermal hole in your walls. The ZED double shell design allows much more glass, daylight and views, with less undesirable heat transfer. Two small Delta T’s are better than one large Delta T.

Never Use Incandescent Lighting – Century-old Thomas Edison incandescent lighting is the least efficient way to provide light. It is the most common, least expensive to install initially, BUT incandescent lighting uses far more electricity, and is the most expensive to operate and maintain. Fluorescent lighting is much more efficient, but most of them have undesirable color temperature. RGB ultrabright LED’s are more expensive, but they are by far the most efficient, with the lowest total cost of ownership, and they allow full spectrum color control.

Never Run Electrical Wiring or Plumbing In Any Exterior Wall – They create poor insulation and air infiltration holes in the building thermal envelope. They can be run in the interior walls that are perpendicular to the exterior walls, or in air-sealed floor outlets, etc. All perforations in the building envelope (including interior wall / ceiling / attic / plumbing / electrical / lighting) must be carefully sealed and inspected. The goal is to eliminate unplanned air infiltration.

Never Ignore The High Value Of Double Shell Thermal Buffer Zones with natural convection airflow to equalize temperature differentials north/south and upstairs/downstairs.

Never Design An Open Staircase Or Loft Area in the air-conditioned portion of a building – Warm air rises like a hot air balloon. The upstairs will ALWAYS be either too hot, OR the downstairs will be too cool (or both). A staircase should have a door at the bottom (preferred) or at the top. The staircase may have optional glass looking into a great room for visual appeal. Glass elevators are nice in more-expensive homes. An open staircase or balcony works well in a double shell thermal buffer zone (sunroom) where a ZED convection airflow loop is engineered to automatically equalize upper and lower temperature differentials.

Never Deliver A New House For Occupancy Without First Using A Calibrated Fan To Measure, Locate, and Repair Any Undesirable Air Infiltration Leaks.

Never Fail To Allow Room For Future South Facing Solar Panels – Photovoltaic solar electric, domestic hot water, and swimming pool water heater. (May be hidden from view on all sides.) Someday soon, you may want to plug your electric car into your PV roof. (smile)

Never Overlook Any Of The Critical Human Comfort Issues – Temperature PLUS humidity (enthalpy), oxygen and CO2. Intelligent Heating Ventilating and Air Conditioning (HVAC) sensors and controls are desirable on larger homes and commercial buildings. Inexpensive intelligent programmable zoned HVAC with multiple sensors and controls can be used to help balance comfort factor differentials north/south, east/west, morning/afternoon, upper/lower, inside/outside, etc. - improving comfort while greatly reducing energy requirements.

Never Do In A Climate That Requires Significant Air Conditioning

Never Use Unshaded West Facing Glass – It is a Solar Furnace on hot afternoons (over 3000 BTU / sq.ft. of unwanted heat added to western rooms)

Never Use Unshaded High Thermal Mass (e.g., concrete) On The West Side – Absorbs afternoon sunlight and then radiates heat into the house long after the sun sets. High thermal mass must be heavily insulated on the OUTSIDE to reduce/prevent undesirable heat transfer. West wall radiant barriers with an air gap are important.

Never (intentionally or unintentionally) draw in unconditioned replacement air that is hotter or more humid than interior air, without some type of heat exchanger / dehumidification solution (heat pipe, etc.)

Never Ignore The Importance Of Year Round Humidity Control / Regulation

Never Use A Dark Colored Roof – You should use a highly-reflective white “cool roof” (or roof planting “green roof”). White metal roof is better than asphalt (with a black substrate).

Never Ignore The Importance Of Radiation In Downward Heat Flow – Must have a radiant barrier under your roof deck. A well-designed ZED attic should not be much hotter than the peak outside air temperature.

Never Ignore The Importance Of Window Overhangs and Shading Devices – Must understand the seasonal path of the sun for your specific location.

Never Operate A Ceiling Fan In A Room When No One Is Present – Ceiling fans can improve evaporative cooling of perspiration and make the skin about 3 degrees cooler, BUT ceiling fans disturb the laminar insulating air layers at the ceiling and around windows and make the room hotter in the summer (like the “wind chill” factor operating in reverse). Ceiling fan usage can thus INCREASE the operating time of your air conditioner system for a given thermostat temperature setting.

Never Do In A Climate That Requires Significant Heating

Never Use Poorly Insulated, Unprotected North Facing Glass – Use double shell design, salt box style, insulated interior window shutters, etc.

Never Ignore The Potential Of Passive Solar Heating – Lots of vertical south facing glass in a non-air-conditioned double-shell thermal buffer zone (sunspace, sunroom, solarium, tropical greenhouse, conservatory, etc.). Do NOT use a lot of glass on any wall of any single shell building. Location-specific south glass overhang design is critical for climates with significant heating and cooling requirements.

Never Ignore The Use Of Self-Regulating Natural Convection To Equalize The Temperature In North And South Rooms – Double shell design, etc.

Highest Priority ZED Topics First

The average American household now spends nearly $2,000 a year on home energy bills, and that amount number is rapidly increasing every year. Perhaps yours is already much more, and certainly more than it was last year. This has the largest impact on the people who are least able to afford it, and understand the underlying issues that will continue to make it worse in the future.

In most American homes, the largest impact on monthly energy bills is “changing the temperature of things.”

During climatic temperature extremes, the heating and air conditioning bill is by far the most important. Heating and cooling often exceed all other energy expenses put together. One obvious solution is “move to Hawaii and live in a loin cloth under a palm tree on a beach, or half way up a volcano.” (smile)

1. If you choose to live where heating and/or cooling is important, we will first show you how to eliminate heating and cooling energy bills altogether, in the coldest AND hottest American climatic zones. During summer and winter temperature extremes, the utility bills required to heat and cool a conventional home can exceed the sum total of all other utility bills put together. We will explain how to totally terminate heating and cooling bills, in a well-designed Zero Energy Home almost everywhere. The International Space Station doesn’t pay monthly electric bills – Why should you?

2. The second most expensive temperature changer is often the poorly designed American kitchen electric refrigerator, which uses power most of the time all year long. We’ll discuss a simple solution to totally eliminate monthly refrigerator electrical energy expense, with a solar-powered, non-electric, time-proven, off-the-shelf, hundred-year-old, cost-effective technology. Does this sound interesting to you? It should be. Very few people understand it.

3. The third expensive temperature changer is domestic hot water. We’ll discuss simple reliable solutions from the 1970’s and modern times to eliminate domestic hot water energy expense, and also how to have a year-round swimming pool with 92-degree water when snow is on the ground nearby. I had solar water heating in my own residence in 1979. New solar water heating products have been recently developed, and they are getting incrementally better every year.

Do you enjoy a lengthy hot shower massage in the winter? Would you like a warm, comfortable, zero energy indoor swimming pool, swim spa, or hot tub, for year round use starting TODAY? No worries! It is easy and cost effective to do right now, and has been for decades.

A major expense in operating energy-wasting American appliances like clothes washers and dishwashers is the cost of the hot water. If we let powerful sunlight heat our water, those expenses go away. Solar hot water heating is one of the EASIEST ENERGY SAVING THINGS that almost any American home can do, most of the year (with only a few exceptions).

4. The fourth expensive temperature changer in a modern energy-wasting American home is the clothes dryer. An inefficient tumble clothes dryer can take an hour of expensive high-current electricity or gas to remove the water from only one load of clothes, and damage them in the process. In the winter, the money paid to heat the air for drying clothes is then exhausted outside. How dumb is that?

Great grandma knew how to use solar energy to dry clothes, long before the first utility company was ever created. Still, these crazy American’s demand their lazy-boy convenience. They don’t like to hang their laundry in full public view, and then wait hours for it to dry. Soooo, we’ll talk about a fast INDOOR solar-powered clothes dryer that does NOT need a clothesline and pins, or hours to gently remove water from wet clothes.

5. Electric-and-gas cooking ranges and ovens are another source of high-rate energy consumption. The readily available off-the-shelf solution here is very simple, and much healthier for you anyway.

After eliminating all of the expensive temperature changers in a Zero Energy Home, then efficient pumps, fans, lighting, electronics and appliances can be discussed, with an explanation of how to make many of them cost LESS than the same equipment does today, to completely eliminate the need for the business-as-usual escalating cost of electricity from your local electric company (even if you do have electric power readily available).

With the total elimination of the need for utility companies, you can build your dream home almost anywhere you like (which may or may not interest your lifestyle desires). All you need is access to water, and ZED can even give you the free solar energy you need to pump and purify healthy drinking water for your home.

If you prefer to live in a populated community, you may be the only enviable one on your block who does NOT have to pay ever-increasing utility bills. Or, you may choose one of the innovative new Zero Energy Home planned communities that are starting to emerge.

Without customary utility bills, you will then have more money to invest, or to spend on other nice things. What would you do with an extra $2,000 net dollars each year? It could even be much more, depending on your tax situation, home size, energy cost inflation rate, etc.

If we can do all of this in an attractive, comfortable, easy-to-own-and-operate home, would you be interested in becoming an intelligent, trend-breaking Zero Energy Home innovator? Would you enjoy it and proudly tell your friends about it?

Does it all sound “Too Good To Be True”? Do you know anyone else who can do it all in a comprehensively integrated, esthetically pleasing, cost effective package, for LESS than you are already spending per month for your home today? How about someone who has been doing it for 25 years already? Read on, and soon you will. (Friendly Florida smiles to you, our new ZED friends.)  

Location-Specific Environment Requirement – Place-Based Design

All of ZED begins with a detailed understanding of the location-specific environment including: degree-day heating and cooling requirements, solar gain potential, latitude, elevation (sea level to mountains), seasonal weather / winds / cloud cover patterns, weather trends (e.g., Florida summer: Clear mornings with cloudy afternoons and frequent afternoon showers), site-specific desirable natural views, transportation requirements, available public utilities (if any), predictable growth trends (rising costs, future development, growth potential for the family / community / business), budget, funding source goals / objectives, building codes, political challenges, material supply, and any other pertinent planning details.

Your location’s seasonal heating and cooling requirements are of particular importance, since they have a major influence on the overall solution architecture that we will recommend.

American homes VARY WIDELY in their location-specific energy requirements, and solar energy potential. One ZED solution does NOT fit all, by any means. In general, the farther from the equator, the more heating requirement and the less available solar energy, but this is not always true. Climate is also impacted by altitude, mountains / valleys, prevailing winds, humidity / evaporation / cloud cover, albedo (surface reflection: white, black, green, etc.), heat index, wind chill, thermal mass, large bodies of water, oceans / lakes, cool trees versus hot concrete / asphalt, urban heat sources, nearby large buildings, smog and seasons.

One quantifiable scientific measure of location-specific design difference is the number of “Degree Days of Heating and Cooling Requirement” for a particular location. It has been gathered for decades by the national weather service, and is well published for about 300 diverse American locations – one of the close to you. The following is a partial list of only a small part of what is readily available. No reasonable home can be properly designed without this (and much more) information.

Get More Information in Larry Hartweg's 800 page book on
"Zero Energy Design"

U.S. City Heating versus Cooling Requirements

Lat = Latitude (angular distance from the equator)

Cool = Annual Cooling Requirement In Degree Days

Heat = Annual Heating Requirement In Degree Days

Solar = Annual Average Solar Radiation Potential
    (Insulation - Average Total BTU/sq.ft./day)

In Miami, there is essentially no need for heat, but cooling and humidity control are very important Zero Energy Design issues. Orlando is North of Miami, where Orange County Florida citrus crops can freeze in the harshest winters. Orlando has a small need for winter solar heating, but summer cooling is 4.4 times more important in Orlando than is heating a home in the winter. In stark contrast, in Chicago heating is 6.6 times more important, as a ZED factor, than is the less significant Chicago degree-day cooling requirement. Many Chicago homes have no air conditioner, since there are only a few uncomfortable days each summer.

These climatological numbers are VERY important for location-specific ZED decisions. As we said: One Zero Energy Home design does NOT fit all. Miami houses SHOULD look and perform much differently than Chicago houses, which have a very different environment requirement. Stock house plans simply to NOT apply to all locations.

It is interesting that the maximum and minimum AVERAGE annual solar gain potential for ALL of the above cities does not vary by a large percentage (1053 to 1864 BTU/sq.ft./day). Whereas, the heating and cooling degree days do (0 to 9270 heating and 108 to 4981 cooling).

Many different solar energy technologies can be used to intelligently reduce or eliminate the need for an external non-renewable energy source, especially for heating and cooling a home (the largest single energy expense for almost everyone).

Energy conservation is our first ZED objective. It requires an expert understanding of each Zero Energy Home’s environment requirements, and owners’ goals, objectives, budget and realistic expectations