Sustainable Schools - Building Orientation


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Siting » Building Orientation

Siting: Building Orientation

A building's orientation with relation to the sun will impact the school's ability to optimize passive heating and cooling, natural ventilation, and daylighting. Exterior view between two buildings, focusing on window size and placement on a building; picture's caption, 'North and south-facing windows. South-facing windows are shaded from direct sunlight, while north-facing windows are large to allow diffused ambient light to enter into the classroom. ' Photo excerpted with permission from CHPS - courtesy of Lisa Heschong.

Generally, it is best to elongate the building along the east-west axis, thus increasing the area of the building that faces north or south. By doing this, the building's exposure to the sun will be maximized. By optimizing exposure to the north and south directions, schools have access to a more diffuse light that is suitable for daylighting. Light comes from the east and west only when the sun is low in the sky, therefore using windows for lighting on those sides is likely to cause glare.

Interior view of the facade of a school building. Large windows take up most of the space, allowing much of the daylight to penetrate; picture's caption; 'The correct building orientation along the east-west axis is cruicial to benefit from the sun's radiated heat and light.'

Featured Resources

Collaborative for High Performance Schools (CHPS)
http://www.chps.net/manual/index.htm#vol2
(Best Practices Manual Volume 2, Site Planning Section, Guideline SP1: Optimum Building Orientation) CHPS aims to facilitate the design of high performance schools in California - environments that are not only resource efficient, but also healthy, comfortable, well lit and contain the amenities needed for a quality education. CHPS has developed a set of Best Practices Manuals (available at www.CHPS.net) to create a new generation of high performance school facilities in California.