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Solar Access
Concept
Independent of location, it is critical that you have good solar access. Solar access is the amount of sun you get on specific surfaces (windows, collectors, etc.) each day of the year.
Access can be limited by hills/mountains, trees, neighboring homes or other buildings. It is important to consider sun location (altitude and azimuth) and the resulting shadows for the full year. This can be done with tools such as the Solar Pathfinder.
Application
I looked at dozens of potential home building sites – most I could rule out without leaving my car, due to trees, hills or other buildings, or for lack of drainage – see Footing Drainage. Many others could be ruled out by sanding at the roadside with just a compass. The remaining sites required a careful evaluation using my Solar Pathfinder, sometimes a transit and a good understanding of exactly what I wanted to build (conceptual design complete) and a little imagination (what would this property look like in 5, 10, 20, 40, 60+ years?). Wanting a 100% Solar Home requires nearly 100% solar access.
The site we selected is nearly perfect in terms of access and drainage. I will have to monitor a few trees as they mature on the East corner; they may someday affect us. Not a problem – hey, I have a chain saw and will need some fire wood!
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With Just a Compass
Typically, just standing in front of a lot, knowing where solar south is, and having an understanding of what you are planning to build is sufficient to see if you will have access to the sun and whether or not the foundation will be high enough to drain to daylight. If the lot meets those tests, then there is a lot of due diligence that must be done to decide if you want to make an offer. What all else needs to be investigated is beyond the scope of this exercise, but includes items like: water (supply & purity), soil type & drainage (perk test), location of bedrock or ledges (exploratory dig), school district, taxes and tax policy, local codes, traffic patterns, local businesses, past businesses and possible soil or water pollution, drive times to your key destinations, etc.
Sometimes elevations can be deceiving and sometimes you may be able to move a little dirt on the property (dirt is expensive to haul for anywhere); this is when you need a transit.
Sometimes solar access can be tricky (you don’t have an obvious 100%) and the Pathfinder is needed to determine exactly what you do have.
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