We have something similar in the southwest called Earth Ships. These homes are made of soil compacted used tires and a stone/mortar mix or sometimes aluminum cans and mortar. In the summer a large south facing angled window runs the length of the house doesn’t see the sun all summer and in the winter, the sun’s angle changes to allow all the light/heat in. We got way more than an 8° difference, 100% passive, at 130F° outside… and if you know anything about the Sonoran Desert, you know the nights can be deadly cold. You can actually go hyperthermic when the temps drop to 100F° immediately as the sun sets. Earth Ships stay stable all year long.
It should probably be mentioned that these houses have only one or two tiny windows, walls that are up to 2m thick, two layers seperate layers of sone wall and a White domed roof, to reflect the sun’s heat.
The fact that walls are made of stone is the least important factor in insulating these homes.
I’d say the roof is the most important part. For some reason we are obsessed with dark roofs, at least in the west. The dome is also innovative as it greatly reduces how much of the roof is ever perpendicular to the sun and this reduces how much uv energy is absorbed.
Stone houses are awesome.
Not nearly the same historical context as the Dammuso are in, but stone buildings generally mirror that property before you factor in central heating and the like.
I live near a Scottish city which prides itself on the building of grand houses using a particular type of quarried stone, and it’s nice being eight degrees below the summer weather…
…but it isn’t much fun being eight degrees below the winter outdoor temperature either!!
Thermal mass so stuff like stone, brick, earth or similar stores the average temperature. The more you have the longer the time period they average out over. So for in Panelleria the mean temperature in August is 26C and that is what those buildings keep over the entire day, even though it can get as hot as 34C during the day. If you have more thermal mass, for example in caves or underground structures, you can have the mean temperature of an entire year.
(Mainland France) When I was a kid, my parents decide to move to a big ancient house with thick stone walls with a lot of repairs, we talked a lot about these things. back then, in the 90s, stone walls were considered superior than average insulation, as it was mostly inexistant at the time.
Nowadays, it is much inferior and you really need to add insulation to be a bit efficient.
If you have more thermal mass, for example in caves or underground structures, you can have the mean temperature of an entire year.
Yep, here 13-14°C is the temperature of all the caves (that are not high in the mountains, altitude is a factor) and incidentally the temperature considered ideal to keep red wine.
This can be used with heat wells: have a way to exchange deep heat, with circulating water for instance, and in winter you can pre-heat your home at 14°C before adding energy. It is heavy work though to bury these pipes, and the efficiency of heat pumps nowadays makes this a bit irrelevant, but it is a nice low-tech possibility.
That’s dead interesting. I can’t profess to understand the hows and whys, but it’s amazing that these sorts of technologies were adopted so early.
Great stuff. I’d positively melt in 34degrees mind!
clay/earthen/cob houses might be the way to go in your neck of the woods! they used to be the go-to house here in central & eastern ireland, which isn’t a million miles away, climate-wise.
they’re surprisingly warm in winter & keep out the damp easily (i assume because they’re more porous than bricks-and-mortar).
the main obstacle here in ireland is getting planning permission to build anything that’s even slightly out of the norm. 😅
Disclaimer: I can write my entire knowledge of DIY and building on an ant’s dong in black marker
A pal of mine started a business building ecologically-sustainable holiday lodges. They were built out of timber and hay, with a limestone render.
They were beautiful and warm, but that was the result of years of battles with the planning dept who pushed back at almost every turn (despite absolute carbuncles going ahead no bother), and the architect who was more concerned with dropping prefabricated lodges in - defeating the selling point of being as green as possible.
I appreciate your input though, if there was ever such a thing as an across-the-water fist bump, this would be it!
TIL about dammuso. They even have rainwater collection systems.
Now I’m curious about their cisterns and how different or similar it might be to the ones used nowadays
Hempcrete if you can get it.
